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T. E. Lawrence Letters
Series Editor: Jeremy Wilson
A definitive
new edition of T.E. Lawrence's correspondence including
much previously-unpublished material.
T. E. Lawrence was
remarkable, among other things, for the quality of his letters. It is
not just that they are interesting and well-written; they also provide
intriguing links to different aspects of British life in the first half
of the twentieth century. As many have discovered, an interest in
Lawrence can quickly become a gateway to the history and culture of his
time.
He corresponded with writers such as
John Buchan, E.M. Forster, David Garnett, Robert Graves, Siegfried
Sassoon, and Bernard Shaw; artists such as Augustus John, Eric
Kennington, Paul Nash, William Roberts and William Rothenstein;
archaeologists and travellers such as Gertrude Bell, C.M. Doughty and
D. G. Hogarth, and public figures such as Nancy Astor, Winston
Churchill and Lord Trenchard.
Lawrence's career and
personality often provoked strong reactions in people he met. Some
admired and respected him. Others questioned his achievements and
resented his post-war enlistment. Someone's reaction to Lawrence often provides
clues to their attitudes
towards other topics.
Around six thousand of
his letters survive, as do a fair number of those he received. The major
letters collections edited by David Garnett
(1938) and Malcolm Brown (1988) include only a fraction of this
material.
The
T. E. Lawrence Letters series will be in two parts:
1.
Large format fine-press
editions
We are publishing much of Lawrence's post-war correspondence with writers
in a series of fine-press volumes numbered I-X. These include, notably,
his Correspondence with Bernard and Charlotte Shaw - the longest
and most important series of his letters to survive. The total
text-length of the four Shaw volumes will be comparable to the length of
Seven Pillars.
These ten fine-press volumes
continue a tradition. In the past, Lawrence's writing has been published
by (among others) Bruce Rogers, the Corvinus Press, the Fleece Press,
the Golden Cockerel Press, The Limited Editions Club, the Officina
Bodoni, the Strawberry Press and the Whittington Press.
2. Subscribers'
Library Editions
Eleven further volumes, numbered XI-XXI, will be similar in format to our Subscribers' Library Edition of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, The Complete
1922 Text.
A
series of five
chronological volumes will cover Lawrence's working career:
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Youth, 1904-1910
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Letters from Carchemish, 1910-1914
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War Diaries and
Letters, 1914-1918
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Political and
Diplomatic Correspondence, 1918-1922
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Service
Correspondence, 1922-1935
Additional volumes will
cover particular aspects of Lawrence's post-war life. More
information
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