Biographical and Historical Note
The Eddie Woods Archive documents an understudied, indeed largely undefined, segment of the “new American poetry and prose” of the post-1945 period – namely, the expatriate and, to a certain extent, surrealist school that has numerous connections with the Beats but is essentially an independent, coherent body of work. The leading figures of this school are represented in this collection by substantial numbers of manuscript materials, correspondence, scarce and rare books, photographs, and a variety of art prints, including numerous silk screens. The principal centers of this expatriate vein of post-WWII American cultural expression were Amsterdam, London, Morocco, Nepal, Bombay and other sites in India, Thailand, Bali, and to a lesser degree Paris. Eddie Woods (b. 1940, in New York) moved into this cultural circle in the early 1970s. Originally a journalist, he first made contact with it through his newspaper and radio work in Thailand, which was eventually followed by his becoming an editor for International Times (IT), a London-based monthly that was one of the counter-culture’s major voices in the 1960s and 1970s. Woods had begun writing poetry and fiction by this time, and after he moved to Amsterdam in the late 1970s, he founded Ins & Outs magazine, then subsequently the Ins & Outs Press and Bookstore, all of which flourished as publishers, publicists, and organizers of expatriate cultural productions from the late 70s and into the 80s (with the Press continuing into the early 90s). In October 2004 the Press emerged from a decade of ‘suspended animation’ with the release of Eddie Woods’ spoken-word CD Dangerous Precipice, followed a year later by his book Tsunami of Love: A Poems Cycle. The recorded version of Tsunami of Love appeared on compact disc in August 2007.
In his role as a cultural impresario and artistic entrepreneur, Eddie Woods, still an active poet and prose writer, is an important presence, both in American expatriate circles and among European avant-gardists, especially Dutch and Italian. Woods’ promotional activities made him, in short, a crucial center to the movement, and his archive documents his close connections with its leading figures, including Paul Bowles, Ira Cohen, Bob and Eileen Kaufman, Louise Landes-Levi, William Levy, and Jack Micheline.
The Archive also contains manuscripts and many photographs of the principal Beat writers, including William Burroughs, Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg, Herbert Huncke, and Harold Norse. It features, as well, significant documentation on numerous European avant-garde figures of the period, such as the British writer Tom Raworth, the Dutch photographer Peter Edel (including portraits of William Burroughs, Julian Beck, Allen Ginsberg, and Yevgeny Yevtushenko, along with annotated contact sheets), Piero Heliczer (Italian-born American poet, playwright and filmmaker), and Chris Sanders, long-time publisher of the International Times.
From the guide to the Eddie Woods papers, circa 1957- 2009, (Dept. of Special Collections & University Archives)
