Steve Davis, the longtime literary curator of The Wittliff Collections, is retiring this December after 30 years with Texas State University. Throughout his tenure, he’s helped elevate The Wittliff into one of the nation’s preeminent champions of Texas and Southwestern letters and culture.
Davis joined the Southwestern Writers Collection—the forerunner of The Wittliff Collections—in 1994. At the time, he was the very first graduate student in TXST’s new Center for the Study of the Southwest.
Davis started as a library assistant before becoming assistant literary curator and then literary curator. Along the way, he’s been instrumental to the archive’s acquisition of the papers of authors including Cormac McCarthy, Sandra Cisneros, Marc Simmons, John Rechy, Benjamín Sáenz, and Charles Portis.
“Steve made great contributions to Texas letters through his writing and through his work with the Texas Institute of Letters—in short, he did much to transform Texas writing through his work as a passionate advocate, editor, and curator,” said David Coleman, director of The Wittliff Collections.
Coleman also noted the popularity of Davis’s interdisciplinary exhibitions—such as the Lonesome Dove exhibit—and his books. Davis’s books include Dallas 1963, J. Frank Dobie: A Liberated Mind and Texas Literary Outlaws: Six Writers in the Sixties and Beyond.
For his part, Davis said he’s proud of the Wittliffs’ efforts to expand conceptions of Texas literary culture to include a broader array of writers and genres.
“We’ve tried to be the forefront of Texas literature, and with that comes what Dobie himself was after, which is to help people in Texas and the Southwest better appreciate the significance and the value of their own part of the world,” Davis said. “And that’s really what we do—we hold up that cultural mirror of the greatest works of Southwestern and Texas literature, and we help shine it back so people can be inspired by, learn about, and better appreciate the place where they live.”
Davis and his wife, Georgia Ruiz Davis, are moving to Albuquerque, New Mexico, where he plans to dedicate more time to writing and going on hikes in the mountains. But he also plans to remain involved with the Wittliff, guiding its book series—including a forthcoming anthology dedicated to African American writers in Texas—and providing counsel until as a new literary curator gets up to speed.
“I think it’s great to give new generations a chance to come forward and help shape the literature of our place in their own ways,” Davis said. “I see my role now as being helpful however I can, but really, I’ve spent 30 years working primarily indoors, and I want to spend more time outside exploring the outdoors.”