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

If under some truly unfortunate circumstances you found yourself imprisoned on a penal colony thousands of miles from home and infamous worldwide for its unlivable conditions, a talent for writing might be your best bet for survival. A considerable amount of perseverance and good luck would also come in handy.

Such was the case of René Belbenoit, a native Parisian who, after returning from the front lines of World War I as a teenager, was sentenced in 1921 to eight years of hard labor in French Guiana for a series of thefts. He first arrived at the penal colony in Saint-Laurent du Maroni in 1923 at the age of 24, and after 14 years of misery, punctuated by several hapless escape attempts, an emaciated and toothless Belbenoit snuck his way into Los Angeles.

Short in stature, slight of build, and cheerful by nature, Belbenoit felt isolated among his fellow inmates, many of whom had committed far more violent crimes than his own. But his classification by the administration as “incorrigible,” a distinction that landed him in solitary confinement on the particularly hostile Devil’s Island, was in one sense entirely fitting: no matter what punishment he faced, Belbenoit continued to make escape attempts until he’d secured his freedom. His final count totaled four prison breaks and two illegal escapes as a libéré, a “freed” ex-convict who, despite having finished his sentence, is forbidden to leave Guiana.

Belbenoit wrote about the experience in his memoir Dry Guillotine, which takes its title from the disdainful nickname the prisoners gave to their penal home. The Ransom Center’s René Belbenoit collection contains the book’s manuscript, a 900-page tome including illustrations, an official prisoner booklet, and several flattened cigarette packets with notes written on the back, presumably from the time Belbenoit spent in prison. He began keeping a written record of his time in Guiana in 1926, but many of his early notes were destroyed by prison guards. When possible, he solicited help from the mother superior of a local nunnery to safeguard his writings. He brought them along on every escape attempt, wrapping them in oilskins for protection from the elements, but many were ruined en route. When something was lost, he would simply rewrite it.

Detailed recollections of prison misery constitute much of the first half of the memoir. The backbreaking labor, often performed naked and shoeless, was a traumatic shock for Belbenoit, as were the swarming mosquitoes and sweltering heat of the tropics. The prison administration took no pains to preserve the inmates’ health, as ships full of replacements arrived regularly. According to Belbenoit, of the average 700 annual arrivals in Guiana, approximately 400 would die in their first year. He writes, “The policy of the Administration is to kill, not to better or reclaim.”

In addition to his accounts of the prisoners’ suffering and the guards’ brutality, Belbenoit offers unique insight into the social structure of the all-male group of the condemned. Complex hierarchies emerged as the older, more aggressive inmates battled each other to win younger boys as their môme, or submissive sexual partners. Subterfuge became a requisite skill for survival in French Guiana. Bribery was ubiquitous but risky, as the possession of money was strictly forbidden. The most experienced prisoners were also adept malingerers, often smoking quinine to sham fever for a day of rest in the infirmary.

Belbenoit, a charming storyteller and known exaggerator, wields compelling narrative at the expense of incomplete veracity. But even his likely embellished accounts, the most dramatic of which would find a comfortable home in soap opera subplots, are revealing. Foremost among these are the tales of Belbenoit’s affair with a 16-year-old daughter of an administrator, and that of a complicated love triangle involving a prisoner, his môme, and a guard’s wife. Fourteen years of enduring both physical torture and torturous monotony honed Belbenoit’s ability to captivate an audience, winning him a network of friends that was essential to his survival.

So while the inmates’ complaints about their merciless treatment fell on deaf ears in Guiana, Belbenoit found an eager readership in the developed world, where headlines announced the departure of penal ships in heavy terms: “Broken Men Sail for Devil’s Island” and “Condemned to a Living Death.” Selling off his notes to visiting reporters turned out to be his most lucrative enterprise, which in turn afforded him a number of unlikely prospects for escape. Blair Niles, a travel writer and novelist, encountered Belbenoit in 1926. She visited with him for several days, buying the notes he had dutifully collected and preserved for 100 francs. Belbenoit used the money to stage an unsuccessful escape, which resulted in extreme, nearly fatal punishment. Niles returned to the United States, publishing her bestselling biography of Belbenoit in 1928, titled Condemned to Devil’s Island. The book, which was adapted into the 1929 film Condemned, was influential in international prison reform movements.

