A pair of extensive, unique collections arrived at Washington
University Libraries in recent weeks, their wide-ranging
contents anticipated to be of much interest to scholars and others
wishing to explore the remarkable literary career of either David Wagoner
(b. 1926) or Alexander Trocchi (1925-1984).
Both collections contain many decades' worth of
drafts, letters, photographs, notebooks, clippings, and more from these celebrated
authors. The materials are currently undergoing preliminary organization in
preparation for full processing over the next few months, according to Joel
Minor, curator of the Modern Literature Collection and Manuscripts. Minor notes
that each of the acquisitions is a significant and appropriate one for the growing
Modern Literature Collection. First established at WU Libraries in 1964, it is already a
repository for both Wagoner’s and Trocchi's early literary papers.
"David Wagoner has been an important figure in
American literature since the early 1950s, as a poet, fiction writer, editor,
and educator. He donated two smaller batches of literary papers to Washington
University in the late 1960s, upon our request to help us build the Modern
Literature Collection. Now with this purchase, the Wagoner archive is
essentially complete," Minor says.
"Alexander Trocchi, a very different sort of writer,
is now considered one of the major Scottish authors of the 20th century and an
international voice for the underground and avant-garde. We purchased a fairly
significant collection of Trocchi’s literary papers from a rare-book dealer,
also in the 1960s. Similarly to Wagoner, this acquisition means we now hold the
complete Trocchi archive available to researchers."
"Interest in the life and career of both writers is
growing," says Minor. "In the past year I have worked with scholars who came
here to access the current Wagoner and Trocchi collections, and I know in both
cases they are excited by the prospect of more coming in."
Minor traveled to Wagoner’s home in the state of
Washington this past summer to conduct an inventory of the poet’s papers, which
amount to about 80 linear feet and cover a span of more than 80 years. The
newly acquired collection includes, for example, a boyhood diary from 1938, typescripts
of numerous unpublished novels and poems, several versions of the screenplay
for his adapted novel The Escape Artist,
co-produced by Francis Ford Coppola in 1982, and correspondence with other significant
poets such as Wagoner’s friend and mentor, Theodore Roethke, at whose
encouragement Wagoner joined the faculty at the University of Washington in
1954.
Wagoner is highly regarded as the leading poet of
the Pacific Northwest. He also has a strong reputation as a teacher of writing and
served as editor of the distinguished literary journal Poetry Northwest for nearly 50 years. Among his published works are
24 collections of poems—two of which were finalists for the National Book
Award—as well as ten novels. He was selected to serve as a chancellor of the
Academy of American Poets in 1978 and has been the recipient of numerous
prestigious awards.
Born and raised in the industrial Midwest, Wagoner's
move to the lush Pacific Northwest in 1954 proved to be the pivotal turning
point in his life. He soon became best known as a poet and novelist whose work
was attentive to place, environment, and the natural world, and dealt with the
corrupting influences of modern society. Now 86, Wagoner continues to write and
publish poetry in periodicals, anthologies, and books—his latest being After the Point of No Return, in 2012.
When asked to comment on his archive as a whole,
Wagoner modestly said, "I'm
especially pleased that Washington University’s preservation of these papers
might help those interested understand [them] better than I did."
Like Wagoner, Trocchi’s work is hardly contained
within one main genre or activity. Trocchi wrote poetry, essays, and stories in
addition to ten novels. He was also a highly respected publisher and
translator. In the early 1950s he left his native Scotland and eventually
settled in Paris, where he established Merlin,
a literary magazine, and Collection Merlin, a small publishing house. In a few
short years he published Samuel Beckett, Jean Genet, Eugene Ionesco, Robert
Creeley, and others. He also collaborated with Maurice Girodias of Olympia
Press by writing literary-porn novels wherein he first started experimenting
with the conventional notions of authorship and narration.
In Paris, Trocchi acquired what would prove to be a
lifelong heroin addiction. His most famous novel, Cain’s Book, is the fictional journal of a heroin addict living and
working on a scow on the Hudson River. It became known as an "anti-novel" and Trocchi
soon garnered the attention of Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs, who became
lasting friends, as well as the attention of the British courts, who banned the
book after an obscenity trial. He lived in the U.S. from the mid-50s to the
early-60s, before settling in London where he started Project Sigma, an attempt
to organize a broad collaboration of international underground movements into a
cultural revolution.
Since his death in 1984, at the age of 59, there has
been a renewal of interest in Trocchi and his heavy influence on the
avant-garde movements of the 20th century. In 2003, a motion-picture adaptation
of Young Adam, his breakthrough book for
Olympia Press, was released in theaters.
The newly acquired papers, purchased from Trocchi's
last partner, Sally Child, contain considerable holdings related to his
involvement with various artistic, social, and literary movements, which
include research files, correspondence, interviews, and journals. Also included
are drafts of his writings, both published and unpublished—most notably, his
long-promised but never-published last novel, "The Long Book."
"I shall
not presume what Alex would have thought about it—but he was also a dealer of
archives, books, and manuscripts, and he would surely approve of a good place
for a good archive—including his own," Child said. "I am of course delighted
and relieved that the papers, which have been through fire and flood, now
join the rest of the Trocchi collection at Washington University in St Louis."
For more information
about these acquisitions or other holdings of the Special Collections
department of Washington University Libraries, visit http://library.wustl.edu/units/spec or call 314-935-5495.
The photos, from top to bottom, are as follows: 1) Among
the varied items to be found in the David Wagoner archive is a diary from his childhood. 2) Curator
of Manuscripts Joel Minor traveled to the home of David Wagoner, right, in the
summer of 2012 to conduct an inventory of the poet’s papers prior to their
acquisition by Special Collections this winter (Photo by Angela Minor). 3) Alexander
Trocchi is pictured second from right in this 1965 photograph, one of the items
in the collection (Photo by
Wim Van Der Linden). 4) Sarah
Schnuriger, Special Collections assistant, sorts through clippings in the
Alexander Trocchi archive that arrived from England in late January. Schnuriger
and manuscripts curator Joel Minor are currently processing the new acquisition,
which spans roughly ten linear feet.
