Sanford Marovitz papers

Finding Aid

Prepared by Barbara Bass, January 8, 2002; Last Updated: May 2020

Inclusive Dates: 1967-1996
Extent: 8 cubic feet (8 record storage boxes)
Physical Location: 11th floor

Biographical Note: Sanford Marovitz was born on May 10, 1933 in Chicago, Illinois. Marovitz served four years in the U. S. Air Force (1953-1957) and then earned a B.A. from Lake Forest College in 1960 and an M.A. in June 1961 and a Ph.D. completed in October 1967 and awarded June 1968 from Duke University. He taught at Temple University and the University of Athens in Greece under the Fulbright Program. He began his career at Kent State University in 1967 as an assistant professor. He was a professor of English and chairman of Graduate Studies at Kent State University. American literature is his major field of study, within which he holds particular interests in Jewish-American fiction, Western writing, and the literature of the American Renaissance. He taught at Shimane University in Matsue, Japan as a visiting professor (1976-1977). Professor Marovitz has published widely in professional journals and collected volumes of criticism; he was co-editor of Artful Thunder (1975), a festschrift in honor of Howard P. Vincent. He collaborated with Clarence Gohdes on the fifth edition of A Bibliographical Guide to the Study of the Literature of the U.S.A. (1984). Other publications include Abraham Cahan (Twayne's United States Authors Series, 1996) and Melville "Among the Nations": Proceedings of an International Conference, Volos, Greece, July 2-6, 1997 (2001). He was also the associate editor of Studies in American Jewish Literature. Marovitz received the Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, 1960-1961; Fulbright Teaching Grant to Greece, 1965-66; renewed, 1966-67 and also the Academic Quarter Research Awards at Kent State University in 1971, 1974 and 1977. He has been listed in Who's Who in the Midwest and Who's Who in the World. He retired from Kent State University in 1996. Marovitz passed away on July 9, 2023.

Scope and Content: Sanford Marovitz's papers contain correspondence, manuscripts and his publications. It also contains correspondence relating to the Shimane University Summer programs.

• Series 1: Correspondence by subjects; Box 1-4
• Series 2: Letters and Recommendations; Box 5
• Series 3: Collective Bargaining Box 6, Folders 1-7
• Series 4: Shimane University: Box 6, Folders 8-20
• Series 5: Manuscripts: Box 7
• Series 6: Publications: Box 8

Series 1: Correspondence by subject

Box 1
Folder -- Contents

1. AAUP: 1991/92
2. American Literature Association: 1990-96
3. American Studies: 1972-93
4. Chair-English Dept.: correspondence: 1987-92
5. Chairman review: 1982-86
6. College English Association of Ohio: 1980-81
7. College English Association of Ohio: 1981-82
8. College English Association of Ohio: 1982-83
9. College English Association of Ohio: 1983-87
10. CEA Panel information: Feb.-Apr. 1981
11. Colloquium Committee: 1979-87
12. Commission to Study [Snyder] Plan: 1975
13. Daikuhara, Chinami: correspondence: 1992-93
14. Department Committees and Personnel: 1980-89
15. Department Committees and Personnel: 1991-95
16. Doctoral Program: 1979
17. EECAP: 1992-93
18. Faculty Senate: 1976

Box 2
Folder -- Contents

1. Gohdes, Biblio Guide ... U.S.A.: 1980-83
2. Gohdes, Biblio Guide ... U.S.A.: 1983-88
3. Greek Studies, etc.: 1970-1994
4. Hillel: 1989-94
5. Hillel: 1995-97
6. Hiring, Recruitment Personnel, Policy, etc.: 1973-75
7. Hiroshima Bunkyo Women's College: 1994-96
8. Honors College: 1986-95
9. International Studies: 1977-1993
10. Jewish Student Union: 1992-96
11. Jewish Studies: catalogs
12. Jewish Studies Conference: 1971-86: folder 1
13. Jewish Studies Conference: 1986: folder 1
14. Jewish Studies Conference: 1986: folder 2
15. Jewish Studies Conference: 1986-97

Box 3
Folder -- Contents

1. KSU Ph.D. holders and responses: 1983
2. Language requirements: 1971-86
3. Lecture and Colloquim Committee: 1989-90
4. Lecture and Colloquim Committee: 1991-92
5. Legal concerns and academic
6. Leipzig [Conference]: application forms: 1968-87
7. Leipzig [Conference]: correspondence: 1986-87
8. Leipzig [Conference]: correspondence: 1994
9. Library Committee: correspondence: 1987-93
10. Library Subcommittee - Educational Policy Council: 1971-81
11. Library Subcommittee - Educational Policy Council: 1981-85
12. Library Subcommittee: 1985-87
13. Miscellaneous: 1969-93
14. Miscellaneous: correspondence: 1987-92
15. Miscellaneous: correspondence: 1993-97
16. Miscellaneous: drafts and correspondence: 1970-79; 1990

