Randy Rasmussen Papers, 1971-2020

Randy Rasmussen Papers

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Collection Overview

Title: Randy Rasmussen Papers, 1971-2020

ID: OGLMC1695

Primary Creator: Rasmussen, Randy L. (1953-2020)

Extent: 4.75 Linear Feet

Date Acquired: 01/19/2021

Subjects: Theater and Film, University of North Dakota - Alumni

Languages: English

Abstract

1953-2020; UND alum and film historian

Scope and Contents of the Materials

The Randy Rasmussen Papers date from 1971 to 2020 and are divided into four series as follows:

Series 1: Writings, 1971-2018

Series 2: Drafts

Series 3: Correspondence, 2009-2020

Series 4: Photographs

Collection Historical Note

"Randy Rasmussen, binding specialist at the Chester Fritz Library, Grand Forks, N.D., died Saturday, Dec. 19, in his home. He was 67.

Randy Rasmussen grew up in Towner, N.D. After graduating from high school, he followed his sister to the University of North Dakota, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English. He was a teaching assistant and worked at the UND Bookstore.

In 1999, he found a new home at Chester Fritz Library.

'I love books,' he said, 'what a better place to work than a library?' Randy wrote four published books related to films, another of his interests. He thought that UND’s Writers Workshops were gems. He left behind several notebooks filled with ideas on what he planned to write. He just didn’t have enough time to do it all.

'Randy was the person everyone knew in the Chester Fritz Library – and everyone liked,' said Stephanie Walker, Dean of Libraries & Information Resources. 'He was truly a wonderful person. He started here in the all-print days, and grew with the Library, his job changing over time. Among other things, Randy cared for our physical collections. Generations of grad students met Randy when he’d ensure their theses and dissertations were carefully bound and submitted to the Archives; recently, he helped ensure the compact shelving that now houses many important collections was perfect. He helped move collections almost endlessly, as we undertook to stay in the Library and keep it open while renovating. Randy was also a published author and film critic, and we’re adding his works to the UND Scholarly Commons. Randy will be much missed.'

Randy would not miss, if possible, plays, recitals, and concerts presented by the University or the city. All of them are gems in Grand Forks and he felt fortunate to live here. Music gave him such pleasure and peace. He took a book and a different set of CDs to every treatment at the Cancer Center. In the end only music worked. He passed away of leukemia Dec. 19. He was a kind, intelligent, interesting man.

Randy was preceded in death by his parents Vi and Loren Rasmussen and survived by his sister Terri and brother-in-law Bernie Mickelson and his many gracious friends and colleagues at Chester Fritz Library. Randy’s family cannot thank them enough for the comfort and care they gave him until the end. He absolutely loved working with all of them and they felt the same about him."

Source: UND University Letter, 5 January 2021

Subject/Index Terms

Theater and Film
University of North Dakota - Alumni

Administrative Information

Repository: Elwyn B. Robinson Department of Special Collections

Access Restrictions: Open for inspection under the rules and regulations of the Elwyn B. Robinson Department of Special Collections.

Acquisition Source: Terri Mickelson, Ames, Iowa

Acquisition Method: Donation; 2021-3429

Related Publications:

Available in Special Collections:

Children of the Night: the Six Archetypal Characters of Classic Horror Films. by Randy Rasmussen. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 1998.

Orson Welles: Six Films Analyzed, Scene by Scene. by Randy Rasmussen. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2006.

Psycho, the Birds and Halloween: the intimacy of terror in three classic films. by Randy Rasmussen. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2014.

Stanley Kubrick: Seven Films Analyzed. by Randy Rasmussen. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2001.

Preferred Citation: (Description of Item). Randy Rasmussen Papers. OGLMC 1695, Box #, Folder #. Elwyn B. Robinson Department of Special Collections, Chester Fritz Library, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks.

Processing Information: Processed by Curt Hanson in July 2021.

Box and Folder Listing

Browse by Series:

[Series 1: Writings, 1971-2018],
[Series 2: Drafts],
[Series 3: Correspondence, 2009-2020],
[Series 4: Photographs],
[Series 5: Miscellaneous],
[All]

Series 1: Writings, 1971-2018

The first series consists of Randy Rasmussen's completed writings, arranged alphabetically. Randy Rasmussen was a published film studies scholar and four of his monographs are available in the Department of Special Collections.

