Guide to the Papers of Patrick White, 1930-2002

Summary

Collection number:

MS 9982

Creator:

White, Patrick, 1912-1990

Extent:

5.07 metres and (32 archive boxes + 1 folio box)

Language:

English

Preferred citation:

Items from this collection should be cited as '[Title or description of manuscript item], Papers of Patrick White, National Library of Australia, MS 9982, [series and file number]'.

Availability:

Available

Access conditions:

Available for research. Not for loan.

Background

Content Summary:

Papers of Patrick White, covering his career and literary work from the early 1930s through to his death in 1990. The collection includes: correspondence received and drafts of correspondence sent by White (1939-1994); 10 literary notebooks (1930s-1970s) which include the beginnings of most of White's 12 novels; papers relating to White's autobiography Flaws in the glass, including all manuscript and typescript drafts; typescripts, corrections and correspondence relating to 3 published novels together with manuscripts for 2 unpublished novels and a novella (c.1965-1986); manuscripts for 3 late plays, typescripts for several major plays, and manuscripts of several [never performed] dramatic works (c.1962-1996); manuscripts and typescripts for several short stories (c.1976-1988); manuscripts for a number of poetry and short prose works (c.1970-c.1988); manuscripts and typescripts of speeches (1972-1989); dramatised extracts, scripts and artwork adapted from or based on White's work (1960-1987); address books and diaries (1960s-1990s); personal documents and certificates (1940-1988); awards received by White (1974-1987); files relating to the Patrick White Literary Award and Patrick White's Choice (1975-1990); theses and draft publications about White's work (1969-1986); scripts written by others and sent to White (1980-1990); photographs (1930-1984); ephemera (1960-1993); and printed material (1934-1990).

Also included are papers of White's lifelong partner, Manoly Lascaris, comprising condolence letters on White's death, photographs and correspondence (1962-2002).

Biographical Note:

Born in England in 1912, the son of wealthy New England (NSW) graziers, Patrick White became Australia's first Nobel Laureate in Literature (1973). White was educated in Australia and in England, where he studied French and German languages and literature at Cambridge in the early 1930s. White began his career as a serious writer in London in the 1930s, writing across all genres as he was to do for the rest of his life. By the late 1930s, he had published poems, plays, short stories, and his first novel, Happy Valley, which he was later to repudiate.

White continued to write during World War II, when he served as an RAF Intelligence Officer in the Middle East. His surviving wartime notebook makes clear that the key ideas and concepts of several of his great novels were conceived during this period of his life. His wartime service had another major and lasting impact: he met Manoly Lascaris in Alexandria, Egypt, in 1941, and spent the rest of his life in this enduring partnership.

After moving between Australia and Europe in the immediate post-war years, White and Lascaris returned permanently to Australia in 1948. They lived first in Castle Hill (NSW) - breeding Schnauzers and trying various small pastoral enterprises while White continued to write and be published - before moving to 20 Martin Road, Centennial Park (Sydney, NSW) in 1964. White died at Martin Road in 1990; Lascaris survived him for 13 years, dying in 2003.

White was a prolific and constant writer. He published 12 novels (and wrote at least 2 further novels and a novella which remained unpublished) and nearly 30 short stories during his lifetime, together with a modest number of poems. His great novels - from The aunt's story (1948) to Memoirs of many in one (1986) - were written steadily over a period of almost 40 years. He had a dozen plays and screenplays produced and wrote several more which were never performed or published. These were written in two distinct periods of activity, from The ham funeral in 1947 to A cheery soul in 1962, and then again from Big toys in 1977 to Shepherd on the rocks in 1987. He published a number of essays during his lifetime, especially in his later years when he became an activist, making speeches and attending protests for the preservation of Centennial Park and other green spaces, for Indigenous rights, for an Australian Republic and against nuclear arms. He was a prolific correspondent: David Marr, his biographer and editor of the 1994 Patrick White: Letters, tracked down 3000 letters by White, despite White's exhortations to many of his friends that they burn his letters in their possession. He also published a searching self-portrait in his 1981 Flaws in the glass, drawing on notes and writings from his earliest notebooks.

White's genius was recognised by many during his lifetime. In addition to the 1973 Nobel Prize, White won the Miles Franklin Award twice (for Voss in 1957, and for Riders in the chariot in 1961), and the Australian Literary Society Gold Medal three times (for Happy Valley in 1939, for The tree of man in 1955, and for The burnt ones in 1965). But he was also denigrated and suffered excoriating reviews of some of his novels and plays. Friend and supporter of many - as his considerable correspondence attests - he also severed long friendships with ferocity, and maintained old enmities, fuelling criticism of his work and contributing to a now somewhat hackneyed persona as a 'monster'.

White continues to be a controversial figure. In 2006, White was named by the Bulletin as one of Australia's 100 most influential people. In the same year, the Institute of Public Affairs included White's 1973 Nobel Prize as one of the 13 biggest 'mistakes' in Australian history. In any case, he is - by a wide margin - Australia's most written about writer, and new critical studies of his work are produced every year.

For further reading, David Marr's 1991 Patrick White: A life, a draft of which was read by White just a few months before his death, is the essential source.

Immediate Source of Acquisition:

During White's lifetime, he asserted that he kept no manuscripts or personal papers, burning his drafts on completion of each work. For many years after his death, it was believed that a single manuscript draft of Memoirs of many in one (1986), donated by White to the anti-apartheid Canon Collins Education Trust for Southern Africa in 1988 and subsequently purchased at auction in 1991 by the National Library of Australia and the State Library of New South Wales, was the only surviving record of White's literary manuscripts. While White does appear to have destroyed a considerable portion of his manuscript material, he clearly retained many literary papers and personal papers until his death. The papers in this collection were in the custody of Manoly Lascaris (White's partner) who died in 2003, and of Barbara Mobbs, White's long-term literary agent and Literary Executor, who presented the collection to the National Library of Australia in 2006.

Arrangement:

While the papers were received from the depositors very well sorted and arranged, rearrangement was required to bring items belonging to specific series together. In addition, incoming and outgoing correspondence has been sorted by correspondent. A number of items not on the original packing list were found in the boxes, and these items have been described in this finding aid. A list detailing the conversion from the original packing list to the final finding aid is available from the National Library of Australia's Pictures and Manuscripts Branch upon request.

Related

Related Documentation:

1. Supplementary finding aid (Type: pdf, Size: 290.2 KB)

   Appendix I - Correspondence Index

Other Finding Aids:

The correspondence in Series 1.1, Series 1.2 and Series 26.1 has been name-indexed. Refer to the attached Correspondence Index for further information.

Existence and Location of Copies:

Selected items from Series 2 and Series 4 have been digitised and are available online through this finding aid.

Indexed terms

Names:

White, Patrick, 1912-1990

Conditions Governing Access:

The collection is available for research.

Conditions Governing Use:

Copying and publication of unpublished manuscript material is subject to copyright restrictions. For such material, written permission to publish must be obtained from the copyright holder(s). Copying of unpublished material for research purposes is permissible 50 years after the death of the creator of the material. White's Literary Executor has given the Library permission to copy White's copyright material for research purposes, at the Library's discretion.

Preferred citation:

Items from this collection should be cited as '[Title or description of manuscript item], Papers of Patrick White, National Library of Australia, MS 9982, [series and file number]'.

Location of this collection:

National Library of Australia

Parkes Place

Canberra ACT 2600, Australia

Contact:

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