But Belbenoit never succumbed to the discouragement of his previous failures, and in 1935, a similar opportunity ultimately led to his freedom. An American filmmaker, whom Belbenoit leaves unnamed in his memoir, apparently offered 200 dollars in exchange for intimate knowledge of how one would conduct a dramatic escape in the tropics. Despite Belbenoit’s answer that the only feasible strategy would be to leave by the sea, the filmmaker retorted, “This must be an escape through the jungles… combat with fierce animals, snakes, swamps… It makes a better picture.” Perhaps it was from this man that Belbenoit learned the fungible value of an exciting story.

Using the cash to secure a 19-foot boat and some provisions, Belbenoit escaped by sea with five other convicts. They were well-received by the British authorities in Trinidad, “true sportsmen” who opted not to have them deported. Belbenoit separated from the group and made his way to Central America, where he spent seven months capturing butterflies to sell and living with native tribes on his journey northward.

Belbenoit finally reached El Salvador, stowed away on a ship, and arrived in Los Angeles in 1937. He made his way to New York, where he published Dry Guillotine in 1938, by which time France had stopped sending prisoners to the penal colony. The prison at Devil’s Island was officially closed eight years later.

Though now largely forgotten, Belbenoit’s extraordinary experience captured media attention for the remainder of his life. He appeared on the television series This Is Your Life and in several articles in the Los Angeles Times and New York Times, and he worked briefly at Warner Bros. as a technical advisor for the 1944 film Passage to Marseille. Belbenoit made the most of his compelling story, understanding just how much power it could wield. After all, it had saved his life.

Additional archival materials for Belbenoit are located in the E. P. Dutton & Company, Inc. Records at Syracuse University, in the Warner Brothers Archive at the University of Southern California, and in the Ralph Edwards Productions Production Records at the University of California at Los Angeles.

Belbenoit’s illustration depicting one of his early, unsuccessful escape attempts by sea.

Cover of the February 1960 issue of Commentary magazine.

Author Morris Dickstein presents the lecture “America’s Best Magazine?: Commentary in the 1960s” this Thursday, April 18, at 7 p.m. at the Harry Ransom Center. In 2011, Commentary magazine donated its archive to the Center, and the collection is now open for research.

Founded in November 1945, shortly after World War II, Commentary was established to reconnect assimilated American Jews and Jewish intellectuals with the broader Jewish community and to bring the ideas of young Jewish intellectuals to a wider audience.

Throughout its history, Commentary has published significant articles on historical, political, cultural, and theological issues in addition to fiction and memoirs. The magazine became a major outlet for leading figures to establish their intellectual careers. The archive spans from 1945…

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

The Ransom Center is currently engaged in a one-year, grant-funded project to digitize, catalog, process and make the Frank Reaugh art collection available online, which will be the first complete collection of the Ransom Center’s new digital asset management system. The project is ongoing and is expected to be completed and available online to viewers by the fall.

The Frank Reaugh collection consists primarily of pastel landscapes on paper and board but also includes oil landscapes and portraits, charcoal sketches, and pen and ink drawings. Reaugh’s (1883–1937) favorite subject, the Texas Longhorn, is often featured within his untamed Texas landscapes. His work includes native subjects and locations ranging from the Texas Panhandle to the state’s western plains and mountainous regions and beyond the state border to New Mexico, Arizona, and Wyoming. Interest in Frank Reaugh has grown steadily over the years, as his contributions as an influential artist, arts educator, benefactor, naturalist, and inventor are being increasingly recognized by curators, collectors, and scholars. Access to the works has long been limited due to their delicate nature and to their sheer number and size.

Digitization of the framed and often fragile works is not simple. Many of the pastels have never before been removed from their original frames and mats, which were largely constructed by Reaugh himself. Thus far, the first half of the collection has been digitized, beginning with Reaugh’s distinctive small-format pastel landscapes. When the project is finished, researchers will not only have unprecedented access to the entire body of Reaugh’s work held by the Ransom Center but will also have the opportunity to peer beneath the frames.

During the process of removing these delicate pastels from their frames, there is often an unexpected surprise waiting beneath the window mat. Reaugh used his own technique to prepare the paper to hold the pastel media, and evidence of this applied fixative is easily visible in the margins of the paper support. A view of the margins of some of these pastels also reveals previously hidden inscriptions and areas where Reaugh tested his colors. One can see the well-delineated borders of his rectangular landscapes, which he sometimes stayed within, but more often allowed his strokes to extend beyond the intended space. Two pastels have even revealed outlined sketches on the reverse, offering insight into Reaugh’s preliminary drawing techniques. In addition to the works themselves, the framing materials and methods speak to Reaugh’s time on the cattle-trail, where it appears that he made use of whatever materials he had on hand.

