#olivia m

[acewatney]

I feel this so hard

(this is from Friendships and Other Ships by Olivia M. featured in this zine)

[kaylarosenzines]

"All in Your Head" #3 Smoothly Navigates the Intersections and Ambiguities of Disabled Queer (A)sexuality and Intimacy

“All in Your Head” #3 Smoothly Navigates the Intersections and Ambiguities of Disabled Queer (A)sexuality and Intimacy

All in Your Head Issue #3: (A)sexuality, Intimacy, and Identity has some of the most consistent quality I’ve seen in an edited zine. This is what an anthology should be. The content (poetry, prose, visual art) is all great, and each piece impresses me for different reasons. And there’s a lot in there! If I’m counting correctly, it’s 94 pages long, which in my zine collection is only rivaled by…

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[muspeccoll]

With Spring seemingly arriving early this year, let’s frolic through The Flowers Personified, or Les Fleurs Animées as the work was published originally in French. This final work of J.J. Grandville was published posthumously in 1847 and is considered to be one of his greatest works.

One reviewer on Public Domain Review wrote, “With its mix of satiric and poetic, the book is considered to be one of his most supreme achievements.”

This book contains 52 steel-engraved, hand-colored plates created by J.J. Grandville and his illustrations are extraordinary.

Also illustrated by J.J. Grandville are The Fables of Jean de La Fontaine, Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (1838), and Daniel Defoe’s The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1840).

His artwork has been said to have influenced the works of Dore, Hugo, Kafta, Tenniel (the illustrator for Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass) and Walt Disney.

J.J. Grandville’s illustrations have also been used as album artwork by various bands including: Queen’s Innuendo album, and Alice in Chains’ self-titled album, Alice in Chains.

Les Fleurs Animées was translated to English and published in the US in 1847 by N. Cleveland. A signed copy is housed in MU Special Collections and Rare Books Department.

-Olivia M.

MU Ellis Special Collections Rare Vault NC1135 .G63 1847

[muspeccoll]

Alright Thespians and art enthusiasts. This one's for you.

Better known for his novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) wrote, in 1891, Salomé-Drame en un acte; or in English, Salome-A Tragedy in One Act. The play is a portrayal of the Biblical story of Salome, the stepdaughter of Herod, who, after her performance of the Dance of the Seven Veils for Herod and his friends, requests the head of Jokanaan the Prophet (John the Baptist) on a silver platter.

Rehearsals for the play's debut began in 1892, but because it was illegal to portray biblical characters on the stage at the time, the performance was banned.

The play finally received its debut on 11 February 1896 in Paris at the Comédie-Parisienne; unfortunately, Wilde was in prison at the time.

Within his play, special attention is paid to the Dance of the Seven Veils (named by Wilde), which, according to an analytical quote by Carmen Skaggs in her book, Modernity Revision of the Dancing Daughter: The Salome Narrative of Wilde and Strauss, gives Salome more depth of character and modernity. She writes,

"Wilde, as a Decadent writer in the nineteenth century, develops the themes of Orientalism and counter-cultural ethics. He enters the chasm of human emotion and reveals both the savage and noble heights to which humanity ascends. He explores the deeply ingrained gender ideologies of modernity and the sexual perversities of modern culture."

and,

"By focusing the narrative upon the dancing daughter and empowering her sexuality, Wilde brings new dimension to her character."

What a great feminist close read! Nothing wrong with a sprinkle of feminism, right?

Anyway, Wilde originally wrote his play in French and this edition was first published in 1893. Earlier in 1892 for the Pall Mall Gazette, Wilde explained his reasoning for writing his play en français:

"I have one instrument that I know I can command, and that is the English language. There was another instrument to which I had listened all my life, and I wanted once to touch this new instrument to see whether I could make any beautiful thing out of it. [...] Of course, there are modes of expression that a Frenchman of letters would not have used, but they give a certain relief or colour to the play. A great deal of the curious effect that Maeterlinck produces comes from the fact that he, a Flamand by grace, writes in an alien language. The same thing is true of Rossetti, who, though he wrote in English, was essentially Latin in temperament."

The French edition was illustrated by André Derain (1880-1954), co-founder of the modern art movement, Fauvism. The first English edition of Salome was published one year later in 1894 and was illustrated by Audrey Bearsley (1872-1898). It was his striking illustrations that caught my eye and that I felt I should share with you all. Bearsley was a leading figure in the Aesthetic (along with Wilde himself) and Art Nouveau movements. His illustrations were created under the influence of the Japanese-style wood cuts, and, "emphasized the grotesque, the decadent, and the erotic."

Signed copies of both the French and English editions of Oscar Wilde's Salome are housed in MU Special Collections and Rare Books Department.

-Olivia M.

Wilde, Oscar, 1854-1900.   Salome : a tragedy in one act, translated from the French of Oscar Wilde / by Alfred Douglas and illustrated by Aubrey Beardsley ; with a new introduction by Holbrook Jackson.  London : Printed for the members of the Limited Editions Club, 1938.   Rare Folio PR5820 .S15 1938b  (ENGLISH)   Wilde, Oscar, 1854-1900.  Salomé : drama en un acte / Oscar Wilde ; illustrations par André Derain. Paris : Imprimé pour les membres de The Limited Editions Club, 1938. Rare Folio PR5820 .S15 1938b  (FRENCH)

[muspeccoll]

This semester we have two new interns working on metadata, provenance, and digital projects with us in Special Collections. First up for introductions is Olivia. Go read all about her, and watch for her posts coming up soon.

[bac-connex]

Thank you DCAMM

[bac-connex]

Supportive Buddies

This year I will commit to the mentorship action of knowing what I know and being open to what I don't know. It is important to be open to learning from others. I am volunteering as a TA for the BAC NOMAS and Sasaki Foundation and will use this ideas to create a better environment for students to learn.

[bac-connex]

A encouraging mentor

A good mentor is someone who is passionate about their work and encourage and support their mentees. They are caring and compassionate. They make sure to listen and guide you. Brenna has been a great mentor over the last week. She has introduced us to the DCAMM family. She has gone out of her way to much sure we felt included in all of our activities and meetings. She encouraged to ask questions even if they were small questions such as clarification over a term.

Today Brenna took us to tour of the Shattuck Hospital. We were able to see an active construction site and see all that can go wrong during the construction phase. Also, it was interesting to learn about how complicated it is to design a hospital especially one that has to work for three different departments. Also, it was interesting to here about how public construction projects are sent out to bid.