Poetry at Beinecke Library

An archive of correspondence, writings, and printed material by or relating to the poet Frank Stanford (Uncat MSS 998) are now available for use at the Beinecke Library. Stanford was born in southeast Mississippi in 1948. In the following year he was adopted by Dorothy Gilbert, and in 1952 relocated to Arkansas when Gilbert married Albert Franklin Stanford. Remembered as a bright and athletic child in his early youth, the young Frank Stanford was greatly affected by the knowledge of his adoption. He entered the University of Arkansas in 1967 as a student of Civil Engineering, but later on switched to study literature, and was well known in the Fayetteville literary community for his poetry. He wrote poems for the student literary magazine, Preview, and many of the early poems following his college years were published in journals such as Field, Ironwood, and American Poetry Review.

Stanford left college without earning a degree. In 1970 he met Irving Broughton, editor and publisher of Mill Mountain Press, who published Stanford’s first book, The Singing Knives. Between 1970-76, Mill Mountain published five more of Stanford’s books. Also in the early 70s, Broughton and Stanford made a documentary film about Stanford’s work and life. The film—It Wasn’t a Dream it Was a Flood—won the Best Experimental Film Award at the West Coast Film Festival in 1975. The following year saw the birth of Stanford’s own publishing company, Lost Roads Publishers. Lost Roads sought to “reclaim the landscape of American poetry” by publishing little known authors, whom the poet C.D. Wright, succeeding Stanford as editor, called the “the beautiful wild poets we grow from the road.” In 1977, Lost Roads Publishers and Mill Mountain Press joint-published Stanford’s epic poem, The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You, a manuscript of over 15,000 lines of poetry that Stanford had been working on sporadically since his early teenage years.

Stanford was well aware of the unique sensitivity that marked him apart from others even in childhood. “When the rest of you / Were being children / I became a monk / To my own listening / Imagination.” Elsewhere, Stanford speaks of Death, which he imagines as a fisherman in a boat: “Young as I am I / Hold light for this boat.” Amongst Stanford’s most powerful poems are his reflections on this shadow from which none return. Franz Wright called him “one of the great voices of Death.” With uncanny insight and beauty, Stanford’s poems often seek to portray and imagine Death, which was, in Wright’s words, “his biggest love affair.”

On June 3 1978, at the age of 29, Stanford took his own life in his home in Fayetteville, Arkansas. His chapbook Crib Death came out shortly afterwards. Lost Roads published more of his poems in You in 1979, and a collection of his short fiction Conditions Uncertain And Likely To Pass Away in 1990. The following year the University of Arkansas Press published The Light the Dead See: Selected Poems of Frank Stanford. Amongst the collection in Beinecke are many of Stanford’s yet unpublished manuscripts, drafts and notebooks. There are photos, music, notes from his daily life alongside articles and journals commemorating his work, amongst a miscellany of other collections.

Related materials may be found in the Library’s Finding Aid Database and Uncataloged Acquisitions Database; copies of Stanford’s books in the Yale Libraries can be located by searching Orbis, the Library’s catalog.

Collection description prepared by Shu-Han Luo, Y’09.

Image: Photo of Frank Stanford from poets.org

The Archibald MacLeish Collection (MSS YCAL 38) and the Archibald MacLeish Collection Addition (YCAL MSS 269) consist of material, such as correspondence, writings, personal papers, and sound recordings, documenting Archibald and Ada MacLeish’s personal life, family history, and careers.

MacLeish and Ada Hitchcock MacLeish, a noted singer, moved to Paris in 1923 to pursue their artistic ambitions. The couple’s move to Paris marks MacLeish’s decision to leave his career as a lawyer and to devote his life to poetry. Although MacLeish had already published a book of poems, this period in Paris was a time of intense study and shift from his earlier poetic style to a more modernist approach. In an interview with Patrick Hynan for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) in 1971 MacLeish explains: “[I] tried to not write myself, until I could see light ahead, where I, whoever this unknown ‘I’ was who wanted to be a poet, could move.”

The couple were part of a thriving artistic community, which included F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and Gerald and Sara Murphy. The Murphys, who are featured in the exhibit “Making It New: The Art and Style of Gerald and Sarah Murphy” at the Yale University Art Gallery, were among the MacLeish’s close friends. In an interview with Patrick Hynan MacLeish discusses his experience in Paris and his relationship with the Murphys. MacLeish notes Gerald Murphy “had very great talents as a painter. [He] later became what Picasso thought was the best American painter in that generation. A man with a marvellous gift for life. A marvellous gift for living life. He lived life consciously.”

