Tag: books

A Closer Look at the Gorey-est of Vampires

by Sara Weber, Special Collections Digital Project Specialist

Merriam-Webster defines a vampire as, “the reanimated body of a dead person believed to come from the grave at night and suck the blood of persons asleep.” The Oxford English dictionary gives the middle of the eighteenth century as their earliest evidence for the word vampire, but the concept far predates that in the folklore of various cultures. While characters of a vampiric nature occur as early as Babylonian poems recorded on cuneiform and the ancient Greek writings of Philostratus, the folklore that is most significant to the development of the Western concept of a vampire was that of the Slavic cultures of Eastern Europe. These malevolent beings were seen as gruesome and frightening, because death, disease, and degeneracy were all attributed to their actions and influence. As the vampire became a more familiar figure in Western cultures during the eighteenth century (by 1740 Alexander Pope compared himself to “one of those vampires in Germany” when he went out at night), they were initially perceived in a similar, grotesque manner. However, over time the vampire—though still a villain—came to be portrayed as charismatic and seductive.

Bram Stoker, Dracula. Eighth edition. London: Archibald Constable & Co., 1904.
(Rare Books Small PR 6037 .T617 D7 1904)

Bram Stoker’s 1897 Dracula was not the first vampire in English literature, Robert Southey’s 1801 poem “Thalaba the Destroyer” is generally given that title. Polidori’s short story “The Vampyre” (1819), Varney the Vampire; or, the Feast of Blood (1845–1847), and Sheridan Le Fanu’s “Carmilla” (1872) all preceded it as well. But Stoker’s vampire has become the template against which all modern vampires are compared. The Count is initially described as,

“…a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white moustache, and clad in black from head to foot, without a single speck of colour about him anywhere. …his hand grasped mine with a strength which made me wince, an effect which was not lessened by the fact that it seemed as cold as ice—more like the hand of a dead than a living man.” (Dracula, Chapter 2)

He is gracious and courteous, however, and as the novel progresses, and he feeds, he becomes less corpse-like. When Mina and Johnathan see him in London, she describes him as “a tall, thin man, with a beaky nose and black moustache and pointed beard… His face was not a good face; it was hard, and cruel, and sensual, and his big white teeth, that looked all the whiter because his lips were so red, were pointed like an animal’s.” (Dracula, Chapter 13)

Count Dracula has become more immortal in popular culture than he was in Stoker’s novel, the subject of numerous theatrical adaptations and cinema classics. The first play—more of a staged reading of the book, really—ocurred the same year as the book was published, as a way of securing copyright protection. In the 1920s, Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderson created their own adaptation, and in 1977 a revival of this version arrived on Broadway. This production featured the design work of Edward Gorey in its sets, costuming, posters, and playbills. He won a Tony Award for the Costume Design, and was nominated for Set Design. The play also won a Tony for Most Innovative Production of a Revival. (Frank Langella was nominated for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play, while Dennis Rosa was nominated for Best Direction of a Play.)

As the play became a popular success as well as a critical one, Gorey’s designs appeared on a variety of merchandise from t-shirts and bags to puzzles, toys, and even a miniature theatre, examples of many of which are found in Notre Dame’s Special Collections.

The Suzy Conway and Robert M. Conway Collection of Gorey Ephemera (EPH 5004) also includes articles and article illustrations, drawings, picture postcards, posters, and correspondence. There are materials relating to his work illustrating book covers for Doubleday, including a few other vampire themed or related texts.

Fronts and back of the dust jackets for Vampires : Two Centuries of Great Vampire Stories, edited by Alan Ryan (Rare Books Medium PS 648 .V35 V3 1987) and 13 Plays of Ghosts and the Supernatural, selected by Marvin Kaye (Rare Books Medium PN 6120 .G45 T45 1990).

In recognition of the centenary of Edward Gorey’s birth and the 25th anniversary of his death, RBSC’s September-October spotlight has highlighted Gorey’s engagement with the New York City Ballet in his distinctive noir style. Although the exhibit officially closes today, it will remain viewable through early next week, before the installation on November 5 of the November-December spotlight. Come visit Special Collections for a further look at some of Gorey’s distinctive work.

Happy Halloween to you and yours
from all of us in Notre Dame’s Special Collections!

