Arthur Conan Doyle's Ouija board. Photo by Pete Smith.

Bethany Johnsen is an undergraduate intern at the Ransom Center who has been working with Cline Curator of Literature Molly Schwartzburg to gather materials for students for a visit on Halloween.

For the students in University of Texas at Austin English Professor Janine Barchas’s freshman honors seminar, a Ransom Center visit on October 31 will bring more than the usual bag of treats: a Halloween-themed presentation introducing students to the Center’s resources.

I assisted Ransom Center Cline Curator of Literature Molly Schwartzburg in putting together the presentation, and this process revealed the provocative connections that such a subject affords, and will, we hope, suggest to these students ways they might use the collections over…

Each Friday, the Ransom Center shares photos from throughout the week that highlight a range of activities and collection holdings. We hope you enjoy these photos that reveal some of the everyday happenings at the Center.

Reading room page and undergraduate student Melissa Herman pages materials from the stacks. Photo by Pete Smith.

Chris Jones, a volunteer in the conservation department, works on the binding for ‘El Salvador: Work of Thirty Photographers.’ Photo by Pete Smith.

Conservation department volunteer Margaret Schafer works on repairing paper tears to an album belonging to Joseph Hergesheimer, an early 20th century novelist. Photo by Pete Smith.

This 1942 poster reminded Americans of the widespread 1933 Nazi book burnings and presented books as playing a fundamental role in the fight against tyranny.

On May 10, 1933, a series of coordinated book burnings took place across Germany. In the academic sphere, the German Students Association’s staged burnings were an attempt to eliminate “un-German” works from university libraries. Addressing the students gathered in Berlin, propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels encouraged them to “clean up the debris of the past.” Ultimately more than 25,000 books were burned, including works by Heinrich Heine, Thomas Mann, and Albert Einstein, Ernest Hemingway, Upton Sinclair, Jack London, and Helen Keller.

The 1933 Nazi-sponsored book burnings in Germany prompted a swift and very public response in the United…

Edna St. Vincent Millay's 'The Ballad of the Harp Weaver,' published by Frank Shay at the bookshop and illustrated by his wife, Fern Forrester Shay (1922).

In 1923, Edna St. Vincent Millay was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver (1921). That prize-winning book was an expanded commercial edition of the poems in this volume. The longer book was published by Harper and Brothers and contained these poems, another poem published first by Frank Shay, The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver (1921), and a handful of additional new verses.

Millay’s The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver was one of four volumes that came to represent the chapbook series Salvo that Shay published from the shop. A “salvo” is a burst…

Click on the four-way arrow in the bottom right-hand corner of the slideshow to convert into full-screen mode.

The personal archive of publisher, author, and artist Fleur Cowles (1908–2009) has been donated to the Ransom Center. The materials will be accessible once processed and cataloged, but an initial assessment confirms that the archive is as dynamic as Cowles was herself.

In 1983, Cowles celebrated the publication of The Flower Game, a book that shared hundreds of responses from friends around the world, all answering the question of what ten flowers they would like to take to a lonely island, assuming anything would grow there.

When soliciting friends, Cowles wrote, “The replies will determine the best loved flowers everywhere (I am writing to many places around the world).”

Participants ranged from European to Hollywood royalty, proving that Cowles didn’t limit herself to a continent nor to small social circles. A detailed chart documents the progress of Cowles’s initiative, revealing the friends invited to participate and the dates for solicitation and receipt.

Just as these responses provide insight into Cowles’s broad personal and professional network, the hundreds of typed and handwritten, signed responses represent just a small fraction of the correspondence found in the archive.

Below are highlights from a handful of the participants.

Cecil Beaton:
Photographer Beaton provided not only his list of flowers but also a handwritten note stating “Any large white orchid of any variety, as long as it is white.”

Candice Bergen:
Actress Bergen’s list included wisteria and night-blooming jasmine, and she elaborated on her selections: “Flowers to see and smell—by day and night—that bloom underfoot and hang overhead, plus a few insect escorts—butterflies and caterpillars, the odd ladybug—for company.”
November 28, 1981

Olivia de Havilland:
Actress de Havilland gave herself an hour to construct her list, which contained water lilies, blue bells, and peonies.

