Literary notebooks, 1930s-1970s

Component identifier:

Series 2

Content Summary:

Over the course of his writing career, White kept a series of notebooks in which he recorded literary references and research notes which he used as background material for his writings. Several of the notebooks also include draft writings, including dialogues and character studies for White's literary works. Material relating to at least 11 of White's 12 novels (The tree of man (1955) appears to be the exception), 2 of White's dozen produced dramatic works and several short stories is contained in these notebooks.

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.

Names:

White, Patrick, 1912-1990

Contents

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