Library Treasure Tour: The Mysteries [Secrets] of Philadelphia

Sat Nov 19 2022 at 02:00 pm

The German Society of Pennsylvania | Philadelphia

The German Society of Pennsylvania
Publisher/HostThe German Society of Pennsylvania
Library Treasure Tour: The Mysteries [Secrets] of Philadelphia Eugène Sue wrote a revolutionary new form of the popular novel: The Mysteries of Paris in 1842. It started an international trend that explored the underside of cities throughout Europe and the United States: corruption, religion, violence, racism, inequality, and nonconforming sex. German Americans produced two of these novels about Philadelphia – one a bestseller published in English in 1845 (and in German in 1851) and the other published in 1850 only in German – on which we will focus – which is found in only two libraries -- two copies are in the Horner Library and the one in a public library in Lübeck.
This tour will take us through the mystery novels that German Americans wrote about Cincinnati, St. Louis, New Orleans, and Philadelphia – both Philadelphia novels precede the other cities – only a second novel on Paris and one on Madrid predate the first Philadelphia mystery novel. The full title of the book at the center of our tour reveals why it is such an important part of Philadelphia history:
Die Geheimnisse von Philadelphia : Eine Tendenznovelle und zugleich ein Beitrag zur Sitten- und Cultur-Geschichte des amerikanischen Volkes. In English: The Mysteries [The Secrets] of Philadelphia: A Systematic Novel and a Contribution to the Norms and the Cultural History of the American People.
We will also delve into the question of who penned the novel and a very early self-help manual the putative author published in the city that was heavily used by new immigrants throughout the land. We will include a number of other similar kinds of works that helped to make the transition of recent arrivals less difficult.
About the lecturer: Elliott Shore helped to raise the funds for and lead the modernization of the German Society Building and conservation of the Horner Library's German American Collection in the 1990s with Bettina Hess. He is a Philadelphian who holds a B.A. from Temple University, an M.A. in History from the London School of Economics, an MLS from Drexel University, and a PhD in History from Bryn Mawr College. Among his publications related to this tour are The German American Radical Press: The Shaping of a Left Political Culture, with Ken Fones-Wolf and James P. Danky, University of Illinois, 1992; Advertising in the European City: Historical Perspectives with Clemens Wischermann, Ashgate, 2000; The German American Encounter: Conflict and Cooperation between Two Cultures, 1800-2000, with Frank Trommler, Berghahn, 2001 and Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 2001. Among his positions, he has led the Historical Studies - Social Science Library at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, Professor of History, Director of Libraries and Chief Information Officer at Bryn Mawr College and the Executive Director of the Association of Research Libraries -- a group of the 125 largest research libraries in the United States and Canada. His most recent book, co-written with Katie Rawson, is Dining Out: A Global History of Restaurants, Reaktion Books, 2019.

Event Venue

The German Society of Pennsylvania, 611 Spring Garden St, Philadelphia, United States

Tickets

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