Blueprints: Falvey Library

Contents: December 2004

• Virginia Spencer Carr: Biographer, professor, and Southern belle
• Lisa Scottoline speaks at Falvey
• Featured databases for December
• Tips for searching Falvey’s resources from off-campus
• Also contributing to this issue

By Luisa Cywinski

   Biographers are fascinating people. Not only can they show us the life of an important personality, but in many cases they are fortunate enough to have walked alongside their subject. Virginia Spencer Carr is just such a person. Falvey Memorial Library was honored by Carr’s visit at the most recent Distinguished Lecture Series event held on November 18 to talk about her recent book, Paul Bowles : a Life (Scribner, 2004). She is noted for having written biographies of Carson McCullers and John Dos Passos, as well as a critical interpretation entitled Understanding Carson McCullers.

   Her adventurous spirit, clothed in eloquence, shone through as she delivered her soft-spoken advice to the biographer in all of us. What is it about literary celebrities that inspires her to examine their lives? Her answer to this question would be that she seeks to experience the “romance of a marvelous adventure.” It is and continues to be an act of love for her to pursue the biographical investigation of contemporary personas.

From Paris to Tangiers to Palm Beach, Carr traveled extensively to accomplish her goal of gathering first-hand information whenever possible. One of the many people she interviewed, prior to and during the process of writing Bowles’ biography was Gore Vidal, who first proposed that she write about Paul Bowles. At the time, she was already under contract to write about Tennessee Williams, but, as fate would have it, the contract dissolved, which allowed her a change of subject. Bowles’ childhood trials, youthful flamboyance and numerous compositions, poems and novels made him an irresistible biographical figure. Carr found that as reluctant as Bowles was to share the intimate details of his life, she was just as persistent in asking the right questions and being bold enough to ask them, which revealed the personal aspects of his life that make the biography complete.

Virginia Carr and Joe Lucia, director of Falvey Memorial Library  (Photograph by John Welsh)

   The original manuscript, which was over 1300 pages, was subjected to the painful process of editing, slimming the volume down to about 600 pages. Unfortunately, some of Carr’s most favorite passages and stories were eliminated but, fortunately, she favored the audience with a few of them. One in particular was how Paul Bowles was acknowledged to be the cheapest man in Tangiers. However, his actions spoke louder than his reputation for thrift. Carr discovered that, over the years, Bowles had contributed generously to his community in Tangiers and, while visiting Carr in the United States, he cheerfully donated $100,000 to establish a fiction writing program at a Florida university with which she was affiliated.

   Although Carr’s lecture dealt primarily with Bowles’ biography, she also shared some advice with future biographers. No matter how many biographies may have been written about a particular person, the writer brings herself into the writing of the biography, making hers a unique perspective of the person about whom she writes. This will become evident as she embarks on her next project which will investigate the life of Eudora Welty, the acclaimed author and photographer.   

By Laura Hutelmyer

   The National Italian American Foundation hosted a talk by Lisa Scottoline, mystery writer and area resident, in the Falvey Memorial Library lounge on November 10. Her appearance, co-sponsored by the English department, was designed as an instructional talk for Professor Karyn Hollis' writing classes. Scottoline entertained the audience with stories of her personal life and writing life.

  Drawing on her great sense of humor, Scottoline told the students that it was a combination of divorce, the birth of her daughter and debt that pushed her to drop her career as a lawyer and become a writer. She focused on her new book, Killer Smile, and explained how she wrote the book around events that occurred in her grandparents' lives. Scottoline told the students that, when writing, "forget an outline and write what you know."

   She encouraged the students to send her their writing samples and stressed the need to secure a good agent. Scottoline’s enthusiasm for writing was contagious, and many in the audience left with the knowledge that they could be writers too if they are patient, ambitious and disciplined.  

By Louise Green

   Marquis Who’s Who on the Web provides biographical information about over one million individuals listed in 20 Marquis Who’s Who titles dating back to 1985. The information provided includes “birth data, family, education and degree, career history, creative works, awards, military history, achievements, current memberships, interest/hobbies and contact information.” (database notes). If an individual elects to provide the data, his or her political affiliation and religion are included. All the information is searchable in the Advanced Search mode.  No more than 1000 names can be retrieved in a single search.

