Our Door is Always Open

SDSU Lit-heads should always make the time to come by our offices and say "Hi." Here's the note that awaits you on your left. Click it to make it humongous!

literati in tights...

See Your Words in Special Collections

Hello again to all of you in Literature Land from Anne in Library Land! In response to an energetic request to "do comics soon!" I reply that I shall, soon--but until then, as a teaser, here's a neat little item from our children's literature collections. A New Hieroglyphical Bible, for the Amusement and Instruction of Children was published in New York in 1815. In this palm-sized gem, the author selected the most memorable and memorizable Bible verses for little minds, and substituted some words with pictures meant to represent the word itself. A significant break from the rote memorization methods common to the time, these "hieroglyphs" were intended to "make the lesson delightful as well as profitable to the juvenile mind" and to teach reading skills while improving recall of religious lessons. The book is unusual not only for its inventive approach to literacy, but also for the fine quality of the wood engravings themselves. Pictures appearing in children's books of the early nineteenth century, when they appeared at all, were usually very crude cuts, worn from frequent reuse in multiple titles. These are striking in their detail, and must have been great fun to see for new little learners.

Though of course these emblematic verses might not count as "comics" as we define them today, they do represent a fascinating shift in American visual culture and help set the stage for the more expansive blending of word and image that would develop continuously throughout the century and end up later with early comics like The Yellow Kid and Little Nemo. This is a great primary source for anyone studying reading in America, religion and literature, or general visual culture. (Also, there's neat pictures of dragons and unicorns, yes, unicorns!)

To see our copy, stop by Special Collections! For more about hieroglyphical Bibles, see David Morgan's awesome Protestants and Pictures published by Oxford UP, 1999.

Pictures from the Diane Ackerman Reading at SDSU April 2009

Photography from the Diane Ackerman reading at SDSU in April 2009--Bianca Chapman reading from The Zookeeper's Wife; Ackerman with Professor D. J. Hopkins, Theatre, SDSU; Diane Ackerman at her reading/luncheon at the San Diego Zoo; another shot of Chapman's dramatic reading (note mood lighting!); and, finally, a shot of English and Comparative Literature Chair Bill Nericcio with Ackerman after her conversation with the audience.

An Inspirational Profile of Cornel West

Cornel West

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Non-fiction Books writers profile

Our Own Children's Literature Guru, Jerry Griswold, in the New York Times Review of Books!

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literature.sdsu.edu to Host Major International Women's Writing Conference

San Diego State University: A History in Word and Image

SDSU: A History in Word and Image is now available via SDSU Press's Amazon.com outlet mall! The perfect gift for recent graduates and alumni of San Diego State University!

Another One of our Cool, Super-Talented Alumni: Sydney Brown

New Logo Tests

Lisa Hemminger in the Mississippi Review! Kudos! Cheers!

A giant tip of the hat to Lisa Hemminger, a recent SDSU MFA Poetry graduate and an outstanding member of our faculty, for her publication in The Mississippi Review.

Click the image below to read her most recently published poem


You can always learn more about our cool MFA Program here.

San Diego's Very Own Little Magazine

Greetings, lovers of all things literary! I am Anne Bahde, Special Collections and University Archives Librarian over at the Library, and I'm honored to be guest-blogging here from time to time (thanks Bill!), and sharing some of the awesome primary sources in our collections with you.

First up: Troubadour: A Magazine of Verse, was published in San Diego between 1928 and 1932, and was one of hundreds of "little magazines" published all over the country in the early part of the twentieth century. The little magazine rose to popularity after Harriet Monroe began Poetry in Chicago in 1912, and this format became an essential tool for the dissemination of modernist works of literature and art during this time. Little magazines emphasized the experimental and the daring in poetry and art, and exposed little-known authors and ideas to new audiences. In many ways, the little magazine can almost be seen as a precursor to the modern zine, in that they were often produced by younger editors, generally had small print runs, and blended art with word in new and appealing ways.

Not many of the contributors’ names to Troubadour have withstood the test of time, though there are some surprises. Ansel Adams contributed three poems to the May 1929 issue featuring California poets, identifying himself there as a “photographer, poet, and mountaineer,” and Booth Tarkington guest-edited the issue devoted to Indiana poetry. Troubadour often features lovely Art Deco covers like these, though sadly the artist is not always noted within. Special Collections has most issues of Troubadour and is seeking more—stop by the Special Collections Reading Room to sample some of San Diego’s literary heritage!