Envelope, undated, titled ‘Review by Richard Eberhart’. The review is complimentary, saying the lengthy book that Louise Kertesz wrote should be published to bring Rukeyser back into the national spotlight. Eberhart says the book should be published as is, and that many people and libraries would be interested in having and reading this book. “Louise Kertesz’s huge volume on Muriel Rukeyser’s poetry should not only be published, but it should prove to be a monument to the value of Rukeyser’s work to American culture. It vindicates her sometime neglect and misunderstanding through decades, and establishes the glory and splendor of her gifts not only to poetry, but in prose books as well. Her imaginative powers are well documented in the words of critics and used throughout.”
Dated July 19th, 1980. A letter from Layle Silbert to Louise Kertesz. Layle was a professional photographer who had some photos of the late Muriel Rukeyser. Louise’s name is spelled ‘Louis’ on the letter, and the letter starts, ‘Dear Mr. Kertesz’.
Dated October 18th, 1976. A letter from Dwight MacDonald to Louise Kertesz. Answers questions Louise posed him in a June 25 letter about “that editorial roughing up of Muriel Rukeyser in the Sept.-Oct. 1943 PR”; “why MR was put down similarly by other critics of the period (Jarrell, Bogan, Humphries)”; and “why Shapiro and Lowell got Pulitzer prizes and MR didn't”; his “opinion of her work to date.” Letter is crossed out in some places and has some handwriting on it.
Envelope with three photos of Muriel Rukeyser. One is from 1975, in the Westgate Prison in Seoul, Korea, another is from 1978 at Sarah Lawrence College, and the other one is undated.
Dated February 12th, 1980. Postcard from Lawrence Ferlinghetti, City Lights, to Louise Kertesz. Asks Louise to give him the facts on the Rukeyser- Octavio Paz connection.
Dated February 7th, 1980 a letter, with envelope, from Lawrence Ferlinghetti, City Lights, to Louise Kertesz. if Louise can tell him the year that Imogen Cunningham portrait was taken, due to the Cunningham Trust not knowing. He also states that the book reads well and that Louise’s publisher will send him a review copy.
Dated January 28th, 1980, a letter with envelope from Lawrence Ferlinghetti to Louise Kertesz. Heto and from the same people, asks how long Muriel lived in San Francisco. Asks Louise to send him a paragraph about Rukeyser’s life and publications when living in San Francisco. Signs off “Hurriedly, Lawrence Ferlinghetti.”
Dated October 25th, 1977. To Louise Kertesz from Kenneth Rexroth. The letter states his willingness to write a preface for Louise Kertesz’s book on Rukeyser, but he adds: “...but between you and me, I don't think the book is very satisfactory. It does not do Muriel justice. She is certainly the best poet of those now in their sixties; she is also the best US woman poet since Mina Loy and Laura Riding, and she is better than either, except for a very few poems of each. All this rehearsal of book reviews gives a completely false picture of anything except Stalinist-anti Stalinist politics and change in the Party Line itself. … Never forget–Muriel for a whole generation was, along with Patchen, myself and very very few others a rare US representative of the international idiom of modern poetry.” Compares her to Octavio Paz, Paul Eluard, Paul Celan, Eugenio Montale.
Dated July 20th, 1977. A letter from Sandra M. Gilbert, University of California, to Louise Kertesz. CC’D to Susan Gubar. They cannot use Louise Kertesz’s essays, “The Bridge, ‘Theory of Flight,’ and The Spirit of Whitman” for their collection Shakespeare’s Sisters.
Dated November 7th, 1978. A letter from Monica McCall at ICM to Louise Kertesz. McCall had spoken with a woman called Lucille Rhodes, who had no stills of Muriel. Muriel will be sending pictures of her son, daughter in law, and two grandchildren.
Dated February 1978. A picture titled Poetry Flash. Taken at the Amnesty International Benefit, it includes Muriel Rukeyser, whose name is misspelled as ‘Murial’.
Dated August 22nd, 1978. A letter from Kay Boyle to Louise Kertesz. The letter writer informs Louise Kertesz that they do not have the picture that Kertesz is looking for, but points her in the direction of Joei Tranchina, who has taken multiple pictures of Muriel Rukeyser.
Dated 1954, a photo of the Bollingen Poetry Prize Selection Committee. A group photo (from the back row, left to right) Wallace Stevens, Randall Jarell, Allen Tate. (Front row) Marianne Moore and Rukeyser.
