My search for related articles started with select Nadine Gordimer folders, which, for the most part, covered the major topic of apartheid in South Africa. The prompt told me there were a series of diaries in the Gordimer collection, which I traced through the Lilly Library's website. From the homepage I clicked on "manuscripts" and then "G" for Gordimer, than located her name on the list and clicked. After reaching her page I clicked on the "guide" to the collection, and then selected "diaries and notebooks." Once on this page I used the "find in page" tool on the search bar of the browser and searched for "South Africa," which highlighted the following the diary entries located in Box 15 Folders 81-87.
After finding additional resources from Gordimer, I decided to search for information on apartheid from another author. To do this, I returned to the Lilly Library Home Page, and searched "apartheid" in the search field. This yielded six results, the fourth of which I chose, clicking on "Fugard." After arriving at the Fugard page, I clicked "inventory," which brought me to a comprehensive list of the Fugard materials, in which I just sort of scrolled through and looked for the themes of South Africa and apartheid in the descriptions. I identified three resources that I thought would be most applicable to the subjects covered in Gordimer. The first was a play, "Orestes," First Production: Castleman Auditorium, Cape Town, 21 March 1971, Published: Theatre One: New South African Drama, Johannesburg: Donker 1973, located in Box 4 Folders 13-16. The second was a New York Times article published 20 September 1964, "African Stages: South Africa is Likely to Offer Most Valuable Contribution to Theatre," located in Box 4 Folder 48. The last resource I identified as potentially useful was a lecture Fugard gave at NYU on October 16, 1990 titled "Some Problems of a Playwright from South Africa," located in Box 4 Folder 49.
The third resource, the lecture, I actually was able to physically call up and look at. I did this by entering the Lilly Library reading room, and requesting to call up a resource. The librarian handed me a red slip on which I wrote the collection, "Fugard," the Box and Folder numbers, "Box 4 Folder 49," and the name of the piece, "Some Problems of a Playwright from South Africa." I returned the slip to the librarian, who requested that I have a seat until she could it bring it to me at the table. A few moments later she laid the folder in front of me and I was able to do a firsthand examination of the transcript of Fugard's lecture.
After skimming the lecture, which was rather lengthy, I did identify a few passages that were applicable to the topics addressed in Gordimer.
"I write my plays in the first instance for fellow South Africans, for myself in the briefest instance, and for fellow South Africans." (p. 12)
- The passage containing this quote identifies some of the issues of personally being exposed to apartheid, and the feelings harbored because of it.
"If anybody in an audience for one of my plays sits there expecting that I am going to make a political statement, or give a message, or lay out a blueprint for a better and juster South Africa, they are going to be disappointed. What is more, because of this expectation, and because they are looking in the wrong direction (this I think has happened to a lot of critics in their reactions to my work), they will most probably miss what I have got to offer, which is a story." (p. 3)
- I think this quote would be incredibly applicable to Gordimer in that she wrote a play specifically about South Africa, and comparing her agenda in writing to Fugard, as both of them being activists against apartheid, would cultivate an interesting argument about the role of arts and literature in social reform.
And that was the extent of my search for related resources in the Lilly Library.
1 comment:
Emily,
I commented on Britt's post about Nadine Gordimer last time, and found her quite fascinating. Not only do I think that she is a wonderful subject for such a project as this, but I draw a lot of similarities between her, and my subject, Mary Donovan Hapgood. So, I thought that I would continue with Gordimer in a sense and see how the research and overall project is fleshing out.
Your search of the related materials that you described in the beginning was efficient and smart. I know that I did not do many of the things that you described, and I now feel that I have been hurting my efficiency in the Lilly Library. Not only were you efficient in your searching, but your research yielded thorough results. Pinpointing the exact folders that you needed was very smart. I know that I personally wasted time with the staff of the Lilly trying to ask them what box specifically to retrieve for my related collection. So, I thank you for opening my eyes on such an economical way of searching.
I was very impressed to see you find the resource of Fugard essentially out of the blue. It seems like this certainly proved fruitful to you. I thought it was very smart to consider how both writers worked in the media of drama. However, is there maybe more to this connection between Fugard and Gordimer than meets the eye? Out of curiosity, did you see if Fugard and Gordimer ever had correspondence? Also, I feel like it might be interesting to contrast Gordimer and Fugard as well as compare the two. It seems that in Gordimer's play, she really sets out to call her comrades to action. However, when juxtaposed with Fugard's philosophy of the importance of the story, not the message, we have two very interesting takes on South African drama.
Finally, to play devil's advocate, I was simply wondering about any other resources you may have come across under the apartheid search. It seems like this could be valuable to see what inspired Gordimer in her quest to stand against apartheid. As a white woman, Gordimer had no direct contempt shown against her to fuel her aggression. So, I would think it might be interesting to simply see just how truly awful the situation was from other texts.
Overall, I think you did a great job. You clearly sparked my interest and made me get into topics that you were not even required to talk about in this post. Best of luck with phase three.
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