Halloween 2024: An Irish Story Produces a Halloween Icon
Halloween 2023: Demon Horses and How to Tame Them
Halloween 2022: A Halloween Tale: “John Reardon and the Sister Ghosts”
Halloween 2021: A Welsh Witch in the Woods
Halloween 2020: Headless Horsemen in American and Irish Legend
Halloween 2019: A Halloween trip to Mexico
Halloween 2018: A story for Halloween: “Johnson and Emily; or, The Faithful Ghost“
Halloween 2017: A spooky story for Halloween: The Goblin Spider
Halloween 2016: Ghosts in the Stacks

Upcoming Events: November 2025

Please join us for the following public events and exhibits being hosted in Rare Books and Special Collections:

Thursday, November 13 at 5:00pm | Italian Research Seminar: “Our Memories, Ourselves: Restoring Political Communities in Purgatorio” by Filippo Gianferrari (UC Santa Cruz).

The Fall 2025 Exhibition | “What through the universe in leaves is scattered”: Mapping Global Dante in Translation

This exhibit traces the global journey of Dante’s masterpiece through rare and valuable printed editions, highlighting how translators, artists, and printers have popularized and reshaped the Commedia. These volumes reveal a dynamic dialogue between Dante’s poetry and the world. A global literary perspective transforms Dante from a monumental yet isolated figure of the European Middle Ages into a central presence in the ongoing international conversation about humanity, the universe, time, eternity, and the power of literature.

Drop in to one of this month’s Exhibit Open Houses to meet and speak informally with one of the curators of the fall exhibition, Mapping Global Dante in Translation. Learn how translators, artists, and printers have popularized and reshaped the Divine Comedy over the centuries and across the world and discover the Library’s many Dante editions.

Friday, November 7, 2:00 – 3:30pm | Exhibit Open House with curator Giulia Maria Gliozzi (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate)

Friday, November 21, 2:00 – 3:30pm | Exhibit Open House with curator Salvatore Riolo (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate)

This exhibit is curated by Salvatore Riolo (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate), and co-curators Giulia Maria Gliozzi (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate); Inha Park (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate); and Peter Scharer (Yale, Comparative Literature doctoral candidate). Theodore J. Cachey Jr. (Notre Dame) and Jacob Blakesley (Sapienza Università di Roma) served as consultants on the exhibit.

The exhibit is co-sponsored by the Center for Italian Studies and the Devers Program in Dante Studies. This and other exhibits within the Hesburgh Libraries are generously supported by the McBrien Special Collections Endowment.

MSH/LAT 0095
(Luz de Sagaceta)

Opening November 5, our next spotlight exhibit will feature several friendship albums being studied this semester by Notre Dame students in a class taught by Vanesa Miseres (Romance Languages & Literatures).

Bibliomania: The Library of Sir Thomas Phillipps curated by Anne Elise Crafton (2024-2025 Rare Books and Special Collections Postdoctoral Research Fellow) will continue through the end of the semester. Portrait of the Artist as a Dance Fan: Edward Gorey and the New York City Ballet curated by Rachel Bohlmann (American History Librarian and Curator) is available to view for just a few more days.

All exhibits are free and open to the public during business hours.

RBSC will be closed during the University of Notre Dame Thanksgiving Break, November 27 – 28.

Special Collections’ Fall 2025 Exhibition — “What through the universe in leaves is scattered”: Mapping Global Dante in Translation

Rare Books and Special Collections’ fall 2025 exhibition, “What through the universe in leaves is scattered”: Mapping Global Dante in Translation, is open and will run through December 19.

This exhibition traces the global journey of Dante’s masterpiece through rare and valuable printed editions, highlighting how translators, artists, and printers have popularized and reshaped the Commedia. These volumes reveal a dynamic dialogue between Dante’s poetry and the world. A global literary perspective transforms Dante from a monumental yet isolated figure of the European Middle Ages into a central presence in the ongoing international conversation about humanity, the universe, time, eternity, and the power of literature.

The exhibit is curated by Salvatore Riolo (Notre Dame Italian Studies doctoral candidate), and co-curators Giulia Maria Gliozzi (Notre Dame Italian Studies doctoral candidate); Inha Park (Notre Dame Italian Studies doctoral candidate); and Peter Scharer (Yale Comparative Literature doctoral candidate).

Theodore J. Cachey Jr., Notre Dame, and Jacob Blakesley, Sapienza Università di Roma, served as consultants on the exhibit.

Events

Drop in to meet and speak informally with one of the exhibition’s curators. Learn how translators, artists, and printers have popularized and reshaped the Divine Comedy over the centuries and across the world and discover some of the Library’s many Dante editions.

