Newly available from the California Legacy series:

Mark Twain’s San Francisco, edited with introduction by Bernard Taper. From earthquakes, police scandals, and tantalizing silver mine bonanzas to elegant ladies blowing their noses in “exquisitely modulated tones” and seals “writhing and squirming like exaggerated maggots” below the Cliff House, Mark Twain has left us a vision of San Francisco that is at once fascinating and hilariously familiar.

California Poetry From the Gold Rush to the Present, edited by Dana Gioia, Chryss Yost, and Jack Hicks. A recent San Francisco Chronicle review calls this volume “an instantly indispensible new anthology from the California Legacy Series.”

Imagine what we’d think of California if Toshio Mori had never written his gentle short stories about life in Oakland’s “Lil’ Yokohama”; if Walter Nordhoff had never hidden behind his alter-ego Senor Don Juan Obrigon to tell the tale of The Journey of the Flame; if Bayard Taylor had never transformed his gold rush journalism into the compelling chronicle Eldorado. It’s pretty easy to do, of course, since all of these essential works of Californiana have long been out of print. No wonder East Coast elites like Woody Allen think there’s no culture here.

We aim to change that perception.

Almost three years ago Heyday Books and Santa Clara University formed a novel partnership. Heyday publisher Malcolm Margolin conceived of a series of reprints, single-author readers, and new anthologies that would bring alive for contemporary readers California’s diverse and lively literary and historical heritage. Combining the resources of California’s oldest university and one of California’s most respected publishers, we launched the California Legacy Series, which now has fourteen books in print and an equal number in production. Recently, we have complemented our book series by establishing at Santa Clara University the California Legacy Project (CLP), which strives to raise public awareness and appreciation for our state’s cultural legacy and to encourage faculty and students in their creative and scholarly interest in Californian culture.

In the next few years we intend to expand the book series, create more public events, and explore other avenues to bring California’s heritage to the widest possible audience. We cordially invite you to be part of that audience as we continue to celebrate our California legacy.

Terry Beers
Director and Series Editor California Legacy
tbeers@scu.edu

© 2003 California Legacy Project, Santa Clara University