Forget Cabot Cove -- Anne George's Birmingham and her Southern Sisters Mysteries

Writer, publisher, teacher, and poet Anne George was born on this day, December 4th, in 1927. She passed away in 2001, leaving a literary legacy that reaches far beyond her home state of Alabama.

Anne was born Anne Carroll Bell in Montgomery, Alabama. She was raised by her grandparents initially and moved to rural Lowndes County as a young girl. It was in her childhood that she became enamored with the detective stories -- from the magazines in her grandparents' house. Upon graduating high school, she attended Judson College in Marion, Alabama and graduated in 1949 from Samford University with a degree in English and Spanish.

She married and moved to Birmingham, where she taught English for over two decades. During that time she attended graduate school at The University of Alabama at Birmingham, earning an MA in English and Education in 1971. She also pursued a doctoral degree, and during that time founded Druid Press with her fellow student Jerri Beck. After ten years in the publishing business, they sold the press and Anne began writing full time.


She is best known for her Southern Sisters mystery series. This popular series began as a short story based on herself and a cousin. The first book in the series, Murder on a Girls' Night Out, was accepted for publication less than a week after she sent it to her agent. She eventually published seven books in the series, with such titles as Murder on a Bad Hair Day, and Murder Shoots the Bull. All of her writing is greatly influenced by her surroundings -- making Birmingham, Alabama center stage for her mysteries.


She was also a successful poet, publishing two volumes of her work. Though she is gone, she is not forgotten by her legions of fans who identify with and idolize Patricia Anne and Mary Alice, two unlikely sleuths full of Southern charm and humor.

Anne George, as an Alabama author, is included in the Hoole Library's Alabama Collection.

Farewell to Odetta

This groundbreaking and inspiring folk singer and champion of African-American history and music passed away yesterday. Odetta was born Odetta Holmes in Birmingham, Alabama on December 31, 1930.

When she was just six years old, she moved to Los Angeles with her family. She received classical voice training as a child and performed with a madrigal group (secular music from the Renaissance and early Baroque period -- all vocal) in junior high school, but by the time she finished high school, she became much more interested in other forms of music. She began her adult musical career in a touring production of the Broadway musical, "Finian's Rainbow", a Irish-ish musical with a score that included gospel and blues elements.



After the tour ended, her career blossomed when she performed as a folk singer in San Francisco in the early 1950s. She performed regularly and was close with folk legends Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger. She was already well established when the folk music scene became extremely popular and commercial in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Odetta's passionate and soulful voice, and her ability to captivate her audience deeply influenced the career paths of latter day folk performers Bob Dylan and Joan Baez. She was a major influence on singers like Janis Joplin and Bruce Springsteen.

And while she did become involved in acting and in other areas, she remained for her entire life a passionate advocate for folk music and its importance. She said, "The folk repertoire is our inheritance. Don't have to like it, but we need to hear it. I love getting to schools and telling kids there's something else out there. It's from their forebears, and its an alternative to what they hear on the radio. As long as I am performing, I will be pointing out that heritage that is ours." Her passion for African-American folk music still serves as a hallmark of the Civil Rights and Black Pride movements. She was a champion of African-American history and culture both thought and in action -- through her powerful voice and through learning, performing, and sharing these important songs with an audience around the world.

In 1999, she was recognized with the National Medal of Arts awarded by President Bill Clinton, and in 2004, she was a Kennedy Center honoree. In 2000, the Library of Congress honored her with its Living Legend Award.

Sound recordings by Odetta can be found in the Hoole Library's Sound Recording Collections.

"If only one could be sure that every 50 years a voice and a soul like Odetta's would come along, the centuries would pass so quickly and painlessly we would hardly recognize time." --Maya Angelou

An Evening (on film) with Eugene Walter!

"A student of human endeavors on this busy planet." --Eugene Walter

Join us at 7 pm on Thursday, November 20 in Gorgas Library room 205 for a fun-filled evening with a screening of the new documentary film by Alabama native, Bob Clem (Waterfront Pix) on fellow Alabama native and Renaissance man, Eugene Walter!

Eugene Walter: Last of the Bohemians documents the life and career of a writer, poet, actor, artist and raconteur whose work celebrates the art of living and personifies the culture of the coastal South. Living in Paris and Rome, Walter (1921-1998) lent his unique personality and wide-ranging talent to a number of different endeavors, many of them at the heart of the postwar artistic renaissance in Europe -- winning numerous awards for his poetry and fiction, helping start the Paris Review, working with and acting in the films of Federico Fellini and other Italian directors, editing the poly lingual literary magazine Botteghe Oscure and meeting and entertaining many of the most famous writers and cultural figures of his time.

From his beginnings in Mobile, Alabama, Walter was blessed with survival skills that enabled him to live the bohemian life, dedicating himself to artistic pursuits without visible means of support. He ran away from home literally as soon as he was able to walk, moving in with his grandmother, then receiving shelter from Mobilians who recognized his talent and his brilliance.

He lived for a time in a warehouse, then in the back of the city's famed Haunted Book Shop (its co-founder and dear friend of Eugene Adelaide Trigg passed away last month at the age of 89),
then as the ward of local theater patron Hammond Gayfer. Walter would later be honored by his native city as an artistic 'Renaissance Man' for his achievements in so many creative endeavors.

Eugene Walter was one of the last of an increasingly rare breed -- the freelance, wandering poet, living day to day in pursuit of art, truth and beauty. Paris and Rome are no longer the inexpensive cities they were in the aftermath of World War II, where artists and writers could survive on a few dollars a week.