Dated January 24th, 1979. A letter from Curtis Harnack, Executive Director of Yaddo,.to Louise Kertesz. The letter contains two photos of Muriel Rukeyser. The cost of the photos was eleven dollars.
Dated April 8th, 1980. A postcard from Kenneth Rexroth to Louise Kertesz. Talks about Louise’s book. “MR was the victim of vast & vicious critical injustices….”
Dated August 22nd, 1979. An article by Thomas Lask entitled “Books: Muriel Rukeyser Revealed as Total Poet,” in which he talks about The Collected Poems of Muriel Rukeyser.
Sunday, March 2nd, 1980. A newspaper article titled RUKEYSER, A PARTISAN OF LOVE by Kenneth Rexroth that details the poet’s death and her legacy: Muriel Rukeyser was a traditionalist. But when, like Mark Twain’s weather, everybody was talking about one tradition or another but doing nothing about it, her tradition was not recognized or was despised.” “Muriel Rukeyser believed in the Community of Love, not because she was convinced that it was going to win but because it is true, it is the right way for human beings to live.”
Unknown Date, Torn-off paper with handwritten notes by Louise Kertesz. Contains addresses and phone numbers of Louise Bernikow, Anne Sexton, William Mcguire.
Dated October 4th, 1978. A letter from Monica McCall of ICM. to Louise Kertesz. The letter states that McCall will send Louise Kertesz some Rukeyser snapshots, and that Professor Jan Berg, who translated Muriel Rukeyser’s poems into Swedish, would like to have a copy of the page proofs. Some handwritten notes are on the letter.
Dated December 29th, 1978. A letter from Richard Eberhart to Beverly Jarett. The letter states that Eberhart would like to give Louise Kertesz a blurb for the cover of the book.
Dated February 1, 1979. A letter from Monica McCall at ICM to Louise Kertesz. The letter discusses a permission letter, asking if the letter is the one from Buffalo or one that they have not attended to yet. It states that Muriel’s health is improving and that she is being taken to a rehabilitation center.
Dated December 27th, 1978. A letter from Curtis Harnack, Executive Director of Yaddo, to Louise Kertesz in regard to duplicating the two group photos of Rukeyser at Yaddo.
Dated January 25th, 1979. A letter from Monica McCall at ICM to Louise Kertesz stating that Rukeyser liked the title of Louise’s book, and that she should be out of the hospital in a week to ten days.
Dated January 10th, 1979. A letter from Eric J. Carpenter to Louise Kertesz. Carpenter gives letters and microfiche to Louise Kertesz due to receiving permission from Monica McCall. Attached, another letter dated January 17th, from Eric J. Carpenter to LK. States that the letters 'crossed in the mail’. Carpenter had sent copies of Rukeyser’s letters on the 9th, and hopes Louise has received them by now. Louise did not request the microfilm of her manuscripts. Both letters from the University of New York at Buffalo.
Dated January 4th, 1979. A letter from Monica McCall at ICM (International Creative Management) to Eric Carpenter, Acting Curator of Poetry Collection at SUNY Buffalo, New York.. Authorizes Louise Kertesz to use letters from the poetry collection in her book. Some handwritten notes are on the paper.
Dated August 23rd. 1978. A typed letter from Miriam M. Reik to Louise Kertesz. Miriam M. Reik, a former student of Rukeyser at Sarah Lawrence recalls Rukeyser’s”unorthodox: but “entirely common sensical” teaching style. She provides one example when the class was assigned Blake’s poetry: “When we came to class, presumably having read it, Muriel asked us to write a description of Newton on the spot. Surprised by the instructions, most of the students set about the task armed with a set of predictable ideas: Newton meant reason as opposed to imagination, science as opposed to poetry; Blake was a mystic and disliked Newton and said so; scientists like Newton looked a certain bespeckled way, and so on. So most of us described an appropriately dry, professorial-looking Newton in this impromptu exercise. When we finished, Muriel managed to jiggle all of these simplicities out of our heads, merely by passing around Blake’s painting of Newton, in which he looks rather like a Greek God, preoccupied with the wonderful symmetries of geometry. This strategy did not solve the question of the relations between science and poetry, and it did not offer a specific interpretation of Blake, but for anyone with half a brain, it set you down a new track, gave you new access to the poems, and broke down what Muriel has called ‘the resistances’ to the work of the imagination.”