Friday, November 7, 2:00–3:30 pm
Friday, November 21, 2:00–3:30 pm

Tours of the exhibit may be arranged for classes and other groups by contacting rarebook@nd.edu.

All exhibits are free and open to the public during business hours. This and other exhibits within the library are generously supported by the McBrien Special Collections Endowment. This exhibit is co-sponsored by the Center for Italian Studies and the Devers Program in Dante Studies.

Upcoming Events: October 2025

Please join us for the following public events and exhibits being hosted in Rare Books and Special Collections:

Drop in to one of this month’s Exhibit Open Houses to meet and speak informally with one of the curators of the fall exhibition, Mapping Global Dante in Translation. Learn how translators, artists, and printers have popularized and reshaped the Divine Comedy over the centuries and across the world and discover the Library’s many Dante editions.

Thursday, October 3, 2:00 – 3:30pm | Exhibit Open House with curator Giulia Maria Gliozzi (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate)

Thursday, October 10, 2:00 – 3:30pm | Exhibit Open House with curator Inha Park (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate)

Thursday, October 17, 2:00 – 3:30pm | Exhibit Open House with curator Salvatore Riolo (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate)

Thursday, October 30 at 5:00pm | Italian Research Seminar: Research presentations by 4th-year students in the Italian PhD program (University of Notre Dame) — this year’s speakers are: Elisa Bisson, Inha Park, and Salvatore Riolo.

The Fall 2025 Exhibition | “What through the universe in leaves is scattered”: Mapping Global Dante in Translation

This exhibit traces the global journey of Dante’s masterpiece through rare and valuable printed editions, highlighting how translators, artists, and printers have popularized and reshaped the Commedia. These volumes reveal a dynamic dialogue between Dante’s poetry and the world. A global literary perspective transforms Dante from a monumental yet isolated figure of the European Middle Ages into a central presence in the ongoing international conversation about humanity, the universe, time, eternity, and the power of literature.

This exhibit is curated by Salvatore Riolo (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate), and co-curators Giulia Maria Gliozzi (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate); Inha Park (Notre Dame, Italian Studies doctoral candidate); and Peter Scharer (Yale, Comparative Literature doctoral candidate). Theodore J. Cachey Jr. (Notre Dame) and Jacob Blakesley (Sapienza Università di Roma) served as consultants on the exhibit.

The exhibit is co-sponsored by the Center for Italian Studies and the Devers Program in Dante Studies. This and other exhibits within the Hesburgh Libraries are generously supported by the McBrien Special Collections Endowment.

The current spotlight exhibits are: Portrait of the Artist as a Dance Fan: Edward Gorey and the New York City Ballet (September-October 2025) curated by Rachel Bohlmann (American History Librarian and Curator)…

…and Bibliomania: The Library of Sir Thomas Phillipps (May-December 2025) curated by Anne Elise Crafton (2024-2025 Rare Books and Special Collections Postdoctoral Research Fellow).

All exhibits are free and open to the public during business hours.

RBSC will be open regular hours during the University of Notre Dame Fall Break, October 18 – 26.

Condemnations of the Teachings of Martin Luther and Luther’s Response

by Alan Krieger, Theology and Philosophy Librarian

Hesburgh Libraries has recently acquired a rare volume that includes two early European university condemnations of the teachings of Martin Luther, as well as Luther’s response to them. Condemnatio doctrinalis libroru[m] Martini Lutheri, per quosdam Magistros nostros Louanien[sium] & Colonien[sium], facta. Responsio Lutheriana ad eande[m] condemnatione[m] (Vuittenbergae, 1520) contains official condemnations of Luther’s positions by the theological faculties of Cologne and Louvain, in which these groups assert that certain of Luther’s opinions are heretical, that he should retract them, and that his books should be forbidden and burned.

Historian Gert Gielis has recently explained the importance of these university writings:

“As the first official statements concerning Luther’s heresy, they were imperative steps in branding his teaching as heretical. Conveyed to Rome by Johannes Eck in March, 1520, the academic condemnations eventually influenced the official papal condemnation of Exsurge Domine, issued [by Pope Leo X] a few months later.”

—Gert Gielis, “«Post exactam et diligentem examinationem». How the Louvain Theologians condemned Luther’s Theses (1519): Context, Practices and Consequences,” Annali di Storia delle università italiane 2017, no. 2: p. 121.

