The Cornell University Library’s Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections is home to the Lafayette Collection, formed in the 1960s through the generosity of Arthur H. and Mary Marden Dean. The collection is the best resource outside of France for the study of Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert Du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette (1757-1834), best known for his role in the American and French Revolutions. “Through his voluminous correspondence, Lafayette sustained a lifelong exchange with political leaders, social reformers, writers, and ordinary people who, like him, were engaged in the liberationist struggles and liberal ideas of the day.”
In celebration of the Marquis’s 300th birthday (September 6) the Library will open the exhibit “Lafayette, citizen of two worlds” on September 25, and in conjunction with the exhibit, Cornell Cinema will present two films: D.W. Griffith’s America (1924), the story of a family caught up in the American Revolutionary War, and James Ivory’s Jefferson in Paris (1995), set in Paris in 1785 during the end of the Old Regime and the beginning of the French Revolution. Nick Nolte plays Thomas Jefferson and Lambert Wilson is the Marquis de LaFayette. According to the exhibition’s curator, Laurent Ferri, “these are the two great moments in Lafayette’s political career, hence the title of our exhibit: “Lafayette, citizen of two worlds.”
“Lafayette, citizen of two worlds”
Hirshland Exhibition Gallery, Carl A. Kroch Library
September 25, 2007 - April 28, 2008
rmc.library.cornell.edu