Content Description
Papers include original manuscripts, personal and professional correspondence, interviews, business records, legal documents, research materials which mostly pertain to Stephen Vizinczey's novel "In Praise of Older Women" (1965). These include original and foreign language manuscripts, correspondence with international publishers, documents from various lawsuits over film adaptations, as well as extensive press clippings tracking the contours of the scandal its publication sparked. In addition, the papers include several works from Vizinczey’s early career, with drafts of plays and articles written before his exile from Hungary and scripts he wrote for the CBC and the National Film Board during his initial years in Canada. Later writings include essays published in major outlets in Canada and the UK, drafts of a foreword to a biography of Mark Twain, and manuscripts of his work in translation. Numerous drafts presented in this archive feature holograph edits and annotations. The papers also feature manuscripts and drafts of each of his seven published books, ending with "3 Wishes" (2020).
Dates
- 1950 - 2020
Creator
- Vizinczey, Stephen, 1933- (Person)
Conditions Governing Access
Collection is closed until processed.
Biographical / Historical
Stephen Vizinczey was a Hungarian-Canadian author who was born in Hungary in 1933. He studied under György Lukács and was a promising young playwright. After having his work censored on multiple occasions, he fled Hungary following the repression of the 1956 uprising against the authoritarian Stalinist regime. Following a brief stint in Italy, he immigrated to Canada and soon became editor of the literary magazine, Exchange. There he met Gloria Fisher Harron (mother of filmmaker Mary Harron), whom he married in 1963. Harron would serve as an important editor and champion of his work throughout his career, as evidenced by her extensive revisions and correspondence on his behalf. Stephen Vizinczey best known work, "In Praise of Older Women", became a major touchstone in the transformation of discourses on sexuality in the 1960s. It recounts the semi-autobiographical story of a young man’s sexual education via a series of affairs with older lovers. The book’s frank depiction of mature female sexuality and intergenerational relationships and eroticism drew outrage from a wide swath of polite Western society. Vizinczey can be credited with popularizing, if not establishing, the common trope of the “cougar” and the “boy toy,” which continue to pervade contemporary culture.
Extent
65 cubic feet.
Language of Materials
Hungarian
English
French
Spanish; Castilian
German
- Language of description
- English
- Script of description
- Latin
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Repository Details
Part of the Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections Repository
2B Carl A. Kroch Library
Cornell University
Ithaca NY 14853
607-255-3530
607-255-9524 (Fax)
rareref@cornell.edu