American literature holdings in the Rare Book and Special Collections Division are far from comprehensive, as most late nineteenth-
and twentieth-century works remain in the General Collections, but there is sufficient unique material to merit attention.
The division routinely collects current copyright deposits of nearly eighty contemporary American women writers. For certain
works by contemporary women writers and artists the Library's only copies are found in the Press Collection or the Artists'
Books Collection.
Susan E. King's Women and Cars (Los Angeles: Paradise Press, 1983; N7433.5.K56 A4 1983 Artists' Bks) and her Georgia (Los Angeles: Paradise Press, 1981; PS3561.I4834 G46 1981 Press) are in the Rare Book and Special
Collections Division only and five of Johanna Drucker's works are found only in the Artists' Books Collection. Three of Sylvia
Plath's works, including The Green Rock (Ely: Embers Handpress, 1982; PS3566.L27 G7 1982 Press) , are found only in the Press Collection, as is Arthur Miller's Homely Girl (New York: Peter Blum, 1992; PS3525.I5156 H66 1992 Press) , with etchings by Louise Bourgeois. Works found in these collections are often published in limited editions, sometimes numbering
as few as ten, and with unusual artwork or bindings.
Significant holdings by a number of earlier writers include works by Laura Benet, Elizabeth Bishop, Alice Brown, Pearl S.
Buck, Alice Carey, Emily Dickinson, Edna Ferber, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Ellen Glasgow, Louise Imogen Guiney, Sarah Josepha
Hale, Lorraine Hansberry, Lillian Hellman, Zora Neale Hurston, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Margaret Mitchell, Marianne Moore,
Margaret Bayard Smith, Gertrude Stein, Eudora Welty, and Edith Wharton. Some of these were acquired as part of special collections
like the Oliver Wendell Holmes Collection and the Finkelstein Collection. Others are particularly interesting because of inscriptions,
unusual provenance, or special illustrations.
The Queen's Twin. Sarah Wyman Whitman. Signed trade binding for Sarah Orne Jewett. (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1899; PS2132.Q4 Holmes). Rare
Book and Special Collections Division.
A unique extra-illustrated copy of Helen Hunt Jackson's The Procession of Flowers in Colorado (Boston: Roberts Brother, 1886; QK150.J12 1888) has six spectacular full-page watercolors of Colorado wildflowers in addition to the twelve in-text marginal watercolors
and a tailpiece. Original artwork by Jackson's good friend Alice Stewart delayed actual publication of this limited edition
of 100 copies for two years. A number of
the novels of Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909) are in bindings designed by her friend Sarah Wyman Whitman (1842-1904), one of
Houghton Mifflin's most respected designers. In particularly good condition are five in the Oliver Wendell Holmes Collection:
Country of the Pointed Firs (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1896;
PS2132.C64 1896 c. 3 Holmes) , Deephaven (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1894; PS2132.D4 1894 Holmes) , Life of Nancy (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1895; PS2132.L55 1895 Holmes) , The Queen's Twin (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1899; PS2132.Q4 Holmes)
, and Tales of New England (London: R. Osgood, McIlvaine & Co., 1893; PS2132.T34 1893 Holmes) and Lost Lady (New York: Knopf, 1926; PS3505.A87 L6 1923 c. 2)
have signed inscriptions by the author, expressing her admiration for Marian MacDowell, who supported Cather's writing (see
the topical essay, “The House That Marian Built”).
