From the Papers of Marianne Moore: MM V:16:11.Marion V. Dorn. Correspondence with Marianne Moore, 1948-1964.
Upcoming Events
Canti dei Negri d’America and Proverbi dei Negri d’America
One of the concerns of the Rosenbach’s current exhibition, Look Again: African American History IS American History is identifying the ways in which African American history has been preserved. An unexpected pair of books from Marianne Moore’s library prove to be an interesting source of African-American history: Canti d’Amore e di Lavoro dei Negri d’America …
Iran? Marianne?
I use Wikipedia all the time. It’s handy. Now, I’m not an expert on anything, so relying on an open-source encyclopedia has its dangers. This fact became clear to me when trying to confirm the date of Marianne Moore’s death using Wikipedia. I didn’t get that far in the Moore entry, though because of this …
You Say Tomato, We Say Tomato
When I first stumbled across this letter, I thought I’d found the pronunciation key to the name “Rosenbach.” Here at the Rosenbach Museum & Library we pronounce our founders’ surname “Rosenback,” rhyming it with smack. The lore around here states that Philip and Abraham pronounced it that way. Most everyone else, though, tends to rhyme …
Who’s this Buckaroo?
Or perhaps I should say “buckarü.”Answer to be posted soon. UPDATE: Marlene Dietrich. This undated photo resides in the Papers of Mercedes de Acosta here at the Rosenbach. Dietrich looks pretty young in this photo — it was probably taken before she moved to Hollywood in 1930. Given the effort she and Josef von Sternberg …
First Folio
Our Librarian, Elizabeth E. Fuller, recently wrote up these notes about the upcoming sale of one of the last Shakespeare First Folios left in private hands: [Note-the image here is of the Rosenbach’s copy of the third folio!] ************* Sotheby’s recently announced that it will offer a copy of Shakespeare’s First Folio at auction in …
Black and White
Truman Capote is in the air these days. (I really liked Philip Seymour Hoffman in Capote, though I do have a small gripe with the Academy giving Oscars to actors playing celebrities — e.g. Hoffman, Reese Witherspoon, Jamie Foxx, Cate Blanchett, etc. — but that’s another post on another blog.) Forty years ago this November …
when it rains…
The Sunday New York Times will have another Rosenbach-associated piece, this time about Ben Katchor’s opera The Rosenbach Company. The opera was commissioned by the Rosenbach in 2003, and performed at the Philly Live Arts/Fringe in 2004. If you missed it then, it’s being performed at Joe’s Pub at the Public Theatre in New York …
Check Us Out!
The news gods smile upon us today with this fantastic NYT Escapes piece by Curtis Sittenfeld. For a museum that has serious “visibility issues,” this is very welcome coverage. Thank you news gods! …and yes, there will be corrections. Most significantly–the Sendak collection is not an “acquisition.” We don’t own it. Mr. Sendak’s drawings are …
Lot in Sodom in the Rosenbach
Check out this stunning movie still from James Sibley Watson’s and Melville Webber’s Lot in Sodom found in the Marianne Moore papers. The 1933 short film tells the story of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis, Ch. 19) in what appears to be fine avant-garde style. When not making experimental films (his only other film, also made …