Washington University Libraries
Department of Special Collections
Manuscript Division

PURPOSE

Washington University Libraries Department of Special Collections serves as the repository for unique primary materials in the Olin Library. One of several collections held at WULDSC, The Modern Literature Collection includes over 125 collections of authors' papers (containing well over 250,000 items), over 35,000 rare or unique printed editions and ephemera, and thousands of other primary materials in a variety of other media. These collections support research by a wide range of scholars including undergraduates, graduates, faculty, and other researchers whose work relies on primary resource materials, including rare books, manuscripts, and archives.

The wide variety of materials found in The Modern Literature Collection provide an exhaustive research collection containing a cross section of authors, journals, and presses that document contemporary literature. The primary patrons are members of the progams devoted to the study of English and American Literature. The Creative Writing Program and American Culture Studies have all used the collections heavily. The Departments History as well as faculty and students from the School of Art have also worked with materials from the Modern Literature Collection. Other patrons of the collections include scholars from the departments of Women's Studies, Cinema Studies, and Performing Arts. An important group of patrons is scholars nationwide and worldwide who are interested in contemporary English and American letters. WULDSC defines its mission as follows:

WULDSC is committed to preserving a record of contemporary literature, paying close attention to exhaustively documenting the writing and performing of a select group of contemporary authors through numerous media. The Modern Literature Collection should complement the collections held in the Olin Library general stacks with unique archival materials that enable primary research within contemporary literature, and editions of primary texts important to the understanding of contemporary letters. In addition, WULDSC will prospectively collect materials and/or editions that will become important historical evidence documenting innovation and change in contemporary poetry, fiction, and non-fiction prose.

SCOPE OF THE MODERN LITERATURE COLLECTION

1. General guidelines:
   Archival and print materials that document contemporary poetry, fiction, non-fiction, or drama. Works are chosen to reflect styles, genres, and themes within contemporary literature.
2. Specific authors or corporations:
   Collection development for the Modern Literature Collection seeks to expand and develop current archival and print emphases. A listing of current manuscript holdings for authors, magazine archives, and press archives can be found on the page for collection descriptions (http://library.wustl.edu/units/spec/manuscripts/mlc). A list of names that anchor the collections can be found on the page listing current and historical collecting priorities. As a usual policy, and with the exception of prospective collection development, continuing print and archival acquisitions should complement existing holdings.
3. General subject areas:
   In addition to expanding and developing around specific collections, WULDSC collects manuscripts and print material for its Modern Literature Collection that use the following subject areas as a general guide:

Contemporary British and American Literature and History
Contemporary British and American Poetry
Contemporary British and American Prose
Contemporary British and American Non-Fiction Prose
Contemporary British and American Drama
Sound recordings of authors
St. Louis Literature and History
Literary Magazine Archives
Literary Press Archives
History of American Literary Studies
American Critical and Cultural Studies

4. Retrospective collecting:
   
   1. For a select group of authors and corporations, WULDSC seeks to build comprehensive holdings. For these collections, WULDSC actively seeks out archival material of all sorts and develops comprehensive print collections that include first, variant, revised, newly introduced and other significant editions or contextually interesting republications of works.
   2. For most authors on its list, WULDSC seeks to complement exising manuscript holdings and build complete print collections including first and very significant editions of printed materials.
5. Prospective collecting:
   Most collecting is based on a list of authors and corporations whose works represent important trends and styles in contemporary literature. For these collections, new books are purchased as they are published to assure comprehensiveness. At times, usually following reviews, other texts are purchased that document emerging trends in contemporary literature. Works by experimental authors or more popular authors are often collected for these purposes. WULDSC will often purchase works of this sort in depth, hoping also to acquire their personal papers by gift or purchase.
6. Primary and secondary literature:
   Preference is given to the acquisition of primary materials, including authors papers, magazine archives, press archives and print material useful in documenting aspects of an author's or corporations career that may be of scholarly interest. Depending on the level at which an individual author, magazine, or press collection is developed, significant new scholarly editions of works are acquired as are publications of letters, diaries, sketch books, and other primary sources. Biographies or institutional histories of note will be acquired. Critical works will only be acquired in a few select cases, and usually critical materials will be purchased for the literature collections held in the general stacks.
7. Contributions to other works:
   Contributions by authors or corporations to texts such as introductions, collaborative works, prefaces, etc. will be collected depending on the level at which an individual author or corporation is collected. Collections development levels are noted in appendices A and B.
8. Language:
   WULDSC collects literature almost exclusively in English. The primary language of biographies, memoirs, and critical works collected is also English.
9. Geographical aspects:
   For the Modern Literature Collection, WULDSC collects poetry, fiction, non-fiction, and drama in English, covering the literatures of England and the United States; and to a lesser extent Canada, Scotland, Wales, Ireland.
10. Chronological aspects:
    
1. 1901-1945: Major authors of the period are well represented, with particularly strong holdings in Samuel Beckett, Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot, William Carlos Williams, and Ford Madox Ford.
2. 1945-present: Fiction of this period is purchased to complete print collections that complement literary manuscript collections, and to ensure that major authors (either already on our list or prospective) are documented.
11. Suppliers
    Current American writers' works are supplied via a list of contemporary authors. Suppliers are Blackwells and, depending on the author, Matheson Books or Serendipity Books . (See Appendix A for the American list.) WULDSC does not attempt to be comprehensive in contemporary British literature. (See appendix B for the British list.) Other titles are requested specifically based on reviews or small press catalogues. Every two years the collecting list is reviewed by the Curator of Modern Literature, the latest review in March of 2001.

