Click for accessible search Skip Navigation

Finding Aid for Tennessee Williams collection of noncommercial recordings, 1948.

Tennessee Williams Collection, 1948

*L(Special) 89-35
Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound. New York Public Library.
40 Lincoln Center Plaza
New York, NY 10023-7498
(212) 870-1663
rha@nypl.org
http://nypl.org/research/lpa/rha/rha.html
    Encoding of this finding aid sponsored by grant funding from The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation.

    ©1999 The New York Public Library. Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations. All rights reserved.

    Table of Contents

    Descriptive Summary Table of Contents

    Title
    Tennessee Williams Collection, 1948.
    Collection ID
    *L(Special) 89-35
    Creator
    Tennessee Williams .
    Extent
    13 sound recordings
    Repository
    Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound. The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. 40 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023-7498

    Administrative Information Table of Contents

    Access

    Collection is open to the public. Access to original items is restricted. Advance notification required for use.

    Publication Rights

    For permission to publish, contact the Curator, The Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound.

    Perferred Citation

    Tennessee Williams Collection, *L(Special) 89.35, The Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

    Biographical Note Table of Contents

    Tennessee Williams (1911-1983), born Thomas Lanier Williams in Columbus, Mississippi, was an American playwright, poet, and novelist. Being from an old Tennessee family, he adopted his first name while in New Orleans in 1939. After graduating from the State University of Iowa in 1938, he traveled around the country while working at odd jobs and writing short plays and getting occasional productions in community theaters. He worked briefly as a scriptwriter for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1943.

    He achieved sudden success with the New York production of The Glass Menagerie (1945). His subsequent success came with A Streetcar Named Desire (1947), which won a Pulitzer Prize.

    Although Williams' life was marked by personal disarray, mental stress, and drug addiction, he enjoyed long-term relationships with male companions and continued to be productive. In 1968 he converted to Catholicism.

    His later plays include Summer and Smoke (1948), The Rose Tattoo (1950), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955, Pulitzer Prize), Sweet Bird of Youth (1959), and Night of the Iguana (1961).

    He also published two novels and several poems. Many of his plays were made into successful movies, but his later works were not well received and he became disaffected from the New York professional theater. He died by choking on the cap of a bottle of pills.

    Scope and Content Note Table of Contents

    Eleven of the thirteen recordings in the collection were made by Williams in 1948 at a New Orleans carnival booth facility. These recordings primarily feature Williams reading his poems, including selections from In the Winter of Cities. Williams also participates in apparently impromptu comic sketches with friends. The remaining two recordings are songs by composer Ray Cook with texts from In the Winter of Cities, here performed by tenor and piano. These two recordings were given to Williams by Ray Cook.

    Organization Table of Contents

    The collection is organized alphabetically.

    Collection Listing Table of Contents

       
    *LJ-10 158*LJ-10 159 In the winter of cities (Songs) / Ray Cook.
    2 sound discs : analog, 78 rpm, aluminum-based acetate ; 10 in.

    Access restricted. Advanced notification required for use.

    Contents: Heavenly grass -- Sugar in the cane -- Lonesome man -- Cabin.

       
    *LT-10 9996 Pancho singing, 1948 .
    1 sound disc : analog, 78 rpm, paper-based acetate, mono. ; 6 in.

    Recorded in New Orleans, 1948.

    Performer: Pancho Rodriguez y Gonzalez.

    Preservation copy in: *LT-10 1887.

    Access to original items restricted.

    Original in: *LJ-7 11.

       
    *LT-10 1887 Pancho talks about Glass Menagerie, 1948 .
    1 sound disc : analog, 78 rpm, paper-based acetate, mono. ; 6 in.

    Recorded in New Orleans, 1948.

    Speaker: Pancho Rodriquez y Gonzalez.

    Access to original items restricted.

    Original in: *LJ-7 12.

       
    *LT-10 1887 Poems [recitation], 1948 .
    7 sound discs : analog, 78 rpm, paper-based acetate, mono. ; 6 in.

    Recorded in New Orleans, 1948.

    Speaker: Tennessee Williams.

    Access to original items restricted.

    Original in: *LJ-7 4, *LJ-7 5, *LJ-7 6, *LJ-7 7, *LJ-7 8, *LJ-7 9, *LJ-7 10.

    Contents: One was true one was faithful -- He sympathized with the persecuted Jews -- I know things that can't be told -- Two poems for Margo: I know things that can't be told ; Peto our pony -- Heavenly grass -- Lady-Anemone -- Yes, lately the place has grown wilder.

       
    *LT-10 1887 Princess interview [comic sketch], 1948 .
    1 sound disc : analog, 78 rpm, paper-based acetate, mono. ; 6 in.

    Recorded in New Orleans, 1948.

    Speakers: Tennessee Williams ; Pancho Rodruguez y Gonzalez.

    Access to original items restricted.

    Original in: *LJ-7 13.

       
    *LT-10 1887 Streetcar named Desire: 11th scene [parody], 1948 .
    1 sound disc : analog, 78 rpm, aluminum-based acetate ; 7 in.

    Recorded in New Orleans, 1948.

    Performers: Tennessee Williams ; Joanna Alberts ; Johnny Maheegan.

    Access to original items restricted.

    Original in: *LJ-7 1.

    Contents: Streetcar named Desire: 11th scene -- Trio: Down in the valley.

    Chat with a librarian now