Trial Request

Literary Manuscripts Berg

A broad range of authors from across the nineteenth century make this essential research tool for all scholars and students researching Victorian literature. Students and scholars are offered an unrivalled opportunity to explore the manuscripts, notebooks, letters and diaries of the nineteenth century’s greatest authors.

Literary Manuscripts Berg traces the genesis of some of the period’s greatest literary masterpieces through the unique manuscripts of their authors, many unavailable elsewhere. They are supplemented by rare printed materials, including early editions annotated by the authors. Each author collection is included in its entirety, allowing users to browse and search the manuscripts as they would in the Berg Reading Room. Authors represented include: Matthew Arnold, The Brontës, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Robert Browning, Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy.

Highlights

  • Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s two ­part diary from 1832, plus four notebooks containing working drafts of poems from 1843
  • A manuscript of Wilkie Collins’ play The Lighthouse
  • A substantial collection of original sketches, watercolours, and pen ­and ­ink drawings by William Makepeace Thackeray
  • A letter by Charlotte Brontë describing the death of Emily Trollope’s holograph manuscript of his novel Miss Mackenzie
  • An original water­colour by Emily Brontë entitled ‘Forget Me Not’
  • Swinburne’s sequence of sonnets on the death of Browning
  • Charles Dickens’ correspondence to Mrs Gaskell, Edgar Allan Poe, Leigh Hunt, George Lewes and many others
  • Bound holograph manuscript of Hardy’s The Three Strangers

Material Types

  • Original manuscripts
  • Literary drafts
  • Correspondence
  • Financial documents

Personal items relating to the Berg authors