The Elizabeth Jenks Clark Collection of Margaret Anderson (YCAL MSS 265) is open for research at the Beinecke Library. A detailed description of the  Collection has recently been added to the Yale Library’s Finding Aid Database: Elizabeth Jenks Clark Collection of Margaret Anderson. In addition to providing a detailed catalog of the collection, the finding aid includes biographical sketches of both Anderson and Clark and a thorough chronology of Anderson’s life and publications.

Margaret Anderson was born November 24, 1886 in Indianapolis, Indiana. In the fall of 1908, she left Indiana and moved to Chicago, where she joined the staff of The Dial and was a book critic for the Chicago Evening Post. Bored at the Chicago Evening Post, she decided to edit her own magazine, giving it the title of Little Review. The Little Review became one of the most influential literature and art magazines of its time. In its early issues, the magazine included work by then-unknown writers, political extremists such as Emma Goldman, and radical social commentary, such as Anderson’s own article in defense of homosexuality.

In 1916, Margaret Anderson met Jane Heap, a Chicago art teacher co-founder of the Chicago Little Theatre. The two women quickly fell in love and moved in together. Heap joined Anderson as co-editor of the Little Review, maintaining a low profile by using a number of pseudonyms. Anderson and Heap moved the magazine to New York City in 1917 with the help of critic Ezra Pound, who the same year started his two-year tenure as foreign editor of the Little Review in London. Pound informed the direction of the magazine until its end. In 1918, Pound sent parts of James Joyce’s Ulysses to Anderson and Heap and the Little Review began publishing excerpts of the manuscript. In 1920, at half-way through the novel, the United States Post Office seized and burned issues of the magazine, charging it obscene. A court convicted Anderson and Heap on obscenity charges in 1921 and fined each woman fifty dollars.

The Little Review then began a period of decline, Anderson turned over the editorship of the magazine to Heap in 1923 and moved to Paris. It was published sporadically and the final issue was published from Paris in 1929. By the time it was finished, the Little Review had published some of the most influential new writers in the English language.

Anderson and Heap lived together for seven years, though their romantic relationship became strained. In 1923, Anderson met and fell in love with the French singer Georgette Leblanc, former companion and accompanist of Maurice Maeterlinck, and moved to Paris with Leblanc. Six years later, Anderson met and started an affair with Solita Solano, a poet and the partner of Janet Flanner. Anderson lived happily with Leblanc, whom Anderson considered to be her great love, and continued her affair with Solano for several years. Anderson wrote and studied piano in Le Cannet until Leblanc’s death of cancer in 1941. Grief-stricken and seeking the solace of friends, Anderson boarded the S.S. Drottningholm for the United States. On board she met and fell in love with Dorothy Caruso, widow of the singer Enrico Caruso, who was also returning to the United States. Within days of arriving back in the United States, Anderson befriended Elizabeth Jenks Clark through Solano, who had returned and was living in the U.S. Clark and Solano became Anderson’s closest friends and she corresponded with them almost daily until her death. Anderson and Caruso lived together in New York until Caruso’s death in 1955. Clark and Solano moved to Orgeval, France, prompting Anderson, who was mourning the loss of Caruso, to return to Le Cannet. Anderson lived out the remainder of her years in Le Cannet, until she fell ill of emphysema in 1973. She died on October 19, 1973 of heart failure.

The teachings of George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff played a profound role in Anderson’s life. While in Paris, Anderson became close to Gurdjieff, an eastern philosopher and spiritual teacher who fled post-czarist Russia. Anderson and Leblanc studied with him, focusing on his original teaching called The Fourth Way, which combined simultaneously focusing on body, mind and emotions to achieve higher levels of consciousness. Anderson remained a student of Gurdjieff’s until his death in October 1949, writing about him and his teachings, most thoroughly in The Unknowable Gurdjieff.

Over thirty-two years, Anderson published a three-volume autobiography: My Thirty Years’ War, The Fiery Fountains, and The Strange Necessity. In her last years in Le Cannet, she wrote her final book, part novel and part memoir, Forbidden Fires, which recounts her days with Georgette Leblanc and Jane Heap.

Elizabeth Jenks Clark (1912-1989) was born in Narragansett, Rhode Island. Clark moved to Paris in early the 1930s. Later Clark lived and sculpted in Philadelphia and New York City, where Clark met and fell in love with poet and editor Sarah Wilkinson, also known as Solita Solano. Through Solano, Clark met Margaret Anderson. Clark, Solano and Anderson would remain close loyal friends until Anderson’s death in 1973.

The Elizabeth Jenks Clark Collection of Margaret Anderson contains correspondence, writings, photographs, sound recordings, and other papers of writer and editor Margaret Anderson. The material documents Anderson’s life, work, and personal relationships with many noted writers, poets, artists, photographers and performers of the twentieth century, in particular her romantic relationships with co-editor and writer Jane Heap, writer Solita Solano and close friendship with sculptor Elizabeth Jenks Clark. The papers span the entirety of Anderson’s life, though the bulk of them document her personal and professional life after the Little Review. The papers are a unique resource on Anderson’s personal life in France, including her friendship and studies with George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff and participation in The Rope. A portion of the papers also document publishing the Little Review and provide context for Anderson’s role as founder and editor of the magazine. The collection contains material of mixed provenance. After Anderson’s death, Elizabeth Jenks Clark and Solita Solano inherited her papers.

