Papers, 1942-1975.
ca. 3900 items
Access: Researchers must obtain the permission of James Merrill before gaining access to the Merrill Papers.
James Merrill's Papers are one of the cornerstones of the Modern Literary Manuscript Collection. Merrill was one of the first authors to commit his manuscripts to Washington University and the growth of his Papers has mirrored that of his literary reputation. Merrill's poetry has had favorable reception from critics and fellow poets alike from the outset of his career; however, it was not until 1967, the year he won the National Book Award for his collection, Nights and Days, that his work began to attract the wide audience that it reaches today. And it was just one year later that Washgington University acquired the first group of Merrill's manuscripts.
Since 1967, James Merrill has become one of the most honored poets of his generation. In addition to a second National Book Award (1979), Merrill was awarded the Bollingan Prize in 1972, the Pulitzer Prize in 1977, and numerous other literary honors. As the individual components of his monumental trilogy- Divine Comedies (1976), Mirabell: Books of Number (1978), and Scripts for the Pageant (1980)-appeared, Merrill's reputation and readership increased steadily, making him one of the few contemporary American poets to achieve both critical success and a readership which extends beyong academia and fellow poets. This popular success is somewhat ironic, however, since Merrill is among our most complex and hermetic poets. Nowhere is the complexity of Merrill's poetry more evident than in the thousands of pages of notebooks, typescripts, worksheets, and galleys that make up the bulk of his Papers. Merrill has reworked nearly every line and the meticulous craftsmanship of the final products is revealed in the manuscript worksheets to have been achieved only through considerable effort. Merrill's heavily revised worksheets are among the best examples in the Modern Literary Manuscripts collection with which to view the extensive transformation a poem undergoes as it moves from rough draft, or even random notes, through its final version.
"James Merrill Checklist." American Book Collector, 4/6. (Nov/Dec 1983).
Hall, Holly, comp. James Merrill, Poet, [exhibit catalog]. (St. Louis: Washington University Libraries, 1985).
Merrill, James Ingram, 1926- American author M ca.3775 C62 J26