Box 4
Folder -- Contents

1. MLA Division Papers: 1985-86
2. MLA Panel: 1984
3. MLA 19th-20th Century American Lit: 1982-86
4. NEMLA: 1992-95
5. 19th Century Lit: June 1, 1970
6. Phi Beta Delta: 1991-96
7. Questionnaires: 1971-94
8. Research Council: 1988-92
9. Research Registrations and Services: 1979-93
10. SAJL [Studies in American Jewish Literature]: correspondence: 1985-87
11. SAJL [Studies in American Jewish Literature]: correspondence: 1987-88
12. SAJL [Studies in American Jewish Literature]: correspondence: 1988-89
13. SAJL [Studies in American Jewish Literature]: correspondence: 1990-92
14. 20th Century American Lit: lecture essays: June 1, 1970
15. Toward M[oby]-D[ick] (MLA volume: 1983-86
16. Undergrad Committee and Courses: 1969-70; 1993-96
17. University Committees and Commissions: 1971-98
18. University Services and Regulations: 1970-95
19. Upward Bound: 1980
20. Vita: 1966-96
21. WLA [Western Literature Association]: 1987-90
22. Wick Program: 1993-95
23. Writing Certificate Program: 1987-95

Series 2: Letters and Recommendations

Box 5
Folder -- Contents

1. Letters and recommendations: 1966-74
2. Letters and recommendations: 1974-79
3. Letters and recommendations: 1980-83
4. Letters and recommendations: 1984-86
5. Letters and recommendations: 1987-88
6. Letters and recommendations: 1988
7. Letters and recommendations: 1989
8. Letters and recommendations: 1990, Jan.-June
9. Letters and recommendations: 1990, July-Dec.
10. Letters and recommendations: 1991, Jan.-July
11. Letters and recommendations: 1991, Aug.-Dec.
12. Letters and recommendations: 1992
13. Letters and recommendations: 1992/93
14. Letters and recommendations: 1993/94
15. Letters and recommendations: 1995-96
16. Letters and recommendations: 1997-2001

Series 3: Collective Bargaining

Box 6
Folder -- Contents

1. Collective Bargaining: 1973-74
2. Collective Bargaining: 1975
3. Collective Bargaining: 1976
4. Collective Bargaining: Committees: 1975
5. Collective Bargaining: Steering Committee: 1975-76
6. Collective Bargaining: UFA: 1975-79
7. Collective Bargaining: UFPA: 1975-79

Series 4: Shimane University

8. Shimane University: general: 1988-89
9. Shimane University: correspondence: 1994-2000
10. Shimane University: summer program: 1982
11. Shimane University: summer program: 1984
12. Shimane University: summer program: 1985
13. Shimane University: summer program: 1985
14. Shimane University: summer program: 1986
15. Shimane University: summer program: 1987
16. Shimane University: summer program: 1987/88
17. Shimane University: summer program: 1992
18. Shimane University: summer program: 1993
19. Shimane University: summer program: 1994
20. Shimane University: summer program: 1995
21. Thessaloniki Exchange: 1984-85

Series 5: Manuscripts and correspondence

Box 7
Folder -- Contents

1. ATQ Collection [American Transcendental Quarterly]: Jan.-June 1972
2. ATQ Collection [American Transcendental Quarterly]: Sept.-Dec. 1972
3. ATQ Collection [American Transcendental Quarterly]: Jan. 1973
4. ATQ Collection [American Transcendental Quarterly]: Feb.-Sept. 1973
5. Festscrift Manuscripts: folder 1
6. Festscrift Manuscripts: folder 2
7. NEMLA (Northeast Modern Language Association): correspondence and manuscripts: Aug. 1985-1986
8. NEMLA (Northeast Modern Language Association): correspondence and manuscripts: 1987-1989
9. Professional correspondence: 1968-84