Images of each artwork (including the fronts and backs, framed and unframed) will be available via the Ransom Center’s new digital asset management system in the fall. Funding for the Frank Reaugh project is made possible with support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the Texas State Library and Archives Commission.

"Clouds for OH" by Frank Reaugh (1860-1945), showing swatches of color in the top margin. Photo by Pete Smith.

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

Everybody loves cartoons. They proliferate in modern newspapers and on the Internet. From Peanuts to Doonesbury, cartoons provide commentary and amusement for the reader. The sueltas collection at the Harry Ransom Center, currently being cataloged under a grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources, also features its own first-rate cartoons. Created by Manuel Tovar, a famous twentieth-century caricaturist, these unique “monos,” as caricatures are known in Spanish, present unusual and interesting depictions of actors and actresses.

Born in Granada in 1875, Tovar illustrated postcards and painted fans and parasols as a young man. When he moved to Madrid, he fulfilled his life-long dream of working as a caricaturist and cartoonist, publishing his first cartoon in 1901 in the magazine Nuevo Mundo. Subsequently, he created cartoons in many well-known magazines and newspapers such as Blanco y Negro, La Correspondencia, El Gráfico, El Liberal, El Heraldo de Madrid, and El Cuento Semanal, whose cover he illustrated regularly for three years. For 15 years, Tovar created a popular daily cartoon for La Voz. He passed away suddenly in 1935, just after completing his daily entry.

Known for his sagacious wit and unique style, Tovar is widely considered one of the greatest caricaturists of his age. The sueltas collection contains a number of items from the “Novela Teatral” series, produced under the direction of José de Urquía from 1916 to 1925. This series is typical of the caricature work done by Tovar, which often depicted real figures in Madrid society. The “Novela Teatral” caricatures portrayed actors and actresses, but Tovar was perhaps most famous for his drawings of political figures and writers. In an interview, he once lamented that political cartoons had caused him a great deal of trouble, as many of his subjects found their representations less than flattering. His artistic style did not change in response to the criticism. He had one confrontation regarding a caricature of a government minister, Juan de la Cierva, who was illustrated wearing unattractive plaid pants. Embarrassed by the portrayal, the minister invited Tovar to inspect his wardrobe and note the lack of plaid pants. Another incident had Tovar hiding in the salon at a theater from an umbrella-brandishing disgruntled authoress who wished to punish the artist for his unflattering caricature of her.

Tovar is credited with having a profound and perfect knowledge of contemporary life in Madrid, and these delightful illustrations provide a fascinating look into the atmosphere of Madrid during the early twentieth century. The sueltas collection continues to provide us with opportunities for remarkable and thought-provoking study.

Related content:

Stories from the Sueltas: Cataloger sheds light on gems in the Spanish comedias sueltas collection

Illustrating the Sueltas

Actress Trinidad Rosales by Manuel Tovar.

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

The papers of British author Nicolas Freeling (1927–2003), best known for his internationally acclaimed crime novels, have opened for research at the Ransom Center.  The collection consists of Freeling’s manuscript drafts, correspondence, journals, clippings, and other documents. Freeling is the author of more than 40 novels and has won several prestigious awards for crime fiction, including the British Crime Writers’ Association Golden Dagger award (1964), the Grand Prix de Roman Policier (1964), and the Edgar Allan Poe Award (1966).

Freeling began his writing career in 1959 while serving a three-week jail sentence in Amsterdam after being accused of stealing food. Although he was deported to England shortly after being released, his experience with an Amsterdam detective inspired him to write the first of his famous Piet Van der Valk detective novels, Love in Amsterdam. Freeling continued the series for ten years, and, to the dismay of readers and publishers alike, killed off the beloved detective in the final book.

Two years after writing the tenth and last van der Valk novel, Freeling introduced readers to French police detective Henri Castang, who appeared in 16 novels. He also penned four non-fiction titles, including two books inspired by 12 years of experience working as a restaurant chef, a book of essays about literature’s best crime writers, and his memoir, The Village Book.

