The Stuff of Writers: Material Culture and Literary Manuscripts

Abstract The process of collecting and curating literary manuscripts is more than gathering an author’s papers and arranging them in chronological or thematic order. The goal of the curator is also to reveal the nature of the creative writing process. This may mean adding artifacts and other materials to the core collection. This article uses the example of the Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings Collection at the University of Florida to illustrate the process of collecting, describing, and providing access to literary manuscripts and associated artifacts and elements of material culture.