University Libraries often has a number of exhibits that feature collections materials
in interesting and narrative ways. Check out our current featured exhibits.
Featured Physical Exhibits
The bad guys are the fun guys’: Celebrating 100 years of Elmore Leonard - August 18
- January 2
Elmore Leonard spent more than six decades writing – from Westerns to gritty crime
novels to screenplays for popular movies. When asked in an interview how he developed
his characters and why he wrote crime fiction, Leonard said, “The bad guys are the
fun guys.”Leonard’s archive has been housed at University of South Carolina Libraries
since 2014. This exhibit celebrates the 100th anniversary of Leonard’s birth and contextualizes
his writings in 20th century popular culture, a culture he had a strong hand in helping
to develop and influence. Items on display include correspondence, typescripts and
pulp appearances surrounding and featuring Leonard’s large body of work as well as
materials from Leonard’s extensive research files. Drafts of various scripts, film
treatments and proposals are on display alongside Leonard’s novels. In addition to
items from the archive, the exhibition contains materials from the George V. Higgins
Archive and the Dashiel Hammet Family Papers, as well as some recent acquisitions
and donations.
“Something significant, elemental, and profound”: Celebrating 100 Years of The Great
Gatsby - January 24 to July 15 2025
Regarded by many as the “Great American Novel,” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby
was first published on April 10, 2025. In celebration of the novel’s 100th anniversary,
this exhibit features items from the Matthew J. & Arlyn Bruccoli Collection of F.
Scott Fitzgerald, which constitutes the most comprehensive research collection for
the study and teaching of Fitzgerald, those associated with him, and his times. The
exhibit features notable items including the contract, galley proofs and first edition
of The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald’s manuscript ledger book, letters written while he
was drafting the novel, inscribed and annotated copies, and material from Fitzgerald’s
friends and contemporaries, such as Ernest Hemingway, Max Perkins, T. S. Eliot, Gertrude
Stein, and others.
Public viewing hours for the exhibit are Monday through Friday from 9am to 5pm.
Women in Science Fiction: From Frankenstein to Dungeons and Dragons
From the 1600s to the present day, women have long made notable contributions to science
fiction. Our Women’s History Month exhibit, located at the front of Thomas Cooper
Library, explores the work of acclaimed writers like Mary Shelley, Octavia Butler
and Margaret Atwood as well as women writers of pulp fiction and Dungeons and Dragon
novels.
From Geometry to Grover: South Carolina Public Television
From Geometry to Grover: South Carolina Public Television opens August 18 in the South
Carolina Political Collections gallery at Hollings Library. The exhibit looks at the
history of public television in South Carolina, starting with geometry and French
classes presented live from Dreher High School in 1958, all the way to today.
