Kenneth Burke Letters to Lily Batterham Burke, 1918-1933 (bulk 1919, 1922-1929).

ArchivalResource

Kenneth Burke Letters to Lily Batterham Burke, 1918-1933 (bulk 1919, 1922-1929).

The collection consists mostly of letters written by Kenneth Duva Burke to his first wife Lily Batterham Burke. The collection includes 166 letters (or notes) from Burke to Lily and 1 letter to his daughter Dutchie (as well as another note to her included on a letter to Lily). The collection offers a unique opportunity to see Burke's life and work within the modernist culture of the 1920s. Topics of the letters vary from Burke's accounts of daily matters such as finances, commuting, Andover, N.J., and family life, to reports about his reading, writing, translations, activities, and meetings with friends and editors. The letters from 1919 were written before Burke and Lily married. Many of the other letters were written during weekdays while Burke worked in New York City and Lily maintained their home in Andover. A few others were occasioned by short separations, as when Lily visited her family in Asheville, North Carolina, or Burke took a job with Scofield Thayer in Martha's Vineyard or researched drugs in Washington, D. C. for Colonel Arthur Woods. In addition to Burke's letters to Lily the collection also includes a few letters written to Burke. Letters from Lily to Kenneth Burke include a signed and, likely, unsigned note. Also included is a letter to Burke from the poet William Carlos Williams, and additionally letters from modernist artist Carl Sprinchorn (1 letter), outdoorsman and artist Jim Butler (1 letter), and Ellen Thayer, assistant editor at The Dial (1 letter). The publishing house Harcourt Brace & Co. is represented by Harrison Smith (3 letters, 1 note) and Louise Bonino (2 letters). Also included are a short letter to Burke from builder Edgar Reed and a letter likely from Lily's mother, Eleanor Ann Batterham. Two additional letters possibly from Eleanor Ann Batterham to Burke and Lily are also discovered in the collection. Other correspondents include "Gladys" (a member of Burke's family, 1 letter), and Lily's sisters Edith Batterham (1 letter), Elizabeth Batterham (3 letters), Margaret Batterham Waters (1 letter), and Virginia Batterham (1 letter). Two receipts are also present.

0.46 cubic feet.

Related Entities

There are 5 Entities related to this resource.

Harcourt Brace & Company

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6b31j90 (corporateBody)

Gross was an editor at the publishing company. From the description of Correspondence to Alma Mahler, 1957. (University of Pennsylvania Library). WorldCat record id: 155863411 Brooks edited a book by Constance Rourke for Harcourt Brace. From the description of Correspondence with Van Wyck Brooks, 1921-1962. (University of Pennsylvania Library). WorldCat record id: 180851633 ...

Burke, Kenneth

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6736s52 (person)

Kenneth Burke was an American literary critic and philosopher of language. From the description of Kenneth Burke letters to Stanley Weintraub, 1971-1984. (Pennsylvania State University Libraries). WorldCat record id: 768251269 From the description of Towards looking back [manuscript], 1976. (Pennsylvania State University Libraries). WorldCat record id: 768131282 From the description of An Eye-poem for the ear [manuscript] / Kenneth Burke. (Pennsylvania State Univers...

Williams, William Carlos, 1883-1963

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6gn8xd9 (person)

This collection covers the years of William Carlos Williams's medical studies at the University of Pennsylvania, a year of service at a New York City hospital, a semester of medical study in Leipzig, and the period when he was setting up his medical practice and courting his future wife, Florence Herman, in his home town of Rutherford, N.J. During this time, his younger brother Edgar went from engineering and architectural studies at M.I.T. to further study of architecture at the American Academ...

Burke, Lily Batterham, 1891-1961

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6f19nss (person)

Sprinchorn, Carl, 1887-1971

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6nv9r70 (person)

Painter; Shin Pond, Me. and New York, N.Y. From the description of Carl Sprinchorn papers, 1887-1972. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 122502508 Carl Sprinchorn was born in Sweden in 1883. He came to the United States at the age of 16. In 1911, he made his frist Maine woods painting. In 1913, he had four pictures in the Armory Show. He painted in New York and Maine from 1917 to 1921 and in Maine from 1937-1952 when he became ill. He died in Selkerk, N.Y. in 1971. F...