   Selecting executives from the Occupation drop down menu and combining it with Villanova as College/University locates 351 names. Villanova can also be combined with Degrees- MBA (38) or MSN (64) or MS* (266, i.e. MS in any field).

   Oxford Dictionary of National Biography Online covers the “lives of over 50,000 noteworthy people from all walks of life in the British past, including artists, scientists, writers, industrialists, performers, explorers, criminals, and eccentrics, as well as politicians, church leaders, and soldiers, mariners, doctors, and lawyers” from 4 B.C. to 2000 A.D.  (database notes).  All persons from the print DNB have been included online and the biographies have been completely rewritten or revised and expanded. 16,300 new biographies have been added. Individuals covered have three things in common: a connection to the British Isles, are noteworthy and are no longer living. The information has been thoroughly researched and includes a list of references used in the preparation of the article as well as archival materials and records of portraits, photographs, etc. The text of each article is fully searchable and themes or groupings are provided to facilitate identifying monarchs, cardinals and saints, etc. listed in the Oxford DNB.

Use the Oxford DNB to identify the Toldpuddle martyrs or Little Weesy or to read the entry for Henry VIII or Princess Diana.

   These and other biographical sources may be searched from your office or home by going to the library homepage and selecting Databases by Subject: Multi-subject: Biographies.  
 

   Some Falvey information resources are accessible by anyone. If you have an Internet connection you can reach Falvey Memorial Library's homepage from an off-campus site to search VUCat, the library's online catalog, as well as other libraries’ catalogs and the many World Wide Web search engines.

   However, some resources are restricted to Villanova University students, faculty and staff due to licensing restrictions. Databases such as Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe, the Britannica Online, JSTOR and other paid subscription databases indicated by an * next to its title on the database list are available to the University community only.

   We’ve made it easier for you to access Falvey's databases and e-journals from off-campus by using the EZproxy server. Instructions for using EZproxy can be found on the library homepage under Access Databases Off-Campus.

   To search the subscription databases, go to “Articles” on Falvey's homepage  and find a database by clicking one of these links: Databases by Title (when you know which database you need), Databases by Subject (for a list of databases in a subject area) or E-journal (for the online version of journals available in electronic format).

   EZproxy prompts you to log in using your University Standard Authentication Password (VU email User ID and password). 
  
   After entering your User ID and password, you will be connected to the database or e-journal you selected. (Note: The following license-restricted resources cannot access EZproxy because of specific technical requirements: Factiva and Marquis Who’s Who. Please connect to the old proxy if you wish to search these databases.)

   EZproxy uses cookies to keep track of your session so you don't have to log in again to access new resources. EZproxy will not work if your browser does not accept cookies. These cookies contain only your session key and expire when you close your browser. No personal information is stored by EZproxy.

  EZproxy will not work with AOL's browser. If you are currently using an AOL browser and want to access the library’s resources from off-campus, please download Netscape Navigator, Mozilla or Microsoft Internet Explorer.  Minimize AOL and open one of these browsers to access the resources at Falvey Memorial Library.

   In some cases EZproxy will accept your username/password, but you cannot enable JavaScript. A possibility is that JavaScript has been turned off on your browser, which can affect some indexes. To enable Javascript in your browser check the instructions for using EZproxy (library homepage Access Databases Off-Campus).

   Do you have a personal firewall/virus protection installed on your PC? Personal firewalls can cause problems with EZproxy. Norton Personal Firewall is a common offender. Temporarily disable your firewall/virus protection and see if that allows you to connect properly. You will need to consult your software manual or contact the software company's technical support for help in setting your security software so that you can access our library resources.

   If you encounter any difficulties when using the EZproxy server or if you have questions about this remote access service, contact us by e-mail at ref@villanova.edu or phone (610) 519-4273 during Research & Consultation desk hours.

   Susan Ottignon, Andrew Nagy and Jutta Seibert helped to implement this new service.

Also contributing to this issue:  Louise Green, Laura Hutelmyer, Jacqueline Mirabile, Judith Olsen and Jacqueline Smith