The Graham Greene Birthplace Trust


Updated Saturday, 09 October 2004
 

HRC, Austin Texas
The Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin

Graham Greene Collection

Scope and Contents


Holograph and typescript manuscripts, diaries, and publisher's correspondence comprise the majority of the Graham Greene Collection, 1924-1998. The collection is organized into five series: Series I. Works, 1924-1977 (35 boxes); Series II. Personal Papers, Journals, and Date Books, 1926-1984 (5.5 boxes); Series III. Correspondence, 1925-1991 (3.5 boxes); Series IV. Laurence Pollinger General Correspondence Files, 1950-1991 (43.5 boxes); and Series V. Laurence Pollinger Copyright Files, 1928-1998 (6.5 boxes). A portion of this collection was previously accessible through a card catalog, but has been re-cataloged as part of a retrospective conversion project.

The Works series contains typescripts and page proofs for most of Greene's major works. Holograph manuscripts are also available for several works including A Burnt-Out Case, Cheap in August, The Comedians, The Honorary Consul, and Our Man in Havana. Many of the novels are also present in screenplay form or edited for different editions. England Made Me, Travels with My Aunt, The Human Factor, and Our Man in Havana are particularly well represented. A complete list of Greene's works present in the collection is available in the Index of Works as the end of this guide.

The Personal Papers, Journals and Date Books series contains six notebooks Greene used over many years to record his dreams, as well as some 74 small spiral date books with appointments and notes jotted in them. Also present are works by other authors found among Greene's papers, an address book, and publicity schedules for two of his books.

The Correspondence series is largely composed of personal letters written by Greene as well as a few letters to Greene and a small amount of third-party correspondence. Most of Greene's letters to newspapers and magazines are "letters to the Editor" and include drafts as well as final typescripts. Perhaps most interesting are letters written by Greene to Vivianne Dayrell-Browning between 1925 and 1927 during their courtship. A complete list of correspondents can be found in the Index of Correspondents at the end of this guide.

The Laurence Pollinger General Correspondence Files series comprises files kept by Greene's long time publisher Laurence Pollinger. Generally the letters in this series are requests for publication, stage, or film use of various of Greene's works. Regular status lists of the state of rights for various materials are also included in the files. The files have been maintained in their orignal order, arranged chronologically, with an occasional folder labeled topically, such as "British Publishers." A small amount of duplication occurs where recipients returned copies of letters attached to their responses.

The Laurence Pollinger Copyright Files series holds records of contract negotions for rights for use of Greene's works and is arranged by media type: audio (radio and books on tape); film (includes contracts for "film and TV" rights); publishing; stage; and television (contracts solely for TV broadcast rights). Within the subseries materials are organized alphabetically by contracting company. Names of individuals from contracting companies are not included in the Index of Correspondents. There are a few folders that contain general contract materials for a given title and those are listed by the work's title. Some of the correspondence in this series duplicates letters found in the previous General Correspondence Files series.

A fairly large quantity of thermo-faxes included in the Laurence Pollinger series were fading towards illegibility and the best photocopies possible have been made for preservation purposes and to facilitate use.

Other materials associated with Greene may be found in the following collections at the Ransom Center:

 

Barker, George
Blunden, Edmund Charles
Bowen, Elizabeth
Church, Richard
Connolly, Cyril
Conrad, Joseph
Cunard, Nancy
Fitzgibbon, Constantine
Ford, Ford Maddox
Grigson, Geoffrey
Hamilton, G.
Harpers
Hutchinson, Mary
Jameson, Storm
Lehmann, John
Lindsay, Philip
London Magazine
Lownders, Marie Adelaide Belloc
Mackenzie, Compton
Maclaren-Ross, Julian
Maugham, William Somerset
Morrell, Ottoline Violet Anne Cavendish Bentinck, Lady
Owen, Peter
Palmer, Herbert Edward
Patmore, Derek
PEN
Plomer, William Charles Franklyn
Pound, Ezra Loomis
Priestly, John Boynton
Pritchett, VS
Scott-James, Rolfe Arnold
Sitwell, Edith, Dame
Stanford, Derek
Strong, Leonard Alfred George
Warner, Rex
Waugh, Evelyn

Further references can be found on The Graham Greene Birthplace Trust web at www.grahamgreenebt.org