viz.

Image still from Twin Peaks episode two.

Inspired by Casey's Halloween post on gender in the horror genre, I'm continuing to riff on the same theme; I'll talk about boredom and violence, truck stop killers, and, of course, Laura Palmer.  

So I just finished watching Twin Peaks. I'm behind the times in tackling this one, but now the show is up there on my list of favorites. That said, while watching over the past few months, I couldn’t help but notice that the underlying message seems to be: Young Women who display independence and/or sexual curiosity will probably be murdered by a deep woods demon. Laura Palmer is only the first casualty. By the series’ end—no serious spoilers here—we have to wonder what will become of our various other heroines. Audrey Horne, Donna Hayward, Shelly Johnson. And of course there remains the question of questions: How’s Annie?

Please note, the opinions expressed herein are solely those of viz. blog, and are not the product of the Harry Ransom Center.

“To clarify, the door likely didn’t come into the collection randomly,” explains Molly Schwartzburg, Curator of British and American Literature at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center. The door that she is talking about, of course, is Frank Shay’s bookshop door, which is currently featured in the Ransom Center’s interesting new exhibit, The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door: A Portal to Bohemia, 1920-1925. “We don’t have many details,” continues Schwartzburg, “but it appears that the owner of the door, who had been the shop’s last manager, decided that after thirty-five years of keeping the door in her home, she was ready to sell it.” The Ransom Center subsequently acquired the door through Lew David Feldman, a dealer who suspected that the Center might be interested because of their extensive Christopher Morley collection. Molly Schwartzburg graciously agreed to chat with viz. blog about Frank Shay’s bookshop door, and its accompanying exhibition.