Freeling resisted his classification as a crime writer, preferring to focus instead on human psychology and social institutions. The images featured in the slideshow largely represent Freeling’s novel Gadget and excerpts from his journals. His attention to detail in the research process and commitment to realism reveal talents that extend beyond writing excellent crime fiction.

Gadget paints an alarmingly factual account of the implications of the nuclear age and its effects on human behavior and motivation. Freeling worked closely with American physicist Peter Zimmerman to achieve accurate renderings of nuclear instruments, and the two men exchanged notes, research, and drawings throughout the novel’s development, all of which can be found in the archive.

The Freeling papers are a rich and varied resource, with documents ranging from recipes that reveal Freeling’s affinity for cooking, detailed drawings of a nuclear bomb referenced in Gadget, journal excerpts about the effects of drinking wine while writing, and more. While Freeling may be known primarily for his detective dramas, his dedication to the analysis of the human mind is preserved in his papers.

A drawing by physicist Peter Zimmerman with his and Nicolas Freeling's notes as part of research for "Gadget," 1971–1975.

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

Materials related to David Foster Wallace’s posthumous novel The Pale King (April 2011) are now open for research at the Ransom Center. The materials related to The Pale King were acquired as part of the Wallace (1962–2008) archive in 2010 but were retained by publisher Little, Brown and Co. until after the book’s publication and the subsequent publication of the paperback edition.

The Pale King materials fill six boxes and  include handwritten and typescript drafts, outlines, characters lists, research materials, and a set of notebooks containing reading notes, names, snippets of dialog, definitions, quotations, and clippings.

The materials have been organized according to a spreadsheet developed by Wallace’s editor, Michael Pietsch. Pietsch, then-executive vice president and publisher of Little, Brown and Co., spent months reading through and organizing the material and found what he called “an astonishingly full novel, created with the superabundant originality and humor that were uniquely David’s.”

In conjunction with the publication of The Pale King, the Ransom Center partnered with publisher Little, Brown and Co. to offer an online preview of materials from the archive in April 2011.

David Foster Wallace's notebook, which contains reading notes, clippings, and writings related to “The Pale King.” © David Foster Wallace Literary Trust. Harry Ransom Center.

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

Alison Clemens is a graduate student in the School of Information at The University of Texas at Austin. She processed the Daniel Stern papers as part of her capstone project for her program, and she shares her experiences working in the collection, which is now open for research.

The Harry Ransom Center acquired the papers of Daniel Stern (1928–2007), novelist and short story writer, in 2009. In doing so, the Center gained an illuminating piece of New York and American literary culture. The collection is filled with Stern’s numerous manuscripts, material related to his careers in writing, advertising, media, and academia, and correspondence with major literary figures, including Bernard Malamud and Anaïs Nin. The material provides a fascinating glimpse of how Stern produced stories as a working writer.

Born in New York City, Stern was raised in Manhattan’s Lower East Side and in the Bronx. He displayed considerable musical talent from an early age. He attended The High School of Art and Music and, upon graduation, played the cello with the Indianapolis Symphony and with Charlie Parker’s band. Stern disliked life in Indianapolis and returned to New York, where he took courses in creative writing and wrote jingles and copy for McCann Erickson advertising agency. Stern rose through the ranks and eventually began working in television at Warner Brothers, where he served on the board of directors in the 1970s.

Throughout Stern’s corporate employment in the 1960s and 1970s, he continued to work on his writing and published numerous novels. The Suicide Academy (1968), to which Anaïs Nin dedicated an essay in her collection In Favor of the Sensitive Man, was popularly successful. In the 1970s, however, Stern would experience two major shifts. First, he left Warner Brothers and moved to the promotions department of CBS in 1979. During this time, he also began writing short stories and sending them to literary reviews, including to Joyce Carol Oates at her magazine Ontario Review. After achieving success as a short story writer, Stern left CBS in 1986 and served as humanities director of the 92nd Street Y until 1988. He assumed teaching positions, including at Harvard and Wesleyan Universities, and joined the University of Houston as Cullen Distinguished Professor of English in 1992.

Stern’s short story collections—including Twice Told Tales and Twice Upon a Time—revisit, revise, and reinterpret literary classics by other authors. Malamud described Stern’s prose as filled with “poetry, inventiveness, verve of style, wisdom in paradox, the argument, [and] wit and comedy.” Stern’s creative process and output is well documented in the papers at the Ransom Center, as the collection contains drafts, correspondence pertaining to specific works, and even unpublished material.