Like many artists, Archibald MacLeish drew on the Murphys for artistic inspiration, basing his Pulitzer Prize-winning play “J.B.” on the Murphys’ tragic loss of two sons and financial collapse. The Archibald MacLeish Collection (MSS YCAL 38) contains material relating to “J.B.” including early drafts, drafts of the Houghton Mifflin edition of the play, of the original Yale production, of the Broadway production directed by Elia Kazan, and of subsequent productions. The Addition contains John Tydeman’s radio adaptation of “J.B.” for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) as well as a sound recording of the play performed for the CBC.

In 1928 the MacLeishs returned to the U.S. and Archibald MacLeish went on to a multi-faceted career as both a poet and a public servant, serving as Librarian of Congress (1939-44), Assistant Secretary of State for Public and Cultural Affairs (1944-45), and Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Poetry at Harvard University (1949-62). MacLeish’s poetry and dramatic writings earned him Pulitzer Prizes in 1932, 1952, and 1959, the Bollingen Prize and the National Book Award for poetry in 1953, the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977, and the National Medal for Literature in 1978. Archibald MacLeish died in Boston on April 20, 1982.

Related manuscript collections can be located by searching the Library’s Finding Aid Database; copies of MacLeish’s printed works in Yale libraries can be located in Orbis, Yale’s catalog for books. (HD)

Images: Ada Hitchcock MacLeish and Archibald MacLeish on their honeymoon in 1916. Box 23, folder 247, Archibald MacLeish Collection Addition (YCAL MSS 269); Ada Hitchcock MacLeish photographed in Paris by Man Ray. Box 24, folder 249-258, Archibald MacLeish Collection Addition (YCAL MSS 269); Draft for “Escape” from Tower of Ivory (1917). An example of MacLeish’s writing style before moving to Paris. Box 23, folder 244, Archibald MacLeish Collection Addition (YCAL MSS 269).

The Beinecke Library is pleased to announce its new staffed reference desk. Researchers and students are welcome to visit the desk to consult with Beinecke staff about the Library’s collections. Librarians will be available at the reference desk Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to noon and Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 3-5 p.m. Additional hours will be added in the coming weeks. Email reference queries can be directed to: beinecke.library@yale.edu

For additional information please contact Research Librarian Eva Guggemos at 203-432-6436.

The papers of poets Gladys Campbell, Kathleen Foster Campbell, Llewellyn Jones have been processed recently and are available for use. All three poets were members of the University of Chicago Poetry Club, a group formed in 1917 by students who wished to address the absence of modern poetry in the University curriculum. Members included Gladys Campbell, Kathleen Foster Campbell, Llewellyn Jones, Glenway Wescott, George Dillon, Elizabeth Madox Roberts, Arthur Yvor Winters, Maurice Lesemann, and Janet Lewis. Harriet Monroe, the founder and editor of Poetry Magazine, visited the group often. Gladys Campbell and Dillon were among the editors of the Poetry Club’s publication, The Forge: A Journal of Verse, published from 1924 to 1929.

Gladys Campbell (1892-1992) attended the University of Chicago and was one of the early members of the University of Chicago Poetry Club. Campbell and George Dillon were close friends for their entire lives and Dillon sent his poems to her for criticism. Other close friends of Gladys Campbell’s were writer Glenway Wescott and poet Charles Bell. Campbell wrote poetry throughout her life and her poems appeared frequently in various publications.

The Gladys Campbell Papers contain correspondence, writings, and other papers that document the work of the poet Gladys Campbell and friends from the University of Chicago Poetry Club, as well as her relationship with other poets. The papers also contain writings of George Dillon, Charles Bell, Janet Lewis, and Maurice Lesemann. The papers span the years 1914 to 1995. A full description of the papers may be found online: Gladys Campbell Papers YCAL MSS 251.

Kathleen Foster Campbell, born Kathleen Foster, attended the University of Chicago to study poetry. After graduating from the University, Campbell maintained a relationship with the members of the club and the University. Through the Poetry Club, Campbell became a close friend of Janet Lewis and Elizabeth Madox Roberts and eventually married Donald Campbell, the brother of fellow writer and Poetry Club member Gladys Campbell.

The Kathleen Foster Campbell Papers consist of correspondence, writings and printed materials that document the relationship between Kathleen Foster Campbell and friends from the University of Chicago Poetry Club, as well as her writings and writings of others. Included among the papers are several writings by Janet Lewis. The papers span the years 1924 to 1992. A full description of the papers may be found online: Kathleen Foster Campbell Papers YCAL MSS 252.

Llewellyn Jones (1884-1961) was born in Castletown in the Isle of Man, Great Britain. From 1914 to 1932, he was the literary editor of the Chicago Evening Post. During his time as editor, Jones also taught writing as a visiting summer instructor at the University of Chicago, where he was a member of the University of Chicago Poetry Club. Jones moved to Boston in 1937 to take the position of editor of the Christian Register, but resigned in 1941. He lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts until his death in 1961.