Box 1

Folder 1: Children of the Night: the Six Archetypal Characters of Classic Horror Films. Advertisements and Reviews, 1998

Folder 2: "Europe '76: the Diary of Two Mad Travelers" by Terri Mickelson and Randy Rasmussen, 1976

Volume 1: "Four Horror Films Go to War: Son of Frankenstein, the Wolf Man, Son of Dracula, Cat People and American Fears During World War II"

Volume 2: "An Investigation of Context, Character, and Technique in James Whale's Film Horror Fantasies." UND Master's Thesis, 1980

Folder 3: "James Whale and the Classic Horror Fantasy"

Folder 4: "A Little Romance and Its Second Cousins: Before Sunrise, the World of Henry Orient, and Romeo and Juliet"

Volume 3: "Lolita: Domestic Maneuvers. The Missing Chapter from Stanley Kubrick: Seven Films Analyzed", 1997

Folder 5: "Notes on A Clockwork Orange (1971)"

Folder 6: "Notes on Dr. Strangelove: Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)"

Folder 7: "Notes on Planet of the Apes (1968)"

Folder 8: "Notes on The Black Cat (1934)"

Folder 9: "Notes on 2001: a Space Odyssey (1968)"

Volume 4: "Orson Welles's Macbeth: Murdered Dreams", 2006

Folder 10: Papers, early 1970s

Item 1: "An Examination of the Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Novel Frankenstein"

Folder 11: Papers, 1971

Item 1: "A Brief History of My Association with the Hunting of Animals"
Item 2: "Concerning Logic and Two Short Stories by Edgar Allen Poe"
Item 3: "An Examination of the Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Novel Frankenstein"
Item 4: "On the Drama 'Cain,' by Lord George Gordon Byron"
Item 5: "On the Essays of Percy Bysshe Shelley"
Item 6: "On the Subject of Vegetarianism"
Item 7: "A Personal Examination of Two Short Stories Written by Mary W. Shelley"
Item 8: "Personal Views on Several Motion Pictures"
Item 9: "Reactions to the Music of Several Composers"
Item 10: "Thoughts on Shelley's 'A Defence of Poetry'"

Folder 12: Papers, 1972

Item 1: "A Brief Examination of Orson Welles' Citizen Kane"
Item 2: "A Critical Analysis of Byron's Manfred"
Item 3: "A Critical Analysis of Shelley's 'Hymn to Intellectual Beauty'"
Item 4: "Monsieur Verdoux and the Chaplin Technique"
Item 5: "The Seventh Seal: Film Techniques of Ingmar Bergman"
Item 6: "Thoughts on Lord Byron's Cain"

Folder 13: Papers, 1973

Item 1: "Aristotle, Johnson, Goldsmith: a Comparison of Theories on Dramatic Poetry"
Item 2: "Binsey Poplars: Hopkins, Natural Beauty, and Man"
Item 3: "The Brothers: Instress in Man"
Item 4: "Browning and the Necessity of an Acceptable Self-Image"
Item 5: "Cleopatra: Two Interpretations"
Item 6: "The End of Glory, Lawrence Lafore"
Item 7: "An Explication of Tennyson's 'Saint Simeon Stylites'"
Item 8: "Fantasy in the Novel and Film 415: Final Exam"
Item 9: "Hitler: the Last Ten Days"
Item 10: "Matthew Arnold and the Byronic Madman"
Item 11: "The Novel to Film Translation of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"
Item 12: "The Pentagon Propaganda Machine, J. William Fulbright"
Item 13: "The Rape of the Lock and the Profund"
Item 14: "Robinson Crusoe, the Middle-Class, and Ambition"
Item 15: "The Tempest: Shakespeare's Ultimate Fantasy"
Item 16: "Translation of the Frankenstein Legend: Novel to Film"
Item 17: Untitled, regarding Albert Camus
Item 18: Untitled, regarding the United States Supreme Court

Folder 14: Papers, 1974

Item 1: "Historians, Detectives, and the Pursuit of Evidence"
Item 2: "Horsefeathers-Duck Soup: the Marx Brothers vs. the World"
Item 3: "Joseph Mankiewicz's Julius Caesar"
Item 4: "The Sense of the Absurd in Shakespeare's Antony & Cleopatra"
Item 5: "T.S. Eliot and the Ideas in Mencken's 'American Culture'"

Folder 15: Papers, 1975-1976

Item 1: "Problems of Thematic Sources and Interpretations of Byron's Manfred", 1975
Item 2: "Analysis of the Character Je in A Taste of Honey", 1976
Item 3: "Critical Evaluation of Josef van Sternberg's The Blue Angel", 1976
Item 4: "Ironic Implications in James Whale's Trilogy of Fantasy Films", 1976

