I spent my summer crying over books. I
can’t imagine this is too atypical when speaking to a community of readers and
writers. But specifically, I spent a week of my summer crying over escape
artist Harry Houdini’s books and other writings in the Harry Ransom Center at
the University of Texas at Austin.
Harry Houdini (1874-1926) was a writer. It
can be easy to forget his intellectual pursuits because even most of his
biographers relegate his career as a writer to be secondary to his career as a
performer, escapist and magician. Yet, Houdini wrote. A lot. He wrote seven
books (mostly on magic), edited a monthly magic magazine, wrote short stories,
professional articles on magic, movie treatments for his silent film career,
and letters (so many letters), professional and personal, especially love
letters to his wife Bess. Houdini left behind a lot more than strait-jackets,
leg irons and lock picks. The Houdini Papers are thankfully preserved and collected
at UT Austin’s Harry Ransom Center, and I am grateful to have been a recipient
of the Swann Grant this summer, which funded my travel, research and tears.
I’m writing an alternate history novel
where Houdini doesn’t die in 1926, and I’ve known since I discovered the
archive that I would need to visit the Ransom Center. I had done so much Houdini
biographical research and yet still struggled with major gaps in understanding Houdini
and Bess as people.
When I decided to apply for the Swann
Grant, I first spoke with a student who won the award last
year to get more information and ask questions on their experience. Then, I met
with Dr.
Carla Thomas, a medievalist. If I can offer new
students any advice, it’s to reach out to your professors, even the ones you
haven’t taken a course with and even the ones whose research does not seem to
line up with your own. In passing, Carla had once told me she would be more
than happy to speak with me about digging around in archives. I made an
appointment to meet with her and voiced my concerns. I had never been to an
archive before, and while I vaguely understood the genre of the research
proposal, I couldn’t quite determine how to write such a proposal for creative
work. Carla left me with very practical advice on how to articulate the
research I had already completed and show how the specific materials in the archive
would contribute to my novel.
At the Ransom Center, even though I was
allowed to take (but not share) pictures on my phone, I spent most of my time deciphering
Houdini’s handwriting, or copying Houdini’s handwriting by hand into my own notes.
As a writer who does a lot of my drafting by hand, it mattered that if I was
touching and reading his letters, then I was writing his words. What did those
sentences feel like scratched from my pencil? Archival work became even
more of a physical experience.
But the best part of the receiving the
Swann Grant, was getting to hold the physical published copy of Houdini’s book,
A Magician Among the Spirits (1924). This is the only copy in existence
with Houdini’s notes for a subsequent edition that was never sent to print—Houdini
died before the project could be completed. In reading his revisions—the slash
of red ink, the physical inserts of pages glued into the book’s gutter, the asterisks
delineating details for new material—I was struck by what I had already known as
integral to my understanding of his character all along. Houdini was a writer.
And I am so proud and honored to be in that company.
Cheryl
Wollner is a second year MFA student studying fiction. Their work has appeared
in the anthologies Today, Tomorrow, Always; Hashtag Queer Vol. 3 and The Best
of Loose Change. If you ask, they will tell you how Houdini really died (it was
not performing a trick).
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