For much of the past year, I have had the pleasure of cataloging promptbooks from the Harvard Theatre Collection. Promptbooks are texts of plays which have been annotated with stage directions, alterations, descriptions of scenery or sound effects, and other details from actual use in the theatre. They function almost like a blueprint to a particular stage production. The Harvard Theatre Collection holds thousands of them, mostly dating from the late 18th through 20th centuries, a significant number of which remain uncatalogued. Many others are only minimally cataloged, with records that omit valuable information relating to their unique manuscript annotations. My job has been to improve access to this remarkable collection, giving the promptbooks HOLLIS catalog records that include access points for genre terms (mainly “acting editions” and “promptbooks”) and, crucially, the names of the actors and other former owners who inscribed their names in them. To date, I have identified over 120 unique owners, all of them now searchable in HOLLIS, ranging from celebrities such as Laura Keene and Edwin Booth, to relative obscurities like Frederick Chippendale and the enigmatically named Q. K. Philander Doesticks. What follows is a kind of highlight reel of my year in promptbooks, four interesting examples selected from the hundreds that have passed across my desk.
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Prompt Service: Cataloging the HTC Promptbooks
How to Kiss Right
This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items from the newly acquired Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection.
This collection includes a lot of erotica, particularly from the 19th-century, but it also includes a lot of sex humor books including this one titled How to do sex properly by Bruce Aiken, Bridgid Herridge and Colin Rowe. It reveals a fascinating glimpse of popular attitudes towards sex in the 1980s. This satiric take on subject relies heavily on illustration most often using stuffed teddy bears throughout the text.
They cover topics such as “learning to kiss right” by recommending that one’s eyes can be open or closed and suggesting a tilted head if your nose is too big. They also counsel making a practice mouth with your hand. 
Another hilarious section outlines possible hiding places should you be caught “doing it.” The dotted lines denote the various options which include A. Outside on ledge. You should first have checked that there is a ledge. B. Hanging from ledge. Not recommended for long periods. C. Under rug. Try not to sneeze.
And if you are trying to keep things exciting they recommend role play. 
You can see these bears are enacting an Arabian Nights theme. To read about what other mischief these bears could be up to you can find How to do sex properly / by a “team of experts,” or Bruce Aiken, Bridgid Herridge and Colin Rowe. London : F. Muller, 1982 in Widener’s collection.
The authors apologize in advance if they cause any offense to the reader or “distress” to the bears.
Thanks to Alison Harris, Santo Domingo Project Manager, for contributing this post.
Emily Dickinson Black Cake Video Wins Award
Houghton librarians Heather Cole, Emilie Hardman, and Emily Walhout in Houghton Library’s Emily Dickinson room. Not pictured: Mochi, the cat.
At the first film festival sponsored by the Association of Research Libraries, Harvard Library took first place for Best Collections-Focused Film for Houghton Library’s video on baking Emily Dickinson’s original black cake. Heather Cole, Emilie Hardman, and Emily Walhout created the video as a way to document their attempt to authentically recreate Dickinson’s cake recipe for her 185th birthday celebration last December.
The inspiration behind the video was to capture “a moment of joy,” said Hardman, who is a research, instruction, and digital initiatives librarian. It was also another way to invite people to explore the digital collections available at Houghton, which includes the largest collection of Emily Dickinson’s poems and letters in the world. Many poems are accessible to all via the Emily Dickinson Archive.
Search & Destroy
This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items recently cataloged from the Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection.
Launched in 1977, Search & Destroy was the first punk rock and new wave publication to emerge in San Francisco. Created by V. Vale, who began publishing the zine through his employer, City Lights Bookstore, Search & Destroy was initially funded with $200 in contributions from Allen Ginsberg and City Lights co-founder Lawrence Ferlinghetti as a way to document the growing punk movement in the Bay Area. While the scene in New York City was already being noticed by the rest of the country, Vale found little coverage of punk on the west coast.
Vale’s vision for the magazine was inspired by Andy Warhol’s Interview magazine, which was filled with art and in-depth interviews. Vale, like many of the players at the onset of punk, frequently referenced the Dada and Surrealist movements. He also included interviews with authors that inspired rising musicians, like William Burroughs and J.G. Ballard. Search & Destroy featured artists who would become legends of this moment in music history – Patti Smith, Iggy Pop, Lou Reed, Jello Biafra, and the list goes on.
The zine itself allowed for the political to enter the conversation—Vale and his team are credited as experts in getting artists to discuss their own politics, and also ran a semi-regular “Politics of Punk” column. Vale distributed the zine across the country, no doubt having a hand in the D.I.Y. zine culture that would become synonymous with punk rock for the next several decades.
To learn more, the complete run of Search & Destroy can be found in Widener’s collection: San Francisco: City Lights, 1977-1979.
Thanks to Irina Rogova, Santo Domingo Library Assistant, for contributing this post.
Epithalamion for Bianca Maria Sforza
Houghton Library recently acquired a rare copy of one of the first independently printed wedding orations. Ad Serenissimum Maximilianum inuictissimu[m] Romanoru[m] rege[m]: in auspicatissimis eius & Augustæ Blanche mariæ nuptiis: Epithalamion. [Milan, Leonardus Pachel after 8 April 1494]. (ISTC im00401800) was written by Giasone del Maino (1435-1519) and delivered in praise of the couple at Innsbruck in celebration of the marriage in March 1494 of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (1459-1519) and Bianca Maria Sforza (1472-1510).
Cynically arranged by her uncle, Ludovico Sforza, then Regent and later ruler of Milan, the union hinged on the exchange of the bride’s huge dowry for the Emperor’s raising of Milan to an imperial duchy. Treated as chattel since birth and twice married by proxy before she reached the age of fourteen, Bianca never gained Maximilian’s affections, never bore him an heir (after several miscarriages and stillbirths) and even served as physical security for his debts. There is no copy known of this edition in the United States.
Inc 5996 | Bianca Maria Sforza, ca. 1493. Ambrogio de Predis. Source: Google Art Project
William P. Stoneman, Curator of Early Books and Manuscripts, contributed this post.