"Support the Arts" Car Tag Grants

This Goodly Land would like to thank every one of you that has bought a "Support the Arts" Alabama license plate. The extra money you paid to get that plate went into a special fund that supports projects in the arts.

This Goodly Land has benefited from two grants that came from this fund. The first provided seed money to help our project get up and running, while the most recent enabled us to launch our new feature "This Day in Alabama Literary History." Other projects from the Alabama Center for the Book (our parent organization) have also benefited from this fund, most recently the 2008 Alabama Book Festival.

As funding gets harder to come by and belts get tightened, programs that allow private citizens to make a contribution to the public good become increasingly valuable. Please thank your Alabama legislators for this program, and tell them you're proud to live in a state that values the arts.

And, if you haven't bought one of these license plates yet, please consider it. Thanks.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Blasts from the Past: 19th Century Digital Texts

When we began selecting authors to profile in This Goodly Land, there was never any question as to whether we would include authors from Alabama's past. Cultural heritage is precious to all of us, but this is especially true in the South.

There was some question, however, about access to books written by our 19th Century authors. Some of these books have been reprinted, of course. Quite a few are included in the Library of Alabama Classics series from the University of Alabama Press. There was concern, however, that people wouldn't be able to locate copies of non-reprinted books without a close personal relationship with a rare books dealer.

The Internet and the World Wide Web have eased this problem to a considerable extent. It's become a lot easier to find and purchase old or out-of-print books by using the Web to locate dealers with copies for sale. But that's not the only option.

Many groups have digitized 18th, 19th, and early 20th Century books and made them available free to anyone who has access to the Web. Some of these projects allow you to look at images of the actual book pages, while all allow you to read the books in plain text versions.

In This Goodly Land's author profiles, whenever one of an author's "Selected Works" is available online, we provide a link to that text. That way, an interested viewer can check it out immediately instead of having to remember to look for it later. This is one way we hope to increase awareness and appreciation of our historic literature.

Here are some of our favorite digital book projects. If your favorite isn't listed, please share it with us in the Comments section.

Making of America (University of Michigan): 18th/19th/early 20th Century books and some periodicals; paper copies can be purchased

Making of America (Cornell University): 19th Century periodicals such as The Century, Harper's Monthly Magazine, and Scribner's Magazine

Wright American Fiction, 1851-1875 (Indiana University): 19th Century novels

Documenting the American South (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill): books, oral histories, legal documents, pamphlets

Women Writers Online (Brown University): books, short stories, poems

Project Gutenberg: books, short stories (includes materials in foreign languages); texts can also be downloaded as zipped files; some available as downloadable audiobooks

LibriVox: downloadable audio versions of books, short stories, poems (includes materials in foreign languages); links to Project Gutenberg texts

Text Archive of the Internet Archive: books, oral histories, legal documents (includes materials in foreign languages); texts can also be downloaded as pdfs; paper copies can be purchased

Google Book Search: books (specify "full view" to select only complete texts); public domain texts can also be downloaded as pdfs

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Video: Winston Groom on Profiles with Wendy Garner

This past May, the Alabama Public Television series Profiles with Wendy Garner broadcast an interview with Alabama author Winston Groom (profiled on This Goodly Land). You can watch this interview as streaming video.

Watch "Winston Groom" on Profiles with Wendy Garner online.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Video: Edward O. Wilson on NOVA

This past May, the PBS series NOVA broadcast "Lord of the Ants," a program about Alabama scientist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Dr. Edward O. Wilson (profiled on This Goodly Land).

When you visit the "Lord of the Ants" Web page, you will find an interview with Dr. Wilson, an excerpt from his autobiography, Naturalist, and capsule summaries for twelve of his books. For the time being at least, you can also watch the program online as streaming video.

Watch "Lord of the Ants" online.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

New This Goodly Land Logo!

As you can see, we have a beautiful new logo for This Goodly Land! It was created by Auburn University Graphic Design student Katie Corven. The curved lines represent both the pages of an open book and the undulations of the Alabama landscape. The green color suggests the lushness of Alabama's forests and agriculture, while the blue reminds us of her waterways.

Ms. Corven designed the logo at the request of a group of Auburn University graduate students in the Department of Communication and Journalism. This past spring, Lauren Mobley, Marisa Webb, Carrie Reif, Shannon Gally, and Carey Moore created an outline for a publicity campaign for This Goodly Land as part of their Public Relations Campaigns class.

In the next year or so, we will be expanding on their efforts and implementing more of the ideas in their campaign. We are extremely grateful for all their great ideas and hard work.

View the MySpace page that the students created for This Goodly Land.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Video: William Bartram Lecture by Dr. John C. Hall

On March 27, 2008, the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities of the College of Liberal Arts in Auburn University sponsored "Bartram's Travels," a lecture about the explorations of Alabama author William Bartram (profiled on This Goodly Land).

The lecture was given by Dr. John C. Hall as part of the Draughon Seminars in State and Local History. Read more about Dr. Hall and the Draughon Seminars here.

Dr. Hall's lecture was recorded and has been made available online.

Download Dr. John C. Hall's "Bartram's Travels" lecture as a free podcast from iTunes.

You must already have the iTunes software on your computer to download this video. You can download the application from the iTunes Home Page.

If you have trouble with the above link, open your browser and go to the Auburn University iTunes page.

Click on the OPEN AU ITUNES link in the center of the page. You will get a pop-up window asking you to launch iTunes. Click on Launch Application. (Again, you must already have the iTunes software on your computer.)

