Belle da Costa Greene’s Letters to Bernard Berenson

Join author Deborah Parker, the 2025 Library of Virginia and Virginia Museum of Fine Arts winner of their annual Art in Literature: The Mary Lynn Kotz Award, for an online talk about her book Becoming Belle da Costa Greene: A Visionary Librarian Through Her Letters.

Belle da Costa Greene was Pierpont Morgan’s personal librarian and the first director of the Morgan Library. She was also the daughter of two mixed-race parents and passed for white. In the nearly six hundred letters that Greene sent to art historian Bernard Berenson, Parker identifies Greene’s energetic pursuit of exceptional opportunities, illuminating the artistry and imaginative features of Greene’s writing—her self-invention, her vibrant responses to books and art, and her pathbreaking work as a librarian.

“The ample cache of letters Greene left behind, gathered…in [this book]…reveals an indefatigably witty, puckish soul who savored books and art, had an active social life and loved gossip and a good story.” —John McWhorter, New York Times

Registration is required for this free event.

Details: 2025 July 25

12PM – 12:45PM

Virtual

About Deborah Parker

Deborah Parker is Professor of Italian Emerita at the University of Virginia. Her books include She Commentary and Ideology: Dante in the Renaissance, (1992), Bronzino: Renaissance Painter as Poet (2000) and Michelangelo and the Art of Letter Writing (2011) and the co-author, along with Mark Parker of  The Attainable Text: The Special Edition DVD and the Study of Film (2011), Inferno Revealed: From Dante to Dan Brown (2013), and Sucking Up: A Brief Consideration of Sycophancy ((2017). Her most recent book is Becoming Belle da Costa Greene: A Visionary Librarian Through Her Letters (2024).