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COLLECTION Identifier: MS Eng 1458

John Masefield letters to Florence Corliss Lamont

Overview

Letters from British poet, John Masefield, to his American friend, Florence Corliss Lamont.

Dates

  • Creation: 1916-1952

Language of Materials

Collection materials are in English.

Conditions Governing Access

There are no restrictions on physical access to this material.

This collection is not housed at the Houghton Library but is shelved offsite at the Harvard Depository. Retrieval requires advance notice. Readers should check with Houghton Public Services staff to determine what material is offsite and retrieval policies and times.

Extent

6 linear feet (6 boxes)

2189 letters from poet John Masefield to his friend, Florence Lamont, spanning nearly four decades. Includes a commentary on the historical era, their friends, families, and work. Some letters include sketches by Masefield. Included with these original autograph letters are a complete set of typescript transcripts of the letters and another set in typescript (carbon copy).

Biographical / Historical

John Masefield (1878-1967) was a British poet. Florence Corliss Lamont (1872-1952) was the wife of Thomas W. (Thomas William) Lamont (1870-1948), a New York financier with the firm of J.P. Morgan & Company. She graduated from Smith College and earned a master's degree in philosophy from Columbia Univeristy. They met in February of 1916 while Masefield was lecturing in New York.

Constance and John Masefield were longtime friends with Thomas and Florence Lamont.

Arrangement

Organized into the following two series:

  1. I. Masefield letters
  2. II. Masefield letter transcripts

Physical Location

Harvard Depository

Immediate Source of Acquisition

*55M-152. Deposit of the children of Thomas W. Lamont, 23 Wall Street, New York, New York; received: 1956 February; gift 1978 January 1.

Bibliography

Some of these letters are published in: John Masefield. Letters of John Masefield to Florence Lamont, edited by Corliss Lamont and Lansing Lamont. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979. See this volume for an in-depth analysis of letters.

Processed by:

Bonnie B. Salt

Title
Masefield, John, 1878-1967. John Masefield letters to Florence Corliss Lamont: Guide.
Author
Houghton Library, Harvard College Library
Language of description
und
EAD ID
hou00212

Repository Details

Part of the Houghton Library Repository

Houghton Library is Harvard College's principal repository for rare books and manuscripts, archives, and more. Houghton Library's collections represent the scope of human experience from ancient Egypt to twenty-first century Cambridge. With strengths primarily in North American and European history, literature, and culture, collections range in media from printed books and handwritten manuscripts to maps, drawings and paintings, prints, posters, photographs, film and audio recordings, and digital media, as well as costumes, theater props, and a wide range of other objects. Houghton Library has historically focused on collecting the written record of European and Eurocentric North American culture, yet it holds a large and diverse number of primary sources valuable for research on the languages, culture and history of indigenous peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania.

Houghton Library’s Reading Room is free and open to all who wish to use the library’s collections.

Contact:
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