The Louvain theologians produced 13 articles and Cologne authored its own set of 10; both faculties presented them to the pope’s representative in Germany, Cardinal Cajetan, for his comments. In early November 1519, the Louvain faculty also sent the text of their condemnation to their Dutch colleague Adriaan Florensz Boeyens, Bishop of Tortosa, who within a few years would become Pope Adrian VI. He answered with a letter on December 4, 1519, expressing his critical views on Luther and supporting the condemnation by Louvain. Both sets of condemnations, along with the letter from Boeyens, were published at Louvain in February 1520. By March 27, Luther had finished a lengthy critique of the universities’ views.

This volume includes the full text of the articles of condemnation issued by both Cologne and Louvain, Boeyens’ letter criticizing Luther, and the first edition of Luther’s rather lengthy reply—which constitutes the majority of the text.

We have identified only three other North American holdings of this Wittenberg edition.

English King Henry VIII’s 1521 Defense of the Seven Sacraments

by Alan Krieger, Theology and Philosophy Librarian

The Hesburgh Libraries has recently acquired a rare copy of the first Lyon (French) edition of King Henry VIII’s Regis Angliae Henrici huius nominis octavi Assertio septem sacramentorum adversus Martinum Lutherum (Lugduni, 1561), the English king’s defense of the Seven Sacraments which was first published in London in 1521.

This edition includes for the first time a scathing attack on the Protestant Reformation by Gabriel de Saconay (1527-1580), which elicited a reply from Jean Calvin. In his preface, Saconay offers a polemical summary of the previous 45 years, including discussions concerning Calvin, Luther, and Zwingli.

Also reproduced in the preface are letters by Erasmus and St. John Fisher concerning the work, as well as a letter from Pope Leo X that appeared in the preface of the first edition.

We have identified only six other North American holdings of this edition.

Memorial Day 2025

by Rachel Bohlmann, American History Librarian and Curator

Martin Luther King, Jr., John C Bennett, Henry Steele Commager, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Reinhold Niebuhr. Speak on the War in Vietnam. New York: Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam, 1967.

To commemorate Memorial Day 2025, Rare Books and Special Collections highlights an anti-war booklet published in 1967 by Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam (CALCAV). 

CALCAV formed at the end of 1965 for clergy and laity from three mainline American religious traditions—Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish—to work ecumenically to express dissent from the US government’s policy in Vietnam and, eventually, in other conflicts around the world. On April 4, 1967 CALCAV organized a mass meeting at the interdenominational Riverside Church in New York City. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who had just accepted the co-chairmanship of CALCAV, gave one of his most important statements against the war in this speech, “Beyond Vietnam.” He was joined by other well-known clergy and public intellectuals, including the historian Henry Steele Commager and Rabbi Dr. Abraham Heschel of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Three thousand people attended the event. 

Wanting to capitalize on King’s new role in the organization and public attention from the Riverside Church program, CALCAV quickly published 100,000 copies of this 31-page booklet. In the introduction, CALCAV declared “We feel that a time comes when silence is betrayal. That time has come for us in relation to Vietnam.” In the booklet, the organization included the four addresses given at that program as well as a speech King had made a few months earlier in Los Angeles, “The Casualties of the War in Vietnam.”

To underscore the group’s seriousness and broad cultural reach, CALCAV invited the public intellectual, theologian, and Union Theological Seminary professor, Reinhold Niebuhr to write the foreword to the publication. In it, the pastor and ethicist observed that although some Americans regarded US involvement in Vietnam as part of the nation’s international responsibility, Niebuhr argued that America in Vietnam was “an example of the ‘illusion of American omnipotence.'” He also defended King’s position of nonviolent resistance to evil, calling it “a real contribution to our civil, moral and political life.”

CALCAV used its publication to defend King from criticism. His anti-war stance had attracted censure from both allies in the civil rights movement and critics in the mainstream press. Just two days after the Riverside Church meeting the New York Times attacked the minister’s position in an editorial (April 7, 1967). CALCAV included a Q&A section at the end of the booklet in which they invited King’s fellow speakers to respond to the New York Times. Commager, Herschel, and John C. Bennett, President of Union Theological Seminar and the fourth speaker, challenged the Times‘ assessment of King by asserting emphatically, “Dr. King was not in error when he said: ‘The bombs in Vietnam explode at home; they destroy the dream and possibility for a decent America.'”

A happy Memorial Day to you and yours
from all of us in Notre Dame’s Special Collections!