These page proofs from 1989’s "Twice Upon a Time" show how Stern’s short stories were compiled, proofed, and published in book format. The listing of story titles on the table of contents is typical of Stern’s short stories; he reimagines class fictional tales, leaving their original titles, along with the name of their authors, in place. Copyright © Estate of Daniel Stern. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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

The Texas collection of comedias sueltas at the Ransom Center contains over 14,000 titles that provide valuable insight into Spanish literature from the second half of the seventeenth century through the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Thanks to a grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources, Cataloging Hidden Special Collections and Archives program, the cataloging work on this collection continues and is expected to be completed by February 2014. The cataloging of these items has revealed numerous interesting titles and phenomena, including illustrated sueltas.

There are several categories of illustrations found in the sueltas: scene illustrations, character and author portraits, and stage diagrams. These illustrations can help scholars better visualize a performance and improve the scholar’s understanding of the appearance and character of Spanish theater. Most sueltas were not illustrated. Because the sueltas were primarily intended for performance and not general reading, illustrations may have been an extraneous expense for publishers. Furthermore, the cost of paper dictated that as many words as possible be squeezed into available space. This makes the items that do have illustrations all the rarer and more interesting.

Scene illustrations:

A scene illustration is often an engraving of the characters in a moment of action. The actors are shown in costume, and the viewer can see the emotions on the faces of the actors. These illustrations are perhaps the most informative about the actual conception of a play. They are also, however, the rarest type of illustration. Images of the following scene illustrations can be seen in the slideshow.

The earliest illustrated suelta dates from 1775. The sueltas at this time generally consisted of text alone. One illustrated suelta includes a fairly crude scene illustration of a child being bathed and a woman ironing. The suelta, titled Letra a la tonadilla de la planchadora, was bound with a manuscript suelta called Sacristan y la viuda. Both items have received significant conservation work to separate and repair them. Ransom Center conservators also removed a sheet of tissue mounted onto the illustration.

The suelta Misantropía y arreptentimiento features a scene illustration unique for a number of reasons. First, the item is dated 1800, which is early in the suelta publishing phenomenon and even earlier in terms of suelta illustration. Furthermore, it pictures an artist’s elegant conceptualization of a dramatic moment in the play outside the confines of the theater. This engraving shows the moment taking place in “real life,” rather than on the stage.  This illustration is far more artistic in nature than typical scene illustrations.

The illustration in Roberto el Diablo is more typical in style of the scene illustrations found in the sueltas. For instance, note the stylized, almost cartoonish, faces and bodies of the characters and their exaggerated body language. The action is being emphasized, while the scenery lacks detail.  The presence of illustrations printed on the wrapper is also uncommon. It was not until later in the century that illustrated wrappers and the use of colored ink became more wide spread.

Character portraits:

Character portraits are among the most visually interesting illustrations. They are often reproduced from photographs, so the details are generally easier to make out than those of scene illustrations. One can see what the actor looked like in full costume. Some character portraits are produced as engravings that offer artistic representations, but still provide insight into the costumery of a main character. Character portraits tend to be of particularly interesting characters, such as the portraits of Boquerón and Nina featured in the slideshow.

Boquerón and Nina are both exceedingly flamboyant characters and the namesakes of the respective plays in which they are featured. Boquerón is a female actress dressed as a ridiculous male character. Note also that an enterprising reader has added a mustache and beard to Boquerón’s face. Nina is a scantily clad woman warrior. She is later featured in a sequel called Seña Manuela in which her costumery may be noted to be equally spectacular, but certainly less risqué.

Stage diagrams:

Stage diagrams are particularly illustrative of the mechanics of the Spanish theater.  A diagram shows how the stage was designed and where certain important props or scenery were placed. In an adaptation of Victor Hugo’s last novel Ninety-three, the stage diagram shows how a stage is altered after a set change. Particularly interesting is the presence of the “puerta secreta,” or secret door. Furthermore, this diagram helps the reader understand how the stage blocking would have looked to a theatergoer.

Related content:

Stories from the Sueltas: Cataloger sheds light on gems in the Spanish comedias sueltas collection

Unusual scene illustrations from the publisher’s wrapper from "Roberto el diablo," 1865.