Dated January 2nd, 1979. A typed letter from Phyllis Leith to Louise Kertesz, writing on behalf of Denise Levertov. Levertov gives Louise Kertesz permission to use her quotes in her book, and brings up that two of her poems in Sorrow Dance, “The Unknown” and “Joy” are related to Muriel Rukeyser’s work.
Dated July 10th, 1978. A typed letter from Jane Cooper to Louise Kertesz. Cooper apologizes for replying to the letter so late, and expresses elation that Louise Kertesz is writing a book about Rukeyser. The letter suggests names of former Rukeyser students to contact. “Muriel’s writing has always meant an enormous amount to me. She was the first contemporary woman poet I read, when I was 13 or 14 … Later, in the 50s & 60s, we taught together at Sarah Lawrence. Her course then was the “Orlando” course–a marvelous, unorthodox history of English literature, which used the Woolf work as a sort of frame, read both at the beginning & end of the year. and some checks are next to the names of the sources. Some handwritten notes are also on the letter.
Dated November 7th, Unknown Year. A handwritten letter from Jane Cooper to Louise Kertesz. Cooper talks about a Writer’s Conference: A Day in Honor of Muriel Rukeyser that she hopes Kertesz will attend. Cooper regrets not having any photographs of Muriel. Letter is underlined in red (by LK) in some places.
Dated December 21st, Unknown Year. A typed letter from Gloria Bowles, University of California, to Louise Kertesz.. Bowles has included a mention of Kertesz’s book on Rukeyser in a review essay for Signs.
Dated August 3rd, 1977. A typed letter from the literary agent Richard Balkin. Balkin declines becoming the literary agent of Louise Kertesz, however, he does suggest that the book will find a publisher, and brings up another company. Some handwritten notes, including the name of another agent, are added. The letter is also underlined in parts.
Dated June 23rd, 1976. A typed letter from William Phillips of Partisan Review to Louise Kertesz: “It’s difficult to answer your questions since they all seem to have some hidden assumptions.”
Dated January 6th, 1978. Copy of a typed letter from Richard Eberhart to Beverly Jarrett, executive editor of Louisiana University Press. Louise Kertesz is CC’D. Contains a Eberhart’s blurb for Kertesz’s forthcoming book. Also contains Eberhart’s handwritten notes to Kertesz.
Dated August 1st, 1976. A handwritten letter from Kenneth Rexroth to Louise Kertesz, in which he agrees to write the preface to her book on MR (The Poetic Vision of Muriel Rukeyser) and discusses Rukeyser’’s relation to the San Francisco Renascence and the Beats: “She didn't associate much with other poets but she was a good friend of mine & of Duncan’s. Patchen had even less to do with the locals. The Beats publicity machine has obliterated the SF ‘renascence’--and, of course, they have no real connection with SF–they are New Yorkers. If Muriel wants to be connected with them, she’s crazy. I have spent 20 years trying to get them off my neck and out of my hair. She is an infinitely better poet than any of the Beats….
Dated October 13th, 1978. A typed aeromail from Clive Bush to Louise Kertesz, providing the full reference to his 1977 essay “Muriel Rukeyser: the poet as scientific biographer.”
Dated April 6th, 1976, a typed letter from MIT professor Cyril Stanley Smith to Louise Kertesz in response to her inquiries about Willard Gibbs and The Traces of Thomas Harriot: “You ask about scientists’ views on W. G. Frankly, I have never met one who liked it. Most of them think that it is not the biography of a scientist. For all of its studies of incoming and outreaching influences, it fails to catch the intellectual experience of the scientist in finding and clarifying his problem and doesn't distinguish between the moments of insight and the hard work of verification and transmission” (underlined in red by LK). Suggests that both WG and The Traces “are somewhat questionable if they are judged by the standards of down-to-earth well disciplined science or history of science, and they may even me [sic] a bit unreliable as biography.” Suggests that the two books need to be supplemented by more critical scientific biographies.The letters are underlined and have handwritten notes by Louise Kertesz.
Dated April 12th, 1976, a typed letter from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) professor Dirk Jan Struik to Louise Kertesz, in response to her inquiries about Muriel Rukeyser’s Willard Gibbs: “I never read Muriel Rukeyser’s book on Willard Gibbs, but did read that one on Thomas Harriot. This was some years ago, and I only remember off hand the general impression it made on me, namely that I got little out of it.”