The Llewellyn Jones Papers document his personal and professional life as a writer and editor and span the dates 1902 to 1962. The Papers contain correspondence, writings, and other papers. The bulk of the correspondence regards the Christian Register and the American Unitarian Association, and his involvement in the Chicago literary community; a small portion of the correspondence is personal in nature. The collection also contains documentation of Jones’s involvement with the Cliff Dwellers, a Chicago club that supports the fine and performing arts. A full description of the papers can be found online: Llewellyn Jones Papers YCAL MSS 257.

Related materials in the Beinecke Collections can be found by searching the Finding Aid Database; poets’ published work can be located by searching Orbis, the library catalog. (MW)

Images: George Dillon, circa 1918 (YCAL MSS 251 photographer unknown, Box 4 Folder 82) ; Gladys Campbell, circa 1957 (YCAL MSS 251 photographer unknown, Box 4 Folder 80)

Due to ongoing construction at the Beinecke Library, the exhibition schedule for “Metaphor Taking Shape: Poetry Art and the Book” has changed: the exhibition will be on view through Saturday, March 15. The companion exhibition “The Publishers” Roundtable: Book Artists in Dialogue” will be on view at the Arts of the Book Collection at Sterling Memorial Library through March 31, 2008.

Metaphor Taking Shape: Poetry, Art, and the Book
The exhibition includes a broad display of books exploring the ways in which poets, publishers, artists, and printers have navigated the intersection of poetry and art in printed formats. The exhibition considers the ways poetry and book arts interact and connect, their shared context, and their potentially conflicting functions; materials on display explore questions of verbal and visual metaphor making, emphasizing the roles of creative and collaborative processes involved in uniting image, verse, and print.
News Release (pdf file)
Podcast and additional information

The papers of the writer and animal trainer Vicki Hearne have been processed recently and are available for use (Vicki Hearne Papers YCAL MSS 250). Born in Austin, Texas in 1946, Hearne grew up in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi before studying writing at the University of California, Riverside, and receiving her B.A. in 1969. She began her dog and horse training career in California in 1967, after learning she had a talent for the work when she trained her own dog under the mentorship of Hollywood animal trainers Bill and Dick Koehler. She continued to work with animals throughout her life.

Hearne’s writing was informed by her work with dogs and horses and the philosophies of Plato, Nietzsche, and Wittgenstein, among others. Her published collections of poetry include Nervous Horses (1980), In the Absence of Horses (1983) and The Parts of Light (1994), and many of her poems were published in poetry and mainstream magazines. A posthumous work, Tricks of the Light, edited by her friend and mentor John Hollander, was published in 2007.

Hearne addressed issues of animal behavior and the ways in which animals communicate with humans in her books of nonfiction and in magazine and journal articles. She authored Adam’s Task: Calling Animals by Name and Animal Happiness, and co-authored the book Horse Breaking: the Obedience Method with Bill Forest. Her articles “Talking With Dogs, Chimps and Others,” and “How to Say Fetch,” were published in Raritan in the early 1980s. She was published in American magazines including The Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, and The New Yorker, and in foreign publications including the Japanese edition of Esquire magazine.

An ardent defender of breeds of dogs labeled by legal authorities as innately dangerous, Hearne served as an expert witness on dog behavior beginning in the 1980s. Her experiences while defending a dog (mistakenly identified as a pit bull) that had been sentenced to death for his biting offenses in Stamford, Connecticut, were the subject of her book, Bandit: Dossier of a Dangerous Dog. The events surrounding the Bandit case were also chronicled in a documentary film, A Little Vicious, which was nominated for an Academy Award in 1992.

The Vicki Hearne Papers consist of correspondence, writings, personal papers, photographs, audiotapes, and clippings, and span the years 1955 through 2001, with the bulk of the material dating from 1980 through 2001. The papers document the development of her writing from her works of poetry in the 1970s, through the books and articles she wrote in defense of dogs at the turn of the twenty-first century. The majority of the correspondence consists of letters from friends, family members, colleagues, publishers, and editors.

Files relating to animal training and material accompanying the drafts of her writings reveal her professional and personal connection to her own companion animals and to those of her friends and colleagues. A full description of the papers may be found online: Vicki Hearne Papers.