2024 post: Influencing Opinion by Mapping the Early American Civil War
2023 post: A Woman’s Reporting on the Bonus Army in Depression-Era Washington
2022 post: Representing Decoration Day in a 19th Century Political Magazine
2021 post: An Early Civil War Caricature of Jefferson Davis
2020 post: Narratives about the Corby Statues—at Gettysburg and on Campus
2019 post: Myths and Memorials
2018 post: “Decoration Day” poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
2017 post: “Memorial Day” poem by Joyce Kilmer
2016 post: Memorial Day: Stories of War by a Civil War Veteran

Rare Books and Special Collections is closed today (May 27th) for Memorial Day and will be closed on July 4th for Independence Day. Otherwise, RBSC will be open regular hours this summer — 9:30am to 4:30pm, Monday through Friday.

Reading Japanese Baseballdom of Hawaii for Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month

by Greg Bond, Sports Archivist and Curator, Joyce Sports Research Collection

In honor of Asian / Pacific American Heritage Month, we are pleased to highlight the recently acquired book Hawai hōjin yakyūshi : yakyū ippyakunensai kinen—titled in English, The Japanese Baseballdom of Hawaii. Written by Rev. Chinpei P. Goto in 1940, this prolifically illustrated 772-page book chronicles the history of baseball played by Japanese and Japanese-American athletes in Hawaii. Featuring nearly 100 pages of photographs and engravings, the book exhaustively documents the history of Japanese-Hawaiian baseball.

Chinpei P. Goto was born in Iwate-Ken, Japan in 1887, and he immigrated to Hawaii with his parents in 1899. Soon after arriving, Goto attracted attention as a talented baseball player, particularly with the Asahi club, one of the earliest successful Japanese teams in Hawaii. He would remain associated with the game in his adopted home for the rest of his life, and, after his playing days, he became a tireless baseball booster and historian.

Asahi Baseball team in about 1906. Chinpei Goto sits in the front row on the left.

He first published a history of the sport in 1919 in his book Hawai hōjin yakyūshi—English title Japanese Balldom of Hawaii. He wrote this updated second edition, Japanese Baseballdom of Hawaii, in conjunction with the reputed 1939 centennial of the invention of baseball. Renowned for his knowledge of the sport on the islands, his obituary on the front page of the March 13, 1954 Honolulu Star Bulletin called him simply “the father of Japanese Baseball in Hawaii.”

Oversize foldout picture, depicting “scenes at initial game of Honolulu Japanese Baseball League, March 4, 1923.”

In his Introduction to Japanese Baseballdom of Hawaii, Goto wrote that on the ball field there was no “distinction… between a millionaire or an ordinary worker,” and, he argued, “in this commonality lies the ideal of true democracy.” He emphasized the importance of the sport to both American and Japanese societies. He explained that he hoped his book would “raise awareness of the nation’s culture” and wanted to see “Hawaiian baseball… continue to flourish.”

Inter-Island Japanese Baseball Championship, c. 1920.

In the book’s foreword, Tadaoki Yamamoto, a Japanese Olympic Team official and a leader in the YMCA movement, praised baseball as “a wonderful and eternal bridge” that “connects the hearts of the people of our nation to the people of the United States with Hawaii as its base.” [All approximate translations provided by the author and any mistakes are mine].

Kaneohe Japanese YMA Baseball Team, Jan. 29, 1939.

Goto’s two remarkable history books are responsible for much of our knowledge of Japanese baseball in Hawaii, and they are still essential reading for any student of this topic. Japanese Baseballdom of Hawaii features plentiful images of important and noteworthy baseball teams, players, and administrators dating back to the nineteenth century.

Honolulu Professional Baseball Team, c. 1916.
Two-page spread featuring images of prominent Japanese baseball players in Hawaii.

These publications were funded in part by patrons who purchased advertisements to support Goto’s historical writing. As a testament to the importance of baseball to the Japanese-American community in Hawaii, a wide range of business bought advertisements, including daily newspapers, beauty salons, and service stations.

Examples of advertisements that supported the publication of Japanese Baseballdom of Hawaii.
Chinpei Goto (standing left) and family in 1939.

Goto converted to Christianity as a young man, and he was eventually ordained as a Methodist minister. He founded and led several churches in Hawaii during the inter-war period. Throughout his life he was known on the islands both for his encyclopedic knowledge of baseball and for his compassionate ministries. If you would like to learn more about the long history of Japanese baseball in Hawaii, Rev. Chinpei P. Goto’s Japanese Baseballdom of Hawaii is available to all researchers.