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

Through a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, a team of archivists and student interns has been working to organize and catalog the papers of attorney Morris Leopold Ernst since September 2009. The collection is now open for research, and a finding aid is available online.

Morris Leopold Ernst (1888–1976), who earned his law degree 100 years ago, may not yet be a household name, but his legal career has had a lasting impact on American society. Ernst dealt primarily with civil liberties cases in a variety of areas, including censorship, obscenity, and first amendment rights. In addition to his busy legal career, he was a prolific writer, authoring more than 30 books and hundreds of articles, essays, and short works on legal topics and other social issues like big business and divorce.

Ernst is probably best known for his work in literary censorship cases. His influential fights include the defense of Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness, Arthur Schnitzler’s Casanova’s Homecoming, and most famously, James Joyce’s Ulysses.

Though the majority of Ernst’s work took place in the early and mid-twentieth century, as our team of archivists sifted through his papers and processed the collection, we couldn’t help noticing how timely the collection seemed. Over and over again the subjects we read about in Ernst’s archive were echoed by stories in the recent news.

The case United States v. One Book Entitled Ulysses by James Joyce, which Ernst and his colleagues carefully orchestrated, won Ernst much fame and set a precedent for arguing and trying “objectionable” literature. Banned in the United States for more than a decade before Ernst won the case in 1933, Joyce’s masterpiece has had to overcome other more recent hurdles. In 2010 the work was in the news when Apple tried to censor a graphic novel version by Rob Berry and Josh Levitas. Before allowing the Ulysses comic to appear as an electronic book for the iPad, Apple requested that the illustrators remove all nudity from their images. Apple eventually rescinded its demand and allowed the original illustrations to appear.

In the 1930s, Ernst was also a prominent figure in the early birth control movement defending the Birth Control Federation of America and the Clinical Research Bureau, predecessors of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. As these organizations printed and distributed educational materials on reproduction and contraception, they were charged with obscenity. In cases such as United States v. One Package of Japanese Pessaries, Ernst exonerated the movement’s leaders from indecency and in so doing, helped promote women’s rights and the freedom of choice. Contraception and women’s rights have continued to be newsworthy topics.

Ernst was also well known for his work with labor unions, famously defending first amendment rights in Hague, Mayor, et al. v. Committee for Industrial Organization et al. This conflict arose in the 1930s when Jersey City, N.J. mayor Frank Hague tried to suppress many of the Committee for Industrial Organization’s (CIO) activities and decreed by city ordinance that laborers could not assemble in public. The case was appealed to the Supreme Court where the workers’ rights were upheld. Though Ernst won that case in 1939, politicians and labor unions have often been at odds with each other. For example, beginning in February 2011 headlines were populated with reports about Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s attempts to curtail union bargaining rights. The AFL-CIO represented workers in these disagreements as well.

Ernst published his book Too Big in 1940, one of the many books he wrote. The title is echoed by the phrase “too big to fail,” with which we all are familiar, as it has been frequently used in the media since the market crash in 2008. Monopolies and the danger of big business were of real concern to Ernst, and he wrote about it not only in that volume, but in numerous magazine articles.

Censorship, birth control, labor unions, and monopolies were only a few of Ernst’s many interests. As a tireless worker he involved himself in many other issues, such as reducing postage rates for books and promoting literacy around the world. His papers provide insight into his legal practice and writing career and could also provide a new perspective on issues in contemporary society.

Morris L. Ernst (left, holding book) was one of the most active attorneys for the anti-censorship cause during the interwar years. In this 1935 photograph, from the "New York Journal American," Ernst defends the Gustavo Flaubert's "November."

Agustín Moreto's "Del Santo Christo de Cabrilla," 1670. Photo by Pete Smith.

Cataloging of the approximately 14,000 titles in the Texas collection of comedias sueltas at the Harry Ransom Center is well underway, funded by a grant received from the Council on Library and Information Resources, Cataloging Hidden Special Collections and Archives program. Appropriately named, this program seeks to support “libraries, archives, and museums that hold millions of items of potentially substantive intellectual value that are unknown and inaccessible to scholars.”

The suelta collection is not a recent acquisition. The first batch arrived in 1925 with a purchase from Professor Clifford M. Montgomery, Professor of Spanish and Portuguese at The University of Texas at Austin. Several other sets of sueltas constituting the bulk…