Most writers and poets today have an academic affiliation, or else a full time job with little time left to write, to dream and to live in the fantasy world that Eugene Walter inhabited every single day, to the delight of most everyone he met. His story is not to be missed! The film was funded in part by a grant from the Alabama Humanities Foundation, a state program of the National Endowment for the Humanities, with additional support from the Sybil Smith Charitable Trust, A.S. Mitchell Foundation, M.W. Smith Foundation, Malbis Memorial Foundation and Ben May Foundation.

Eugene's books are included in the Hoole Library's Alabama Collection. There is also a small manuscript collection relating to Eugene Walter at the Hoole Library. You can review Eugene's author information and some of his tangible contributions to literature via This Goodly Land.

Watch a preview! And please join us for a fun opportunity to celebrate this treasured world citizen!

Roll Tide Roll!

The University of Alabama's football team is ranked #1 in both the AP and the USA Today Coaches Poll. This detail from a 1930s UA publication has newfound significance on this Monday in November. Congratulations to Coach Saban and the Crimson Tide!

Holding Court with The Prince of Frogtown! An Evening with Rick Bragg at UA Libraries

There is just about nothing better than a great story. So if you love great stories told by an outstandingly spectacular storyteller, please join us at 7 pm on Wednesday, October 29th in Gorgas Library room 205 for an opportunity to meet renowned Alabama author, Pulitzer Prize winner and University of Alabama professor of Journalism, Rick Bragg.



His latest book, The Prince of Frogtown (Knopf, 2008) is the final volume of his beloved American saga that began with All over but the Shoutin' and continued with Ava's Man. in The Prince of Frogtown, Bragg closes his circle of family with an unforgettable tale about fathers and sons inspired by his own relationship with his stepson.

This event, like all UA Libraries lecture series events is free and open to the public. A book signing and reception will follow the reading, with books for sale courtesy of the Supe Store. The UA Libraries Lecture Series is made possible in part through the generous support of Dr. Lakey and Susan Tolbert. A copy of the flier is available here for download -- and for more information on the UA Libraries Lecture series visit the website at www.lib.ua.edu/events We hope to see you there!

And if you haven't already, take a look at Rick's piece on Nick Saban and the Crimson Tide recently published in Sports Illustrated.

A Best-Selling Author was Born....Carl Carmer and Stars Fell on Alabama

October 16 marks the birthday of bestselling author and former University of Alabama professor of English, Carl Carmer. Born in 1893 in Cortland, New York, Carmer came to The University of Alabama in 1927 after completing graduate work at Harvard University. His experiences in Alabama led to his best-selling book, Stars Fell on Alabama.

The New York Times review from the period said, "Carmer reveals himself here as a writer of more than ordinary perceptiveness and imagination, with the power of extracting from what he sees, hears, and feels an essence which is fundamentally poetic."

What he saw, heard, and felt, from experiences all over the state, still stand today as powerful documentation of folkways, and of the racial violence and conflict that existed in Alabama. Carmer became friends with people who took him all over the state, and he experienced first hand everything from foot-washings and shape note singing, to myths and superstitions (like the legendary night in 1833 when "stars fell on Alabama -- the Leonid meteor shower), as well as the horror of an actual lynching -- and he wrote about it all with great honesty.

Carmer left Alabama in 1933 (coincidently one hundred years after the stars fell...)to serve as the assistant editor at Vanity Fair magazine.

Carmer had a colleague, Clarence Cason -- who also wrote honestly about Alabama during this same period. An essay on Carmer and Cason, exploring their work and Cason's tragic fate was published in 2003 in the journal Southern Cultures, by Dr. Phil Beidler of the UA Department of English. This fascinating essay,Yankee Interloper and Native Son: Carl Carmer and Clarence Cason Unlikely Twins of Alabama Exposé is a very worthy read and gives a great glimpse into these two men and the period in which they wrote.


Carmer went on to write thirty-seven books in all, in addition to his editorial and consultant work, advising on matters of folklore for Walt Disney productions! He also recorded four albums of folk music. His most famous work, Stars fell on Alabama has been in print for many years, most recently reprinted by The University of Alabama Press in 2000, with an introduction by former NY Times editor and Alabama native, Howell Raines. The images above are first editions of the book from the Hoole Library's Alabama Collection. Carmer died in 1976 at the age of 93. Today is the 115th anniversary of his birth.

Portrait of Carl Carmer from This Goodly Land entry on Carmer

Visit Alabama Authors at http://www.lib.ua.edu/Alabama_Authors/
or Carmer's entry in This Goodly Land to learn more about him and more about Alabama's rich literary heritage!

A-Quiver With Significance: Marianne Moore, 1932—1936

Today in Gorgas Library 205, at 4 pm, Dr. Heather Cass White, Associate Professor of English will read from her book and discuss her project, which includes a collaboration with University Libraries , namely the acquisition of a rare volume of Moore's work, which was turned into a facsimile edition through the work of the Hoole Special Collections Library staff. This is an excellent example of how Special Collections can help to facilitate and further the research and teaching efforts of The University of Alabama faculty and students.

The Pangolin and Other Verse by Marianne Moore.
London: Brendin Publishing Co., 1936.
1 of 120 copies printed at the Curwen Press, Plaistow, London. Drawings are by George Plank.

“Building the edition off of a facsimile reprint of Moore’s powerful collection of poems, The Pangolin and Other Verse, makes good sense given the importance of the volume to her modernist peers. As White notes, Moore paid particular attention to the ordering of her verses in this collection, as she did to every aspect of the book’s production. The volume makes an excellent case study in the ways in which the material presentation of a book of poems can prove vital to addressing the content of the verses within.” – Robin G. Schulze, Pennsylvania State University, editor of Becoming Marianne Moore: The Early Poems, 1907-1924

The University Libraries Lecture Series is made possible in part through the generous support of Lakey and Susan Tolbert.