Upcoming Events: May 2025 and through the summer

Please join us for the following public events and exhibits being hosted in Rare Books and Special Collections:

Tuesday, May 13 at 1:30pm | “Potawatomi in Un/Expected Places: Archives, Stories, and the Native American Initiative of Notre Dame” by Zada Ballew.

Last year, Ballew spent nine months at Hesburgh Library researching on behalf of the Native American Initiative (NAI) of Notre Dame. Her goal was to better understand the role that Indigenous peoples have played in the founding and shaping of Notre Dame’s history. What she found surprised her in ways that she didn’t expect. In this talk, she will share some of the most important findings with the people who helped make this work possible.

Presented by the Professional Development Committee (PDC) of Hesburgh Libraries.

Thursday, May 15 at 3:00pm | Hesburgh Libraries’ 2024-2025 Rare Books and Special Collections Postdoctoral Fellow Anne Elise Crafton (MI PhD ‘24) will discuss the major research and collections project they completed during their postdoc year. Crafton catalogued over 270 previously undescribed medieval and early modern documents in the Hesburgh Libraries’ collection. They will discuss the challenges and discoveries which emerged from the project and reflect on the intensive work of making the hitherto unknown documents accessible for scholars, students, and faculty at Notre Dame and beyond.

There are currently no events scheduled to be hosted in June or July.

The exhibition Tragedies of War: Images of WWII in Print Visual Culture runs through the summer and closes in late July. Learn more about the exhibit in this video, and plan your visit this summer.

The current spotlight exhibit is Building a Campus Boycott to Support Midwestern Farmworkers (January – May 2025). In May, we will install spotlights highlighting Medieval charters (May – August 2025) and Medieval homiletics (May – July 2025) from our collections.

Rare Books and Special Collections is open
regular hours during the summer.

RBSC will be closed Monday, May 26, for Memorial Day and Friday, July 4th, for Independence Day.

Upcoming Events: April 2025

Please join us for the following public events and exhibits being hosted in Rare Books and Special Collections:

Thursday, April 3 at 4:00pm | Medieval Institute Working Group “The Materiality of Medieval Texts” Lecture: “Workmanly and Truly Made: Everyday Writing and the Materiality of Literature” by Daniel Wakelin (University of Oxford).

Thursday, April 10 at 3:30pm | Exhibit Tour – Tragedies of War: Images of WWII in Print Visual Culture.

Thursday, April 10 at 4:30pm | Exhibit Lecture: “The Fascist Lair: the Battle of Berlin” by Robert M. Citino (retired Samuel Zemurray Stone Senior Historian at the National WWII Museum).

Thursday, April 22 at 3:30pm | Exhibit Tour – Tragedies of War: Images of WWII in Print Visual Culture.

Thursday, April 22 at 4:30pm | Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) Program commemorating the victims of Holocaust and featuring a live performance of “I Never Saw Another Butterfly” by Lori Laitman, performed by Anne Slovin (Soprano, University of Notre Dame) and Jason Gresl (Clarinet, Saint Mary’s College).

The Spring 2025 Exhibition — Tragedies of War: Images of World War II in Print Visual Culture — is now open and runs through the end of July. Based predominantly on recently acquired Rare Books and Special Collections European holdings, the exhibition commemorates the end of the Second World War (1939-1945) and will explore a diverse assortment of themes including Fascist Racial Ideology, the Holocaust, Children in War, Resistance, Liberation, and Memories of War.

Curated by Natasha Lyandres (Curator, Rare Books & Special Collections), Jean McManus (Catholic Studies Librarian, University Archives) and Julia Schneider (German Language and Literature and Italian Studies Librarian, Hesburgh Libraries).

The current spotlight exhibit is Building a Campus Boycott to Support Midwestern Farmworkers (January–April 2025). In 1980, the University of Notre Dame became the first major university to boycott Campbell Soup products in support of Midwestern farmworkers represented by the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (Toledo, OH). In a few short months, a small and dedicated cohort of students tapped into a growing movement and convinced the campus to act in solidarity.

Curated by Emiliano Aguilar (Assistant Professor of History, University of Notre Dame, and Faculty Fellow, Institute for Latino Studies).

Rare Books and Special Collections will be closed April 18 in observance of Good Friday.

We will resume regular hours on Monday, April 21.