The iTunes Store will open up at the Auburn University section. Click on the icon for the College of Liberal Arts, then click on the icon for Outreach. There will be two tabs (like file folder tabs) near the bottom of the page. Click on the Public Lectures tab. "Bartram's Travels" is the second lecture in the list. Click on the Get Movie button to begin your download.

(This video file is large and has a very long download time. You may need to download very early in the day or late at night to avoid having the system time out.)

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Video: Albert Murray Symposium online

On January 23, 2008, the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities, with the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts in Auburn University, the Auburn University English Department, and Tuskegee University, sponsored "Albert Murray and the Aesthetic Imagination of a Nation: A Symposium," a scholarly examination of the life and work of Alabama author Albert Murray (profiled on This Goodly Land).

The symposium sessions were recorded and have been made available online. You can watch them as streaming video from YouTube or download them as free video podcasts from iTunes.

Watch the symposium on YouTube:

"Introduction." Speakers: Mark Wilson, Anne-Katrin Gramberg, Auburn University (9:11)

Session One, Part One: "Jack the Rabbit and an Alabama Briar Patch." Speaker: Jay Lamar, Auburn University (19:30)

Session One, Part Two: "Cosmos Murray and the Aesthetic Imagination of a Nation." Speaker: Barbara A. Baker, Tuskegee University (25:54)

Session Two, Part One: "Albert Murray and Tuskegee Institute: Art As the True Measure of Place." Speaker: A. Caroline Gebhard, Tuskegee University (27:58)

Session Two, Part Two: "Confrontation and Transcendence in Twenty-First Century Blues." Speaker: Jackie McCorvey, Jr., Tuskegee University (14:31)

Session Three, Part One: "Albert Murray and Visual Art." Speaker: Paul Devlin, Stony Brook University (SUNY) (32:11)

Session Three, Part Two: "Dewey's Pragmatism Extended: Education and Aesthetic Practice in Train Whistle Guitar." Speaker: Roberta S. McGuire, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh (27:32)

Session Four, Part One: "Murray and Mann: Variations on a Theme." Speaker: Lauren Walsh, Columbia University (23:56)

Session Four, Part Two: "Murray's Mulatto America." Speaker: Maurice Pogue, Michigan State University (26:33)

Session Five, Part One: "Chinaberry Tree, Chinaberry Tree." Speaker: Bert Hitchcock, Auburn University (26:31)

Session Five, Part Two: "Hyphens, Heroes, and Dragons: A Conversation with Albert Murray." Speaker: Don Noble, University of Alabama (12:01)

Keynote Session: "'It Don't Mean a Thing If It Ain't Got That Swing': Albert Murray, Omni-American." Speaker: John Callahan, Lewis and Clark College (56:44)

Keynote Questions. Speaker: John Callahan (4:44)

Download the symposium as free podcasts from iTunes:

Open your browser and go to the Auburn University iTunes page.

Click on the OPEN AU ITUNES link in the center of the page. You will get a pop-up window asking you to launch iTunes. Click on Launch Application. (You must already have the iTunes software on your computer to download these videos. You can download it from the iTunes Home Page.)

The iTunes Store will open up at the Auburn University section. Click on the icon for the College of Liberal Arts, then click on the icon for the Albert Murray symposium. The symposium sessions will now be available for you to download.

(These video files are very large and have long download times. Depending on the speed of your Internet connection, you may need to download them one at a time to prevent the system from timing out. )

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Video: "Where Are You From?"

Back in the fall of 2006, when we were getting This Goodly Land ready for public launch, we knew that we would have to address the issue of what constitutes an "Alabama author." We saw and liked an essay written by Todd Keith, then editor of PORTICO Magazine, on what it means to be a Birmingham writer. We asked Todd if he would adapt this to Alabama writers as a whole, and he agreed. "Literary Alabama: Is There Such a Thing As an 'Alabama Writer'?" has been on our site from the beginning.

This past spring, we asked local author and Auburn University English instructor Peter Huggins to make a video with us and say something about his relationship with Alabama. Fortunately for us, Peter had recently published an essay on the meaning of place in literature, and he adapted it for our purpose. The resulting video, "Where Are You From?", is now on our Web site and available for viewing.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

This Day in Alabama Literary History

We've just added a fun new feature to the home page of This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape. We call it "This Day in Alabama Literary History."

When you access our home page, a program embedded in the page code automatically checks the day's date and presents you with a list of events in Alabama literary history associated with that date. If you want to see what happened on another date, you can use the menus to select any combination of month and day.

You can subscribe to an RSS feed for "This Day in Alabama Literary History" by clicking on the feed icon in the lower left corner of the TGL home page.

There are still a few blank spots on the calendar that we would like to fill. If you know about a historic event related to Alabama literature and you would like us to include it, please tell us in the Comments section or use the Suggestion Form from the Web site.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape

Welcome!

Welcome to our blog for This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape. This Goodly Land is an online literary map for the State of Alabama. On our Web site, we provide biographical sketches of Alabama writers past and present and link them to the places in Alabama that were/are significant to them.

We'll be using this blog to call attention to new site features, new author profiles, and other things that make us proud. We'll also be making announcements about events such as conferences and festivals where we'll be promoting This Goodly Land. Occasionally, we'll call your attention to items we think are of interest to the Alabama literary community as a whole.

This won't be a daily blog. It may not even be a weekly blog. We will emulate David Byrne and Mr. Ed and only write when we have something we feel is worth communicating. We hope you'll agree with us. Of course, if you don't, that's what the Comments section is for.

Midge Coates, Project Manager
This Goodly Land: Alabama's Literary Landscape