Related materials in the Beinecke Collections can be found by searching the Finding Aid Database; recently acquired materials may be found in the Uncataloged Acquisitions Database. Vicki Hearne’s published work can be located by searching Orbis, the library catalog. (SB)

Exhibition Podcast: Metaphor Taking Shape: one of the exhibition curators discusses highlights from the show (MP3)

Metaphor Taking Shape: Poetry, Art, and the Book includes a broad display of books exploring the ways in which poets, publishers, artists, and printers have navigated the intersection of poetry and art in printed formats. The exhibition considers the ways poetry and book arts interact and connect, their shared context, and their potentially conflicting functions; materials on display explore questions of verbal and visual metaphor making, emphasizing the roles of creative and collaborative processes involved in uniting image, verse, and print. A companion exhibition, The Publishers’ Roundtable: Book Artists in Dialogue, will be on view at the Arts of the Book Collection at Sterling Memorial Library. Both exhibitions are on view from January 22 through March 31, 2008.

Recordings of some of the poets featured in the exhibition can be found at the followings links: William Carlos Williams at PennSound; Johanna Drucker at PennSound; Ron Padgett at poets.org; John Yau at PennSound; C. D. Wright at poets.org; Robert Duncan at PennSound; Rita Dove at poets.org.

Image (above): Blaise Cendrars, watercolor pochoir by Sonia Delaunay, La Prose du Transsibérien et de La Petite Jehanne de France, Paris: [Les Hommes Nouveaux], 1913 (detail).

Other works discussed in this podcast include the following:

Works by William Morris at the Kelmscott Press, including
Dante Rosetti, drawings by William Morris, Ballads and Narrative Poems, Hammersmith: Kelmscott Press, 1893.

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Paul Verlaine, drawings by Pierre Bonnard, Parallèlement, Paris: A. Vollard, 1900.

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Walker Evans, photograph of the Brooklyn Bridge; from the
Black Sun Press edition of Hart Crane’s The Bridge, published in 1930.

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Marisol, image from: William Katz, ed., Stamped Indelibly:
a Collection of Rubberstamp Prints, New York: Indianakatz, 1967.

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Incantations by Mayan Women: Fathermothers of the Book
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico: Taller Leñateros

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Jeremy Sigler, images and one poem by Jessica Stockholder
with printmaker Ruth Lingen,
Led Almost by My Tie, New York: Picture Books, 2007.

on view January 22 through March 31, 2008

Metaphor Taking Shape: Poetry, Art, and the Book includes a broad display of books exploring the ways in which poets, publishers, artists, and printers have navigated the intersection of poetry and art in printed formats. The exhibition considers the ways poetry and book arts interact and connect, their shared context, and their potentially conflicting functions; materials on display explore questions of verbal and visual metaphor making, emphasizing the roles of creative and collaborative processes involved in uniting image, verse, and print. A companion exhibition, The Publisher’s Roundtable: Book Artists in Dialogue, will be on view at the Arts of the Book Collection at Sterling Memorial Library.

In conjunction with this exhibition, a symposium featuring poets, artists, publishers, and critics in conversation will take place on March 13 and 14. Speakers include Carolee Campbell, Macy Chadwick, Steve Clay, Simon Cutts, Johanna Drucker, Ann Lauterbach, Anna Moschovakis, C. Mikal Oness, Kyle Schlesinger, Buzz Spector, C. D. Wright, and John Yau. For more information and to register, please visit http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/metaphor/index.html.

Image: Blaise Cendrars, watercolor pochoir by Sonya Delaunay, La Prose du Transsibérien et de La Petite Jehanne de France, Paris: [Les Hommes Nouveaux], 1913 (detail).

Please join us at 4pm on Thursday, January 17th for a reading and discussion by scholar Janet Malcolm, about her new book Two Lives: Gertrude and Alice published this fall by Yale University Press. Malcolm researched this work in the Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas Papers at the Beinecke Library. Janet Malcolm is the author of The Journalist and the Murderer, The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes, and Reading Chekhov, among other books. She writes for The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books and lives in New York City. This event is free and open to the public.

Two Lives is a work of literary biography and investigative journalism exploring the lives of modernist writer Gertrude Stein and her partner Alice B. Toklas. The portrait of the legendary couple that emerges from this work is unexpectedly charged. As Malcolm pursues the truth of the couple’s charmed life in a village in Vichy France, her subject becomes the larger question of biographical truth. “The instability of human knowledge is one of our few certainties,” she writes. Two Lives is also a work of literary criticism. “Even the most hermetic of [Stein’s] writings are works of submerged autobiography,” Malcolm writes. “The key of ‘I’ will not unlock the door to their meaning—you need a crowbar for that—but will sometimes admit you to a kind of anteroom of suggestion.” Whether unpacking the accessible Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, in which Stein “solves the koan of autobiography,” or wrestling with The Making of Americans, a masterwork of “magisterial disorder,” Malcolm is stunningly perceptive.