Dated December 13th, 1978. A typed letter from John Cheever to Louise Kertesz, talking about a photograph from Yaddo with Muriel in it. Also contains some handwritten notes by Louise Kertesz.
Dated September 20th, 1978. A typed letter from MH (Mary Hayne) to Louise Kertesz North recounting North’s experience in a class held by Muriel Rukeyser. Entitled: “Come To Your Shell: Muriel Rukeyser from the eyes of a student.
Dated September 12th, 1978. A typed letter from Mary Hayne North, a former student of MR at Sarah Lawrence, to Louise Kertesz, talking about contributions that she could make for Louise’s book, such as her review of THE GATES, as yet unpublished; she also offers to paint a portrait of Muriel Rukeyser and wonders if she knows of grants that might support such endeavor..
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This December 1990 broadcast includes an interview with the Director Urvashi Vaid of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, musical selections, and a sketch comedy piece.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This October 1990 broadcast includes musical selections, information on queer events in Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County, LGBTQ-related news from around the world, and an interview with American cartoonist and original creator of the Bechdel test, Alison Bechdel.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This February 1995 broadcast includes an interview with famed poet and writer Allen Ginsberg.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This August 1991 broadcast includes information about queer events in Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County, musical selections, LGBTQ-related news from around the world, and an interview with an Ann Arbor area lesbian male impersonator.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This July 1991 broadcast includes musical selections, information on queer events in Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County, and LGBTQ news from around the world.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This July 1991 broadcast includes a listing of local queer events in Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County, LGBTQ-related news from around the world, musical selections, and the second half of an interview with Native American and AIDS activist Beth Brant.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This July 1991 broadcast includes information on queer related cinema, LGBTQ news from across the country, musical selections, and a piece by drag queen Vaginal Cream Davis.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This June 1991 broadcast includes an intro to the twelfth anniversary of the White Night riots in San Francisco that occurred after the assassination of Harvey Milk, musical selections, and a reading of a poem titled "I am a SCAB (Society for the Complete Annihilation of Breeding)."
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This January 1991 includes an interview with Indigo Girls singer/songwriter Amy Ray.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This January 1991 broadcast includes an interview with Elise Bryant, a Ann Arbor-based playwriter of the production of "Zoo Zoo Chronicles."
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This January 1991 broadcast includes an interview with Ilene Lynch from the domestic violence organization SafeHouse about the topic of lesbian battery.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. The February 1991 broadcast includes LGBTQ news and events in Washtenaw County as well as an interview with LGBTQ novelist Lev Raphael.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This October 1990 broadcast includes an interview with novelist and gay activist Sarah Schulman.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This September 1990 broadcast includes musical selections and an in-depth interview with three members of the HIV/AIDS advocacy group ACT UP Ann Arbor and a defendant in the Adrian 17 sex scandal in Adrian, Michigan. The Adrian 17 were seventeen male defendants who were all charged with gross indecency for engaging in homosexual acts at a public park. Over half of the men were over 40, married, and had children living in the Adrian community. The local Adrian newspaper published the names and addresses of each defendant on the front page of the newspaper.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This May 1990 broadcast includes musical selections and a detailed discussion with a University of Michigan PhD candidate Raelynn Hillhouse, who studied extensively in Communist East German and in Soviet influenced Eastern Europe. The conversation with Hillhouse describes the status of LGBTQ people living and expressing themselves in Eastern Bloc countries.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This May 1990 broadcast includes musical selections, news and announcements on LGBTQ related events and information, and an interview with three guests from the University of Michigan and ACT UP to discuss the status of HIV/AIDS in the country.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. The January broadcast highlights LGBTQ news and events in Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan and includes the reading of a queer poem. The February broadcast begins with news and announcements about LGBTQ events and information in Washtenaw County, and later includes a roundtable discussion from several people about being the child of lesbian or gay parents.
Closets R4 Clothes was a LGBTQ oriented student radio program from the University of Michigan's WCBN Ann Arbor. The Closets R4 Clothes collection in the Eastern Michigan University Archives contains radio broadcast recordings from 1988 to 1999. This broadcast from June 1991 includes an update on queer news and events in Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County and an interview with Matt Bower from the local Metro Detroit chapter of Copwatch.
