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Abraham Lincoln’s 1860 Campaign Biographies and the Lincoln Image
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PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — On November 1, at 5:30pm in the Lownes Room of the John Hay Library, Director of Special Collections and the John Hay Library, Thomas Horrocks, will give a talk on Abraham Lincoln’s 1860 campaign biographies and the role they played in shaping the Lincoln image. Campaign biographies from the Hay’s McLellan-Lincoln Collection will be on view before and after the talk. A reception will follow. This event and reception are free and open to the public.The genre of campaign biographies emerged during the 1824 presidential campaign between Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams. Every presidential campaign since, including those of recent memory in which TV, film, the autobiography, and the Internet and social media have played increasingly influential roles, has had its share of candidate biographies. Promoting presidential candidates through published biographies — as well as through other genres of print, parades, and speeches — was especially important in Lincoln’s time due to the accepted tradition that candidates did not openly seek office. At that time, promotion of a candidate was left to others, the party, partisan newspapers and their editors, and to commercial firms. In order to make an informed choice, American voters had at their disposal several sources of information, including various genres of print about the candidates.
Nineteenth-century campaign biographies, however, provided in one place the most extensive information on a candidate’s life, character, and qualifications for the presidency. These biographies, written by experienced journalists, hack writers, and budding literary figures, generally adhered to a formula when presenting candidates’ lives. They were essentially propaganda pieces intended to present a candidate in the best possible light, and to create a positive image that would resonate with the American people. As such, Lincoln’s campaign biographies reflect what personal qualities nineteenth-century Americans considered essential to successful leadership.
In 1923, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Class of 1897 purchased the McLellan Lincoln Collection, one of the five most distinguished Lincoln collections in the world, for Brown University. The McLellan Collection has been supplemented over the years by major gifts, and has increased to more than five times its original size. Most recently, the collection has been the beneficiary of the interest and attention of Douglas W. Squires, Class of 1973. Today the collection comprises 30,000+ items in various media, of materials by and about Abraham Lincoln, and about the historical and political context of his life and career, chiefly the U.S. Civil War and its causes and aftermath.
The Brown University Library is home to more than 6.8 million print items, plus a multitude of electronic resources and expanding digital archives serving the teaching, research, and learning needs of Brown students and faculty, as well as scholars from around the country and the world. http://library.brown.edu/
Contact: Jennifer Braga | 401-863-6913
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Announcing the Brasiliana Collection at Brown University
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PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — At 6pm, on October 24, 2012, Brown University will launch the Brasiliana Collection and feature the newly indexed Thomas E. Skidmore Papers, an anchor of the collection in the Reading Room of the John Hay Library. A display will be on view including highlights of the Brasiliana Collection, items from the Skidmore Papers, and the new companion website to Skidmore’s textbook Brazil: Five Centuries of Change (Oxford University Press). A reception will follow. The collection launch is co-organized by Brown University Library, Brown’s Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, and the departments of Portuguese and Brazilian Studies at Brown. The event is free and open to the public.
The Brasiliana Collection at Brown is an initiative conceived and directed by James Green, Professor of History and Brazilian Studies. The collection is intended to support the growing interest in Brazilian studies among students and faculty at Brown as well as scholars around the world.
Special collection strengths include: Brazilian travelogues: travel accounts, 16th-19th century; early literary criticism on Machado de Assis; pamphlets from the Positivist Church of Brazil; books on Espiritismo; Literatura de cordel (Brazilian chapbooks); personal papers of scholars in the field, and the World Newspaper Archive Latin American Newspapers 1805-1922. The Circulating collection is especially strong in 19th-21stcentury novels and history: colonial, slavery, abolition, independence, and dictatorship period.
In April 2006, Professor Thomas E. Skidmore donated his personal library and papers to Brown University Library. The monograph collection consists of approximately 6,000 items, mainly in English and Portuguese language, and reflects over thirty years of collecting 19th- and 20th-century materials on Brazil and other areas of Latin America. The collection contains numerous Brazilian rare and special books on subjects related to race, nationalism, politics, economics, and Brazilian history. The new website Brazil: Five Centuries of Change includes an inventory of the collection, and an archive, developed with Brown students over the last two years.
The Brown University Library is home to more than 6.8 million print items, plus a multitude of electronic resources and expanding digital archives serving the teaching, research, and learning needs of Brown students and faculty, as well as scholars from around the country and the world. http://library.brown.edu/
Contact: Patricia Figueroa Curator, Iberian and Latin American Collections | Patricia_Figueroa@Brown.edu -
Nobel Prize Winner Mo Yan’s Works On Exhibit
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PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — On October 11, 2012, Chinese Author Mo Yan was awarded the 2012 Nobel Prize in Literature. In celebration of Mo Yan’s award, Brown University Library’s East Asian Curator, Li Wang, selected a number of Mo Yan’s works in Chinese and English translation for display in the Gardner Room (room 311) on the third floor of the John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Library.Born in 1955 in a farmer’s family in Shandong province, Mo Yan (pseudonym of Guan Moye) wrote more than 30 novels and other books. One of his best known novels, “Red Sorghum” (VHS copy available in the Library) was revised as a reward-winning movie in 1987, directed by Zhang Yimou. A number of Mo Yan’s books have been translated into English, French, Spanish, German, and Swedish.
The Brown University Library’s English titles include Red Sorghum: A Novel of China (1993), The Garlic Ballads (1995), The Republic of Wine: A Novel (2000), Do Anything for A Laugh (2001), Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out: A Novel (2008). The exhibit also features the Chinese works: Shifu, You’ll Shisan bu (十三步) (“Thirteen Steps”, 1989), Fengru feitun (丰乳肥臀) (“Big Breasts and Wide Hips”, 1996), Tanxiang xing (檀香刑) (“Sandalwood Death”, 2001), Muzhi kao (拇指铐) (“Thumb-cuffs”, 2008), and Wa (蛙) (“Frog”, 2009). Several English books that contain selected works by Mo Yan, and posters from the movie “Red Sorghum” in the magazine “Popular Cinema,” are also on display.
More works by Mo Yan will be added. The display is on view through October 19, between 9am and 5pm.
The Brown University Library is home to more than 6.8 million print items, plus a multitude of electronic resources and expanding digital archives serving the teaching, research, and learning needs of Brown students and faculty, as well as scholars from around the country and the world. http://library.brown.edu/
Contact: Jennifer Braga | 401-863-6913