 

TYPES OF MATERIALS

WULDSC collects books, journals, newspapers, yearbooks, annuals, manuscripts, photographs, drawings, archives, ephemeral materials and a variety of other original materials. Emphasis is placed on acquiring items in their original states. In most cases, authors' books will only be acquired in their first appearance. In general this means the first edition in the country of the author, though precedence is given to the first appearance in print. Collected editions of works are purchased for major authors. Scholarly editions of works are also added for major authors or corporations. Facsimiles are purchased, but sparingly. Most facsimiles will be purchased for the general stacks.

STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES

1. Strengths:
   The strength of this specific collection lies in its extensive documentation of contemporary literature through collecting focused on specific author's or corporation's careers. The clear strength of the collection is in contemporary American poetry, with contemporary American fiction not far behind. The collection has strong primary material holdings that support areas of inquiry such as environmentalist literature, gender studies, cultural studies, and many other areas of research.
2. Weaknesses:
   While continuing to build on existing strengths, the collection needs to begin reflecting strong work in non-fiction prose undertaken by contemporary authors. The collection needs to begin reflecting emergent modes of writing reflecting various types of literature now written in the United States. The collection may need to broaden its holdings in international literatures to complement certain collections.

TRANSFER CRITERIA FOR MOVING GENERAL STACKS MATERIALS INTO THE MODERN LITERATURE COLLECTION

The following criteria govern the transfer of general stacks materials to the Modern Literature Collection. If a book meets one or more of these criteria, it can be routed to Special Collections for review. Special collections staff will evaluate the book and decide on a case-by-case basis whether to transfer the book or return it to the general collection.

1. Limited edition titles (usually 500 copies or less) are collected according to the importance of the author or illustrator. They are not collected per se and will be added to Special Collections only if the text is of special interest or if the author is a writer collected by WULDSC .
2. Autographed books (signed by author, artist) or association copies (personal copies of famous people).
3. Editions of works that document information about an author or corporation held as a manuscript collection, that fill gaps in the printed works held in Special Collections, or are of scholarly interest. A first or important edition. Decisions to move materials from Olin stacks to Special Collections stacks will be made by WULDSC on a case by case basis.

DEACCESSION POLICY FOR THE MODERN LITERATURE COLLECTION

Introduction:

Deaccession of materials from the Modern Literature Collection is governed by different principles from those for general research collections. Because of the primacy of preserving special collections materials in their original format and, concomitant with that, the role of special collections as repositories for cultural history, WULDSC will carefully assess all materials before accepting them to lessen the likelihood of deaccession. This said, there are valid reasons why materials in special collections may be deaccessioned.

Acknowledging these points, The Rare Book and Manuscripts Section of the Association of College and Research Libraries included a lengthy set of guidelines for deaccession of materials in Standards for Ethical Conduct for Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Librarians, with Guidelines for Institutional Practice in Support of the Standards, 2d edition, 1992. The following policy for deaccession of materials from WULDSC and Special Collections incorporates and upholds the standards established by RBMS for the ethical deaccessioning of materials from special collections.

Guidelines for the Deaccession of Materials:

1. In the deaccession of rare books and manuscripts, WULDSC will weigh carefully the interests of the public for which it holds the collections in trust, the interests of the scholarly and cultural community, and WULDSC's own mission.

2. WULDSC will consider any legal restrictions, the necessity for possession of valid title, and the donor's intent in the broadest sense.

3. Procedures for the deaccession or disposal of materials will be at least as rigorous as those for purchasing and should be governed by the same basic principles. The decision to dispose of materials must be made only after full and scrupulous consideration of the public interest and the needs of researchers; the process of deaccession will be carried out in as open and public a manner as possible.

4. Mandatory restrictions on disposition which accompanied a donation will be observed unless it can be shown clearly by appropriate legal procedures that adherence to them is impossible or substantially detrimental to the Washington University. When statements of donor's preferences accompany an acquisition, any departure from them will be carefully considered and negotiated with the donor or the donor's heirs or settled by appropriate legal procedures.

5. Responsibility to the needs and reputation of WULDSC requires that, in preparing for and accomplishing any deaccession, WULDSC will take care to define and publicly state the purpose of the deaccession and the intended use of monetary or other proceeds of the deaccession, to avoid any procedure which may detract from the Library's reputation for honesty and responsible conduct, and to carry out the entire process in a way which will not detract from public perception of its responsible stewardship. The following points must be taken into consideration:

6. WULDSC will insure that the method of deaccession will result in furthering the agreed purpose of the deaccession, whether this be monetary gain or more appropriate placement of scholarly resources.

7. WULDSC will disclose to the potential new owner or intermediary agent any action, such as the retention of a photocopy of the material, which may affect the monetary or scholarly value of the material.

8. To the fullest extent possible, WULDSC will make public information on the disposition of deaccessioned materials.

9. WULDSC will not allow materials from its collections to be acquired privately by any library employee, officer, or volunteer, unless they are sold publicly and with complete disclosure of their history.

11. Due consideration should be given to the library community in general when disposing of items. Sales to, or exchanges between, institutions will be explored as well as disposal through the trade.