Title: James Agee Audiotapes

Date/Date Range :   1971-circa 1972

Extent: .5 linear feet

Abstract:

This collection contains eight audiotapes related to James Agee and his works. Several recordings are of Agee reading his own work and of Father James H. Flye reading Agee's work and reminiscing about him. Also, two tapes record lectures on Agee, which likely date to a 1972 Conference in Sewanee, TN.

Call number: MS-3045

Repository: University of Tennessee Special Collections Library, Knoxville, TN

Aquisition Information:

This collection is property of the UT Special Collections Library.

Access Restrictions:

Collection is open for research.

Copyright:

The copyright interests in this collection remain with the creator. For more information, contact the Special Collections Library.

Preferred Citation:

[Identification of Item], James Agee Audiotapes, MS-3045. University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Special Collections Library.

Collection consists of one half box.

James Agee (1909-1955) wrote a myriad of articles, stories, scripts, and poems during his short forty-five years. In 1934, Yale Press published his collection of verse, Permit Me Voyage, which was followed in 1941 by his social report of cotton tenants in the South, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, a collaboration with friend and photographer Walker Evans. In 1954, Houghton Mifflin Co. published Agee's semi-autobiographical novel The Morning Watch. He wrote commentary for Helen Levitt's film, The Quiet One, and an introduction to her book, A Way of Seeing. Also, Agee adapted stories into film scripts, for example The Blue Hotel, The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky, The Night of the Hunter, and Noa Noa. In 1951, The African Queen earned Agee and John Huston an Academy Award nomination for Best Screen Writing. However, Agee is best known for his 1957 autobiographical and Pulitzer Prize-winning novel A Death in the Family, edited and posthumously published by long-time friend and first trustee of the James Agee Trust David McDowell.

This collection contains eight audiotapes related to James Agee. There are two copies for each of the four recordings. "James Agee: A Portrait" , Sides 1 and 2 contain James Agee reading some of his own works, while Sides 3 and 4 contain Father Flye reading some of Agee's pieces and reminiscing about him. (Each of these tapes has a detailed content list from 1971 in Folder 1.) Agee narrates on "The Quiet One" . The "Agee Week" tapes contain talks about Agee and his works, and although undated, these tapes likely belong to the James Agee Week Conference of 1972 held in Sewanee, TN.

Some other James Agee collections at the UT Special Collections Library include MS-1500, MS-2474, MS-2296, MS-2730, and MS-2832.

• Agee, James, 1909-1955.
• Authors, American -- Tennessee.
• Audiotapes.