Douglas Fairbanks:
Actor Fairbanks’s list includes a reference to his trademark carnation. Topping his list at number one is “The dark red (or Harvard red) carnation, as I have worn one in my button-hole actually since I have had a button-hole.”
March 6, 1979

Jane Goodall:
The challenge of selecting flowers was difficult for anthropologist Goodall, who wrote, “The first 6 flowers were very easy to chose—but the last 4 were much harder. Not because it is difficult to think of 4 flowers one loves, but because it is difficult to reject others.”
February 27, 1979

Princess Grace of Monaco:
Listed among her favorite flowers, Princess Grace included bamboo, noting, “I hope you will accept bamboo although I have never seen it flower.”
March 7, 1979

David Hicks:
Among his list of flowers, designer and interior decorator Hicks includes datura, hyacinth, and tuberose.
July 8, 1980

Lady Bird Johnson:
Former First Lady “Lady Bird” Johnson touted resilient flowers, claiming “Since I am an intensely practical person, I would choose flowers which give the most results for the least work and Zinnias and Marigolds and white Daisies would have to be on my list of favorite flowers. In my lifetime experience, I have found them to be so hardy and they give a great profusion of color over long weeks—I’ve always saluted their generosity!”
February 8, 1979

Laurence Olivier:
Actor Olivier’s list focused on roses. He wrote, “At the moment my gardening mind is filled with roses, so let me offer you a dozen of these.” Some of the varieties included Papa Meilland, Panorama Holiday (an exquisite pink, commonly named Beautiful Flower) and Blue Moon.
August 10, 1981

Nancy Reagan:
Former First Lady Nancy Reagan’s list included sweet peas, freesia, and violets.

Liz Smith:
Journalist Smith, a native Texan, elaborated on her list, “But my favorites, the ones I would have to have, are the lovelies—the wildflowers of Texas: Bluebonnets, winecups, Indian paintbrush, wild daisies, wild poppies—a collage of color and nostalgia.”
June 10, 1980

Rufino Tamayo:
Among some of the Mexican artist’s favorites, Tamayo includes the calla lily, hibiscus, and the yucca.
April 3, 1979

Each Friday, the Ransom Center shares photos from throughout the week that highlight a range of activities and collection holdings. We hope you enjoy these photos that reveal some of the everyday happenings at the Center.

Eric Cartier, a graduate student in the School of Information, works with an audio reel of William Faulkner reading his own short story "The Bear." Photo by Pete Smith

Library Assistant Ancelyn Krivak uses the Digibook scanner to create digital images for a book of poetry. Photo by Pete Smith

Henry Miller's 'Tropic of Cancer' (1934) was banned in the United States for 30 years. Photo by Anthony Maddaloni.

Upon its publication in 1934, Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer was deemed obscene by the United States Customs Department and was not legally available in the United States. Editions like this one, published in Japan, were smuggled into the U.S. to satisfy demand. Miller had been seeking an American publisher since 1934 and had hoped to defend Tropic of Cancer in court as early as 1936. Local district attorneys, however, were not persuaded, and over 50 cases against the novel were brought to various state and local courts. The ban on Miller’s work was finally lifted in 1964 after a Florida case…

'The Journals of Spalding Gray" was edited by Nell Casey.

Writer and actor Spalding Gray (1941–2004), whose archive opens for research today, is best known for his highly personal monologues and for helping to define a new era in theater where public and private life became an indivisible part of each new performance. Gray’s archive was acquired by the Ransom Center in 2010.

Writer Nell Casey had access to the archive before it arrived at the Ransom Center, and her book The Journals of Spalding Gray has been released today. Cultural Compass interviewed Casey about her work in the archive and the surprises she found in Gray’s journals.

In honor of the book’s release, the Ransom Center is giving away two copies of the volume. Email hrcgiveaway@gmail.com with…

Page from Spalding Gray journal, which spans from February to April 1990.

Spalding Gray was an actor, performer, and writer. He appeared on Broadway in various one-man shows and is widely accredited with the invention of the autobiographical monologue.  His archive, recently acquired by the Ransom Center, is composed of more than 100 private journals that span more than 40 years of Gray’s career. Nell Casey, editor of the book The Journals of Spalding Gray, which was released today, distilled the mass of journal entries into a portrait of the man behind the magnetic performer who ended his life in 2004. Cultural Compass spoke with Casey about her interest in Gray, the surprising notes she found in the journals, what she admires…

Dennis Hopper and Nicholas Ray, ca. 1971. Photo by Mark Goldstein.

The archive of film director Nicholas Ray (1911–1979), best known for his film, Rebel Without a Cause (1955), is now open for research. Spanning more than 35 years, materials in the collection include original treatments, annotated scripts, photographs, journals, notes, audio reels, video recordings and film that provide an account of Ray’s working methods and ideas. View the finding aid for the collection or read an article about the collection in the Chronicle of Higher Education.