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T. E. Lawrence's Correspondence
Contents This section will be added to during work on the T. E. Lawrence Letters
series. Moreover, I am aware that we have copies of many letters in our
files that
have not yet been added to these lists, which were last thoroughly
updated in 1989. However, it seems
better to make a start with this much-delayed section than to postpone
it indefinitely, since researchers may find even the draft listings helpful. Conversely, if you know of letters to or from Lawrence that are
missing from the relevant section of this list, please let me
know.
Jeremy Wilson
CHRONOLOGICAL HANDLISTS
For lists and texts of Lawrence's
published letters see the Writings
section
Handlist of Lawrence's letters
The years shown in blue as links are
currently on-line.
Where there are two links for a year:
'a' = January to June
'b' = July to December
Pre-war
1905 | 1906 | 1907
| 1908 | 1909 | 1910 |
1911 | 1912 |
1913 | 1914
War and Diplomacy
1914 | 1915 | 1916 | 1917 | 1918 | 1919 | 1920 | 1921 | 1922
Service Years
1922 | 1923 |
1924 | 1925 | 1926 | 1927a
| 1927b |
1928 | 1929 | 1930 | 1931 | 1932 | 1933 | 1934 | 1935
This Letters Listing
will have two components:
Chronological handlists
These yearly handlists will include letters
written by Lawrence and letters received by him for which texts are
known to be extant.
Other information that these handlists will
contain when complete will include the first four words of each letter,
the date of each letter, page-references for publication in one of the widely
available major collections (see below), and the approximate length of
each letter, in words,
omitting the address and signature lines.
Handlists by
correspondent
These handlists will include letters
written by Lawrence and letters received by him for which texts are
known to be extant.
Other information that these handlists will
contain when complete will include the first four words of each letter,
the date of each letter, page-references for publication in one of the widely
available major collections (see below), the approximate length of each letter, in words,
omitting address and signature lines, and the location of the original
or, failing that, a photocopy of the original or a transcript.
Published sources
There are many errors and omissions (often
silent) in the earlier editions of Lawrence's letters. The best and
most fully annotated texts, as they become available, are those in the
definitive T. E. Lawrence Letters series which began to appear in
2000. The six volumes in this series that are scheduled to appear in 2000
and 2001 (Vols 1-4, 9 and 11) are shown in the tables in red.
Many Lawrence letters have been published -
with greater or lesser accuracy - in other places. Where these are letters
that are not contained in one of the major collections below, the
place of publication will in due course be added in footnotes to each
table.
-
Letters which purport to be printed
complete are indicated in black type.
-
Letters where an
omission is indicated, or where I know that there is a silent
omission, are indicated in dark grey type and the publication
reference is placed within square brackets. If
the first words of the letter are not in the passage quoted, they also
are placed within square brackets.
-
Letters which are
not published in the sources already listed (see below) are listed in
pale grey type
The published sources already included in
this listing are:
For letters by T. E.
Lawrence:
B: RG:
Robert Graves (ed.) T. E. Lawrence to his Biographer Robert Graves
[originally published in 1938, but reprinted in one volume with:]
B:LH: B. H. Liddell Hart, T. E.
Lawrence to his Biographer Liddell Hart (London, Cassell, 1963)
DG: David
Garnett (ed.) The Letters of T. E. Lawrence (London, Jonathan Cape,
1938)
HL: [M.
R. Lawrence (ed.)], The Home Letters of T. E. Lawrence and his Brothers
(Oxford, Blackwell, 1954)
Letters:
The T. E. Lawrence Letters series (the definitive edition of T. E.
Lawrence's correspondence). Projected volumes announced to date. (This list is indicative. As the series progresses there may be changes to
the contents of some volumes.):
Castle Hill Press fine-press
Letters series,
29cm:
This series will contain most
of Lawrence's post-war literary correspondence. Volume-length will be approx.
220-280 pages. The first volumes were published in 2000.