Folder 16: Papers, 1977-1978

Item 1: "'Bartleby': Adaptation from Short Story to Film", 1977
Item 2: "'Bartleby' and the Romantic Preoccupation", 1977
Item 3: "Privacy and Deception in Faulkner's As I Lay Dying", 1977
Item 4: "Ring Lardner, Jr. and the Influences on His Work", 1977
Item 5: Untitled, regarding Willa Cather, 1977
Item 6: "American Graffiti: Involvement vs. Detachment", 1978
Item 7: "Habits of Mind: Four Novels by H.G. Wells", 1978
Item 8: "The Island of Doctor Moreau: Crisis and Readjustment", 1978

Folder 17: Papers, undated

Item 1: "The Horror Film: 1930-1935"
Item 2: "Pinter's Idea of Characterization in The Birthday Party"
Item 3: Untitled, regarding James Whale's Frankenstein

Folder 18: Stanley Kubrick: Seven Films Analyzed. Advertisements, Correspondence, and Reviews, 2001

Volume 5: "Tangling with Dragons: Growing Up Fairy Tale Style in Tangled and How to Train Your Dragon", 2018

Volume 6: "Tangos Before Sunrise, Sunset, and Midnight: a Conversational Journey with Jesse and Celine", 2017

Series 2: Drafts

The second series consists of Randy Rasmussen's rough drafts and notes, arranged alphabetically. Some of these drafts became published works, while others remained solely drafts.

Box 1

Folder 19: "Annabel Lee"
Folder 20: "Before Midnight"
Folder 21: "Before Sunrise": Folder contents: Loose notebook paper, a typed written rough draft, and one handwritten notebook
Folder 22: "Before Sunset"

Box 2

Folder 1: "The Birds"
Folder 2: "Chimes at Midnight"
Folder 3: "Fallen Heroes"
Folder 4: "Dr. Strangelove": Folder contents: three individual notebooks
Folder 5: "Film Notes", 1981-1989
Folder 6: "Forbidden Planet: Utopia vs. Dystopia"
Folder 7: "Frankenstein by Mary Shelley"
Folder 8: "How to Train Your Dragon": Folder contents: three individual notebooks
Folder 9: "Jacques Barzun", 1977
Folder 10: "A Little Romance (1979)"
Folder 11: "The Magnificent Ambersons"
Folder 12: "Notes on A Clockwork Orange"
Folder 13: "Notes on Cat People (1942)"
Folder 14: "Notes to The Great Garrick"
Folder 15: "Orson Welles's Macbeth"
Folder 16: "'Ozymandias' by Percy Shelley"
Folder 17: "Poe"
Folder 18: "Revised Halloween Sequel"
Folder 19: "Rocky Horror Picture Show": Folder contents: loose leaf paper and one individual notebook
Folder 20: "The Shining": Folder contents: four individual notebooks
Folder 21: "Son of Dracula (1943)"
Folder 22: "The Wolfman": Folder contents: two individual notebooks
Folder 23: Untitled notebook, regarding Citizen Kane
Folder 24: Untitled notebook, regarding The Lady from Shanghai
Folder 25

Box 3

Folder 1: Untitled notebook - Miscellaneous film notes
Folder 2: Untitled notebook - Miscellaneous film notes
Folder 3: Untitled miscellaneous notebook
Folder 4: Untitled miscellaneous notebook
Folder 5: Untitled miscellaneous notebook

Series 3: Correspondence, 2009-2020

Box 3

Folder 6: E-mails (printed out), circa 2009-2013: Personal e-mails to and from various individuals
Folder 7: Correspondence with McFarland & Company, Inc. Publishers, Jefferson, North Carolina, 2013
Folder 8: Thank you note to the Chester Fritz Library, 21 December 2020

Series 4: Photographs

Box 3

Folder 9: Rasmussen Family Photographs, 1993-1994
Folder 10: Chester Fritz Library Photographs

Box 4

Volume 1: Green Photograph Album, 1990s: Photographs depict the staff at the UND Bookstore, the Chester Fritz Library, and the buildings and grounds of the University of North Dakota
Volume 2: Red Photograph Album: Various photographs of the buildings and grounds on the University of North Dakota

Series 5: Miscellaneous

Box 3

Folder 11: Randy Rasmussen Memorial Lecture Series, 2023-

Browse by Series:

[Series 1: Writings, 1971-2018],
[Series 2: Drafts],
[Series 3: Correspondence, 2009-2020],
[Series 4: Photographs],
[Series 5: Miscellaneous],
[All]

Department of Special Collections
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