A full description of the collection can be found online: Elizabeth Jenks Clark Collection of Margaret Anderson. Scanned photographs and negatives from the collection are found in the Library’s Digital Images Online at http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/digitallibrary/anderson.html. A podcast with curator Nancy Kuhl and archivist Molly Wheeler can be listened to here: Unfolding the Corners: Intimacy in the Archive of Margaret Anderson. Margaret Anderson’s published work can be located by searching Orbis, the library catalog.

Molly Wheeler, Archivist

Images: Photograph of Margaret Anderson; Margaret Anderson and Georgette Leblanc in France; George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff; Margaret Anderson; Elizabeth Jenks Clark in Orgeval, France

New Podcast: Living Distance: The Life and Papers of James Welch; an audio essay by Eric Ward ‘09, read by Presca Ahn ‘09, exploring the life, legacy, and archive of James Welch, the American writer of Blackfeet and Gros Ventre heritage. (MP3: 15:28)

James Welch was a poet, novelist, and teacher. Born on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation in Browning, Montana, with Blackfeet and Gros Ventres ancestry, Welch drew upon the histories and experiences of Native Americans in his literary work. His publications include collections of poetry, novels, and nonfiction. Works include Riding the Earthboy 40 (1971), Fools Crow (1986), The Heartsong of Charging Elk (2000), and Killing Custer: The Battle of the Little Bighorn and the Fate of the Plains Indians (1994).

The James Welch Papers consist of manuscripts, correspondence, and personal papers documenting Welch’s life and work. Welch is well known for his fiction dealing with the histories and experiences of Native Americans, and the drafts of manuscripts, for novels and other works, together with correspondence and secondary literature, make the Welch papers a valuable resource for research in literary, American, and Native American studies. The collection spans the years 1889 to 2006, with the bulk of the collection dating from the early 1960s to 2003. A complete description of the collection is available online: James Welch Papers (call number: YCAL MSS 248).

Image: Photograph of James Welch by LaVerne Harrell Clark

New Reading Room Hours, Effective June 1, 2009
Mondays – Thursdays 9:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.
Fridays 9:00 a.m.– 5:00 p.m.

New Exhibition Gallery Hours, Effective June 1, 2009
Mondays – Thursdays 9:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.
Fridays 9:00 a.m.– 5:00 p.m.
Saturdays 12:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Image: David Plowden, Sidewalk Clock, 1963; from the David Plowden Papers (call number: WA Plowden)

As part of its ongoing commitment to improve research capabilities by increasing and preserving its collections, the Beinecke Library has created a state-of-the-art off-site shelving facility to house our growing manuscript and book collections. As a result, some collections now housed off-site must be paged at least 24 hours in advance for use in the Library’s reading room. Collections housed in the new shelving facility will be identified in Orbis, the Library’s catalog, with the following information “LSF-Request for Use at Beinecke Rare Book Library.” Requests must be made with the Beinecke Library Access Services Department by email to beinecke.library@yale.edu .  Please be sure to include the call number, author and title of the item(s) you wish to view and include in the subject line of your email, “LSF request.”  Contact the Access Services Desk for more information: 203-432-2972 or beinecke.library@yale.edu.

Image:  Photograph of Beinecke Library under construction. Additional photos of the Library’s construction can be viewed here: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library Construction Photographs, 1961-1963.

The Yale Collection of American Literature is pleased to announce the opening of a new exhibition:  Love Touch Hype! Visionaire, Magazine in the Extreme, on view at the Beinecke Library from April 30 through June 30, 2009.

This exhibition presents a selection of the publication Visionaire from the first issue, “Spring” (1991), a loose-leaf portfolio of images and text, to the most recent issue, “Surprise” (2008), a series of wonderfully engineered pop-up books. Described by the editors, Stephan Gan, Cecilia Dean, and James Kaliardos, as a “multi-format album of inspiration, a journal of fashion and art, a tribute to creativity,” Visionaire foregrounds not only the dynamic relationship between art, fashion, and print culture broadly speaking, but the way in which such entities speak to and reflect the spirit of the times. As an “extreme magazine,” Visionaire draws upon a traditional commitment to craft while it pushes the boundaries of how to engage with both multi-dimensional formats and the relationship between innovative design and technology. As such, the periodical highlights the energetic dialogue that arises through collaboration when established and emerging artists interpret and re-envision various conceptual themes. [ca. 50 items]

Image: Visionare magazine issue “Touch.” To see examples of Visionare magazine, visit:  http://www.visionaireworld.com/index.php

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Living Portraits: Carl Van Vechten’s Color Photographs of African Americans, 1939-1964 features some 140 never-before-exhibited color photographs by Carl Van Vechten. Van Vechten (1880-1964) had an artistic vision rooted in the centrality of the talented person. He cherished accomplishment, whether in music, dance, theater, fine art, literature, sport, or advocacy.