Volume I: Correspondence with Bernard
and Charlotte Shaw, 1922-1926 (Fordingbridge, Castle Hill Press, 2000)
Volume II: Correspondence with Bernard and Charlotte Shaw, 1927 (Fordingbridge,
Castle Hill Press, 2003)
Planned for
2007 Volume III:
Correspondence with Bernard and Charlotte Shaw, 1928
Planned for 2008 Volume IV:
Correspondence with Bernard and Charlotte Shaw, May 1929-1935
Planned for 2009 Volume V:
Correspondence with E. M. Forster, F. L. Lucas and Frederic Manning
Volume VI: Correspondence
with Edward Garnett and David Garnett
Volume VII: Correspondence
with Robert Graves
Volume VIII: Correspondence
with John Brophy, John Buchan, Mrs. Thomas Hardy, and Siegfried Sassoon
Volume IX: Correspondence with
Henry Williamson (Fordingbridge, Castle Hill Press, 2000)
Volume X: Miscellaneous
Literary Correspondence, including letters to John Brophy, John Buchan, C. Day
Lewis, C. M. Doughty, James Hanley, Noel Coward
Castle Hill Press subscribers'
library
editions
24cm.
These substantial volumes,
designed and printed to high standards and bound in good-quality cloth, will
contain Lawrence's general correspondence. They will be similar in format to the
Subscribers' Library Edition of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, The Complete 1922
Text (2003). The volume-length will be 325-700 pages. In some cases there
may also be a small trade edition published by J and N Wilson.
Volume
XI: Letters, 1905-10 to his family and others. Profusely illustrated
with photographs of castles visited by Lawrence.
Planned
for 2008-9: Volume XII:
Letters from Carchemish including
letters to his family, D.G. Hogarth, E. T. Leeds, C. M. Doughty, James Elroy
Flecker, and others, together with collateral documents.
Volume XIII: War Diaries and Letters including Lawrence's
surviving wartime diaries and notebooks, his reports and private correspondence,
and significant references to him in wartime records.
Volume XIV: Political and Diplomatic Correspondence 1918-1922.
Starting with letters and minutes written after his return to England in the
1918, the volume will cover the 1919 Peace Conference, Lawrence's work in the
Colonial Office with Winston Churchill, and his final diplomatic mission to the
Middle East.
Volume XV:
Service correspondence, 1922-35, including both official and personal
letters to wartime, Tank Corps and RAF personnel. The volume will give a
remarkable picture of Lawrence's career in the ranks.
Volume XVI: Correspondence with Advisers. D. G. Hogarth, Robin
Buxton, Lionel Curtis, John Snow and Edward Eliot. Important letters to some of
Lawrence's closest post-war advisers.
Volume XVII: Correspondence with Printers and Publishers:
Jonathan Cape, Sydney Cockerell,
C. J. Cumberlege, Peter
Davies, F. N. Doubleday, St. John Hornby,
Ralph Isham, Bruce Rogers,
Raymond Savage, and others. These letters trace Lawrence's involvement with
publishing, and contain much information about the three books published during
his lifetime (The Forest Giant, Revolt in The Desert, The
Odyssey of Homer) as well as various prefaces and introductions.
Volume XVIII: The world of Art. Herbert Baker, C.F. Bell, H.S.
Ede, Eric Kennington, Augustus John, Paul Nash, William Roberts, William
Rothenstein, and Kathleen Scott.
Volume XIX: Correspondence with Women: Nancy Astor, Lil Black, F.E.
Hardy and others, including post-war letters to his mother, Sarah Lawrence.
Volume XX:
Correspondence with Journalists and Historians. R.D. Blumenfeld, Geoffrey
Dawson, B. H. Liddell Hart, Lowell Thomas
Volume XXI: General Post-War Correspondence. George Brough, Edward
Elgar, Ernest Thurtle, A.P. Wavell and others.
* Letters to E. T Leeds was the
direct forerunner of the T. E. Lawrence Letters series, although
the series was not planned when it was published.
MB:
Malcolm Brown (ed.) The Letters of T. E. Lawrence (London, J. M.
Dent, 1988)
For letters to T. E. Lawrence
LTEL: A.
W. Lawrence (ed.), Letters to T. E. Lawrence (London, Jonathan
Cape, 1962) |
