English
Papers from John E. Matthias. Microfilm from Cambridge University Library.
John Matthias Papers (JEM), University of Notre Dame Archives (UNDA), Notre Dame, IN 46556
Papers of John Matthias, consisting of notebooks; drafts of poems, essays, and editorial work; limited and signed editions and/or pamphlets and chapbooks; letters from British and American poets; drafts of translations and correspondence with translators; letters from editors, critics and scholars; and other files documenting his career as poet, critic, scholar, translator, teacher, poetry fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge, editor of Notre Dame Review, and the subject of literary study by a variety of critics in the UK and US.
Matthias' correspondence, manuscripts, and agreements for his book
Poet, professor of English at the University of Notre Dame, and author of many books of poetry and criticism including two on the life and poetry of David Jones,
Eighteen poetry notebooks representing Matthias' process in composing poems, but containing no complete drafts of poems; files of correspondence with poets; and files representing his activities at Notre Dame - dating chiefly 1971-2010.
Matthias writes that this accession contains "the most important files of letters" and "spiral notebooks going back to 1973 in Little Shelford, UK, in which I find very rough drafts of a large number of poems. Now and then there are also folded in typed worksheets. I had thought at one point to destroy all of these, but then got interested in them myself and therefore thought somewone else might get interested eventually. they also include various out of the way notes that sometimes contextualize the writing I was doing in them. There are no complete holograph poems in these notebooks. I don't work that way. But there are plenty of passages, stanzas, and fragments that anyone acquainted with my work will recognize."
Matthias says that the rest of the accession "contains chiefly two categories of letters and manuscripts: 1. Both sides of a lifetime correspondence with the Swedish scholar and poet Goran Printz-Pahlson. . . . 2. Misc. Notre Dame correspondence with former students re. publication of the poems of Michael Patrick O'Connor, along with early letters from Michael Patrick himself. "
Letters and Reviews of works by Matthias; correspondence and writing exchanged with other poets; manuscripts and other material related to Battle of Kosovo book, including material on Ivan Mestrovic's work.
Rare chapbooks by poets of interest to Matthias, some with related correspondence.
Matthias letters; Richard Burns [Berengarten] papers; Matthias course packets; "A Compound March" chapbook by John Peck; Sequoia (Stanford University literary magazine containing early work by Matthias); and photocopied poems and other material used by Matthias in teaching poetry courses at Notre Dame.
One box of David Jones material and one chiefly representing Matthias' teaching, but also containing texts supporting the Compostela section of A Gathering of Ways.
Twenty long-playing phonograph records with modern poets reading their own poetry; 3 digital video and 2 digital audio disks, most with recordings of poets reading their work or commenting on poetry.
CD-RW containing Microsoft Word documents (docx): "Two Kinds of Autobiography" by John Matthias; and Memory Screen, a CD-ROM multimedia book by Alan Halsey (2005).