He began to make photographic portraits in 1932; in 1939 he discovered newly available color film. For a quarter century, he invited friends and acquaintances, well-known artists and fledgling entertainers to sit for him, often against backdrops reminiscent of the vivid colors and patterns of a Matisse painting. Among his subjects were a very young Diahann Carroll, Billie Holiday in tears, Paul Robeson as Othello, and a procession of opera stars, composers, authors, musicians, and others who made notable contributions to the cultural life of the country. The exhibition includes 140 full-sized portraits, digitally reformatted from Van Vechten’s original slides. [ca. 140 items]
Selected images from the Carl Van Vechten Photograph Collection

Living Portraits: Carl Van Vechten’s Color Photographs of African Americans, 1939-1964 is on view from April 30 through June 30, 2009. For more information: 203-432-2969

Images above: Diahann Carroll,  Paul Robeson , Billie Holiday, and Pearl Bailey photographed by Carl Van Vechten. Photographs by Carl Van Vechten are used with permission of the Van Vechten Trust; the permission of the Trust is required to reprint or use Van Vechten photographs in any way. To contact the Trust email: Van Vechten Trust.

G. E. Patterson and Jennifer Moxley, Poetry Readings
Thursday, April 23, 4:00 pm
Beinecke Library, 121 Wall Street
Yale Collection of American Literature Reading Series
Contact: nancy.kuhl@yale.edu

Poet, critic, and translator G. E. Patterson is the author of To and From and Tug, winner of the Minnesota Book Award.  Patterson’s awards include fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Cave Canem, the Djerassi Foundation, the MacDowell Colony, and the Minnesota State Arts Board. After living in the Northeast and on the West Coast, he now makes his home in Minnesota, where he teaches.

Jennifer Moxley is the author of books of poetry including: The Line, Often Capital, The Sense Record ; and Imagination Verses. Her memoir The Middle Room was published  in 2007. She has translated two books by the French poet Jacqueline Risset, The Translation Begins and The Powers of Sleep. She is poetry editor of The Baffler, and contributing editor of The Poker. She works as an Associate Professor at the University of Maine.

In honor of National Poetry Month, throughout April the Beinecke Library’s Room 26 Cabinet of Curiosities will feature poetry-related collection materials from the Yale Collection of American Literature and the James Weldon Johnson Memorial Collection of African American Arts and Letters. Stop by often–new posts will be added twice a week.

Image: manuscript draft of H.D.’s  “Hippolitus Temporizes” (YCAL MSS 24).

Please join us for a Yale student poetry reading on Thursday, April 2nd, 2009, at 4:00pm. Student poets reading their work include: Rebecca Dinerstein, Elisa Gonzalez, David Gorin, Jordan Jacks, Rosanna Oh, James Pollack, Chiara Scully.

This event is free and open to the public. The Beinecke Library is located at 121 Wall Street, New Haven. For information about events in the Yale Collection of American Literature Reading Series visit: Readings at Beinecke Library.

The Poetry Society of America has awarded Yale Lecturer Richard Deming the 2009 Norma Farber First Book Award for his collection of poems Let’s Not Call It Consequence. The book was selected by this year’s judge, poet Martha Ronk. In her award citation, Ronk wrote:

Let’s Not Call It Consequence contains poems of restless thinking as the speaker wrestles with the mysteries of both small matters and great tragedy. They are intelligent, original, and highly crafted and keep one tracking lines that maneuver through specifics of the world (”the cold pear atop the formica table) and the fictionalizing that sustains and deludes: “Say/ it is winter, and through the snow/ a dark figure-a man-crosses/ a bridge between you and there.” Or the repeated use of “let’s” that pulls in the reader, as in Let’s Not Call It Consequence. They are written out of anxiety, insomnia, disappointment; yet the vivid singularity of things works to shift the thinking that always undergirds the poem at hand: autumn leaves, cast-off shoes, stones thrown from the 5th Ave. bridge (”The Logic of Green”).

Deming’s language is so engaging that readers feel literally caught in its permutations and fragility: “it’s difficult, some-/ times to know/ how one/ means.” At the center of this book is the language out of which we try to think (including that of other poets):

Night’s out of joint
and with the incessant
——–din of insomnia, reason’s a dog to kennel.

How to be disinterred from nothing.

If only
——-this thinking thing thought thoughts only

***

A lecturer in the Yale English Department, Richard Deming is a poet and a theorist who works on the philosophy of literature. His poems have appeared in such places as Sulfur, Field, Indiana Review, and The Nation, as well as Great American Prose Poems: From Poe to the Present.  In addition to his recently-published collection of poetry, Let’s Not Call It Consequence (Shearsman Books), Deming is also the author of Listening on All Sides: Toward an Emersonian Ethics of Reading (Stanford University Press). For more information and examples of Deming’s work visit: http://www.phylumpress.com/richarddeming.