Guide to Reading Letter Transcriptions
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| Textual Feature | Appearance |
|---|---|
| passage deleted with a strikethrough mark | |
| passage deleted by overwritten added letters | |
| passage added above the line | passage with added text above |
| passage added on the line | passage with added text inline |
| passage added in the margin | passage with text added in margin |
| handwritten addition to a typewritten letter | typed passage with added handwritten text |
| missing or unreadable text | missing text noted with "[illegible]" |
| uncertain transcriptions | word[?] |
| notes written by someone other than Willa Cather | Note in another's hand |
| printed letterhead text | printed text |
| text printed on postcards, envelopes, etc. | printed text |
| text of date and place stamps | stamped text |
| passage written by Cather on separate enclosure. | written text |
Re-reading Gibbon3's Decline and Fall4. Planning college paper5 of which she is to do book reviews and dramatic criticism, also editorials. Writing.
destroyedInformation about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let3307.xml
- Letter identifier
- 3307
- Contents
- Document is two handwritten leaves. In October 1947, Edith Lewis purchased from rare book and manuscript dealer Louise Stegner of Omaha, NE, forty-nine letters from Willa Cather to Alice E. D. Goudy dated from 1890 to 1930. Lewis summarized these letters in an unused daily diary volume. At a later date, she destroyed the originals of the letters, but the summaries of thirty-seven of the letters, dated from 1890 to 1915, survive.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Alice E. Dailey Goudy1
- Date letter was written
- August 15, 1891
- Place letter was written
- Red Cloud, Nebraska, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Charles E. Cather Collection (MS350), University of Nebraska–Lincoln Libraries, Archives & Special Collections, Lincoln, NE
Person Annotations
Goudy, Alice Estelle Dailey (1853-1937). Cather’s high school teacher
and friend. Alice Dailey grew up in Nemaha County, NE, where she
attended the Nebraska State Normal School at Peru, NE, which her father had
helped found. She married fellow teacher Alexander K. Goudy in 1882; both
taught at the Normal School. When they moved to Red Cloud, NE, in 1888, he
was superintendent of schools and she was the high school principal. She
encouraged Cather to attend the University of Nebraska. The Goudys moved to
Lincoln, NE, in 1891, when he was elected state superintendent of schools;
Alice Goudy was assistant, then deputy, state superintendent. After A.K.
Goudy suffered a stroke around 1900, the couple retired to Nemaha County.
Cather wrote to Mrs. Goudy for many years, although few letters have
survived.
Gibbon, Edward (1737-1794). English historian. Edward Gibbon was born in Putney, Surrey, England to Edward and Judith Gibbon. Although he was baptized into the Church of England, he converted to Roman Catholicism in 1753, which disqualified him for public office and caused his father to send him to Switzerland. After beginning his education at Oxford University, Gibbon lived and studied in Switzerland, France, and Rome before returning to London after his father’s death and dedicating himself to writing. Gibbon is best known for his six-volume work The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776-1788), which Cather references studying during her collegiate career.
Place Annotations
Work Annotations
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776 to 1788) by Edward Gibbon
Hesperian
