University of Texas at Austin

William Goyen:

An Inventory of His Art Collection in the Art Collection at the Harry Ransom Center

Creator: Goyen, William, 1915-1983
Title: William Goyen Art Collection
Dates: 1929-1954, most undated
Extent: 1 box, 3 framed works, 2 ceramics (18 items)
Abstract: The William Goyen Art Collection comprises eighteen works from Goyen’s archive. These include works by his Taos associates, Frieda Lawrence, Dorothy Brett, and Frieda Lawrence's second husband, Angelo Ravagli, as well as portrait drawings of Goyen by Don Bachardy and Joseph Glasco.
Call Number: Art Collection AR-00311
Language: English
Access: Open for research. A minimum of twenty-four hours is required to pull art materials to the Reading Room.


Administrative Information


Acquisition: Purchases (R6315, R10755) 1974, 1985, and Gift, 1974
Processed by: Helen Young, 2003
Repository:

Harry Ransom Center, The University of Texas at Austin

Biographical Sketch


Charles William Goyen was born on 24 April 1915 in Trinity, Texas, to Charles Provine Goyen and Mary Inez (Trow) Goyen. When he was eight, the family moved to Houston, where Goyen attended public schools. He graduated from Sam Houston High School and received his B.A. and M.A. degrees in Comparative Literature from Rice University in 1927 and 1939.
Goyen taught at the University of Houston for one year. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II aboard an aircraft carrier, where he began work on his first and most celebrated novel, The House of Breath. After the war he returned briefly to Texas before leaving to pursue a writing career. From 1945 to 1952 he lived for periods in New Mexico, California, and New York City. In Taos, New Mexico, he built a tiny adobe house on land provided by Frieda Lawrence; here he was close friends with Lawrence, Mabel Dodge Luhan, and Dorothy Brett.
After the success of The House of Breath (1950) and his first collection of stories, Ghost and Flesh: Stories and Tales (1952), he was awarded Guggenheim fellowships in 1952 and 1954, which allowed him to spend time in Rome in 1954 and 1955. After he returned from Europe, Goyen stayed in New York City for several years. He started writing plays and stage adaptations of his own fiction; six of his plays were produced, and he won a Ford Foundation Grant for Theater Writing. His theater work also brought him into contact with Doris Roberts, a stage, motion-picture, and television actress, and they married in November 1963. From 1966 to 1971 Goyen worked as an editor at McGraw-Hill. Over the years he taught as a visiting lecturer at various universities, including Brown, Columbia, Princeton, and the University of Southern California. The Goyens moved to Los Angeles in 1975, and he died there of lymphoma on August 29, 1983.

Sources:


Gibbons, Reginald. "William Goyen". Dictionary of Literary Biography. Vol. 218, American Short-Story Writers Since World War II, 2nd ser., ed. Patrick Meanor. Detroit: Gale Research, 1999.
"Goyen, Charles William."The Handbook of Texas Online. http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/GG/fgo32.html (accessed 31 October 2002).
Goyen, William. Three Women: a Memoir. Austin, Tex.: Harry Ransom Center, 1999.

Scope and Contents


The William Goyen Art Collection comprises eighteen works from Goyen’s archive. These include works by his Taos associates -- two works by Frieda Lawrence, a collage by Dorothy Brett, and two ceramic works by Frieda Lawrence's second husband, Angelo Ravagli. There are two portrait drawings of Goyen -- one attributed to Don Bachardy and one by Joseph Glasco. The works are listed alphabetically by artist. Titles are transcribed from the items. Cataloger’s titles appear in brackets.

Related Material


The Ransom Center also has materials from Goyen's archives in its Manuscripts Collection, Library, and Photography Collection.

Item List