Series 6: Publications

Box 8
Folder -- Contents

1. Article: "Abraham Cahan (1860-1951): an annotated bibliography": Summer 1970
2. Article: "Aldous Huxley and the visual arts": 1973
3. Article: "Aldous Huxley's intellectual zoo": 1969
4. Article: "Albion Winegar Tourgee": manuscript
5. Article: "Albion Winegar Tourgee (1838-1905)": Winter 1975
6. Article: "Ambivalences and anxieties: character reversals in Sinclair Lewis' Mantrap": 1988
7. Article: "America vs. Shakespeare: from the Monroe Doctrine": 1986
8. Article: "American Literature: international themes and implications: 1989
9. Article: "Anne Tyler's Emersonian balance": 1992
10. Article: "Book of Lights: Jewish mysticism in the shadow of the bomb": 1985
11. Article: "The Collector's Imagination": 1969
12. Article: "The Cryptic Raillery Of 'Saint Katy the Virgin'": Summer 1972
13. Article: "Emerson, Thoreau, and the phenomenon of Jimmy Carter": 1978
14. Article: "Emerson's Shakespeare from scorn to apothesosis", signed by the author: 1982
15. Article: "The Expository Prose of John Steinbeck": 1974
16. Article: "Freedom, faith, and fanaticism: cultural conflict in the novels of Chaim Potok": 1986
17. Abstract [PhD dissertation]: "Frontier Conflicts: villians, outlaws, and Indians in selected 'Western' fiction: 1799-1860: 1968
18. Article: "The Guilty and the Doomed : the urban trap in American slum and ghetto fiction": English Notes: v. 6, no. 1, Dec. 1971
19. Article: "Herman Melville: a writer for the world": 1986
20. Article: "Images of America in American-Jewish Fiction: 1988
21. Story: "An Incident on Broadway"
22. Article: "A Jew is A Jew is a Jew: the dilema ov indentity in American Jewish fiction"
23. Article: "John Steinbeck and Adlai Stevenson": Summer 1970
24. Article: "Kent, Ohio: the American crisis": Summer 1970
25. Article: "The Literature Survey; its definition and proposal": 1970
26. Article: "The Lonley New Americans of Abraham Cahan": 1968
27. Article: "Melville Studies in Japan": Nov. 1978
28. Article: "Melville's Problematic 'being'": 1982
29. Article: "Melville's Temples": 1992
30. Article: "More Chartless voyaging: Melvile and Adler at sea": 1986
31. Article: "Myth and realism in recent criticism of the American literary west": April 1981
32. Article: "The N-N Confidence-man": Sept. 1984
33. Article: "New Greek poetry: 196-1973": translated and edited by Eleonora D. and Sanford E. Marovitz: Winter 1975
34. Article: "New York and others: regionalism in American-Jewish literature": 1990
35. Article: "Othello unmasked": 1973
36. Article: "Owen Wister: an annotated bibliography of secondary material": signed: 1974
37. Article: "The Panorama of America in American-Jewish Fiction": 1988
38. Article: "Poe's reception of C.W. Webber's gothic western, 'Jack Long; or, the shot in the eye'": June 1971
39. Article: "A Prophet in the labryinth: the urban romanticism of Edward Lewis Wallant": 1985
40. Article: "Roderick Hudson: James's Marble Faun": 1970
41. Article: "Romance or Realism? Western periodical literature: 1893-1922": May 1975
42. Article: "Scratchy the demon in 'the bride comes to yellow sky'": 1971
43. Article: "The Secular trinity of a lonely millionaire: language, sex, and power in the rise of David Levinsky": 1982
44. Article: "Teaching English-learning Greece": Summer 1968
45. Article: "Testament of a patriot: the Virginian, the tenderfoot, and Owen Wister": 2 copies, 1 signed: 1974
46. Article: "Three days on Mount Athos": 1966
47. Article: "Toward Moby-Dick: a freshman honor's course": 1985
48. Article: "YEKL: the ghetto realism of Abraham Cahan": 1969
49. Book review: American humor magazines and comic periodicals by David E. E. Sloane: 1988
50. Book: Bibliographical Guide to the Study of Literature of the U.S.A. edited by Clarence Gohdes and Sanford Marovitz: 1984
51. Book review: A Casebook on 'the Grapes of Wrath' edited by Agnes McNeil Donohue: 1969; 1974
52. Book review: Chicago and the American Literary Imagination by Carl S. Smith: 1984
53. Book review: Compton Mackenzie by D. J. Dooley; Forster's Women: Eternal Differences by Bonnie Blumental Finkelstein; Aldous Huxley: A Collection of Critical Essays edited by Robert E. Kuehn
54. Book review: Creative Awakening: the Jewish presence in Twentieth Century American Literature 1900's-1940's; In the Mainstream: the Jewish Pressence in Twentieth-century American Literature, 1950's-1980's; Dramatic Encounters: the Jewish presence in Twentieth-Century American drama, poetry, and humor and the Black-Jewish Relationship: 1987
55. Book review: The Crowd in American Literature by Nicholaus Mills: 1987
56. Book review: George Theotokas by Thomas Doulis: 1975
57. Book review: Interpretation of Material Shapes in Puritanism: a study of rhetoric, prejudice and violence: 1988
58. Book review: Steinbeck and the Arthurian Theme edited by Tetsumaro Hayashi: 1975
59. Book review: "Tilchin's Mourning" from Melville Society Extracts: No. 75, Nov. 1988
60. Book review: "Unseemly Realities in Owen Wister's Western/American Myth": 1984
61. Book review: Visions of the American West by Gerald F. Kreyche: 1989
62. Book review: Western American Literary Criticism by Martin Bucco: 1985
63. Book review: Witness Through the Imagination: Jewish American Holocaust Literature by S. Lillian Kremer: 1989
64. Book review: Words for the Wild: the Sierra club trailside reader edited by Ann Ronald: 1987
65. Introduction to American Jewish Literature: Spring 1989: v. 8, no. 1
66. Miscellaneous notices: 1970-72
67. Faculty adviser: Trieme: Spring 1966; Winter 1967
68. Publications and professional documents: 1969-79
69. Publications and professional documents: 1980-84
70. Publications and professional documents: 1985-93
71. Correspondence on publications: 1969-74