Autograph and typescript drafts, [1920s]-1967, of verse translations from German by Vernon Watkins, many apparently unpublished. Proofs and cuttings are included of some poems published in periodicals and anthologies, together with a few notes by Ruth Pryor and original German texts used by Watkins.
Pryor, Ruth.
Autograph and typescript drafts, [1930s]-1966, of verse translations by Vernon Watkins from Italian and Spanish, apparently mainly unpublished. Extracts from Watkins's translation of Dante's Inferno (ff. 1-55) were broadcast by the BBC in 1966.
Autograph and typescript notes and drafts, 1953-1967, by Vernon Watkins for introductions to readings of his own poetry and that of others.
Autograph and typescript drafts, [c. 1940]-[1967], by Vernon Watkins of essays and lecture notes on W. B. Yeats and his work.
Autograph and typescript drafts, 1929-1932, of an unpublished collection of stories and verse produced by Vernon Watkins in collaboration with two friends from Cambridge, one of whom prepared the lino-cut illustrations. Also included is a verse fragment of a Fairy Comic Opera entitled 'Garden of Chimaera' (ff. 127-32).
Typescript drafts, 1941-1963, of published works by Vernon Watkins, comprising two poems, 'Discoveries' (see The Ballad of the Mari Lwyd (1941)), and 'The Salmon' (see Uncollected Poems (1969)) (ff. 1-2); a prose translation of a play by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, 'The Salzburg Great World Theatre' (see Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Selected Plays and Libretti, ed. by Michael Hamburger (1963)) (ff. 3-49); and a foreword, 1963, to Kenneth Grahame, The Golden Age and Dream Days (1964) (ff. 50-57).
Autograph and typescript drafts, [1930s]-1967, of poems by Vernon Watkins, almost all apparently unpublished.
There are copies of both short and long poems, as well as fragments, including multiple drafts of 'The Birth to Destruction', 1937-1947 (ff. 6-17), 'The Moth', 1952-1966 (ff. 55-89, thirty-seven drafts), 'The Will', 1960-1961 (ff. 93-100), 'The Melodramatic', 1965-1967 (ff. 101-112), and 'The Fall of Sodom', [1960x1967] (ff. 285-300), and a number of apparently different poems on the theme of 'Taliesin', 1938 (ff. 18-33). 'The Measure Moves' (ff. 70 verso, 72 verso, 73 verso, 75 verso) and 'The Guest' (f. 223 verso) appeared in Fidelities (London, 1968), pp. 26, 96.
Autograph and typescript drafts, [c. 1944]-1967, of light verse, acrostics and poems for children by Vernon Watkins, composed 1925-1967 (ff. 1-85), together with drafts for published articles, lectures and radio talks, 1948-[1964] (f. 86-138).
Most of the verse (ff. 1, 3-28, 35-56, 58-68, 71-82) was published in Vernon Watkins, LMNTRE Poems (Swansea, 1999). The prose includes drafts of an article and radio script variously called 'The Place and the Poem', [?1949] (ff. 86-99), 'The Place and the Poem. Swansea' (ff. 100-101) and 'Swansea Poems', 1948 (ff. 102-107), a version of which was published as 'Swansea', Texas Quarterly, 4.4 (Winter 1961), 59-64; 'Poetry of the Second Phase', 1962 (ff. 111-114), partly published as 'The Second Phase in Poetry', Unicorn, 10 (Spring 1963), 9-10; and radio scripts, 'The Need of the Artist', 1962 (ff. 108-110), published in The Listener, 8 November 1962, pp. 756-757, and 'Problems of Communication', 1963 (ff. 115-122), published as 'The Joy of Creation', Listener, 30 April 1964, pp. 720-721.
Notebook containing autograph drafts, September 1966, of a series of eight lectures entitled 'Modern Poetry Lectures', apparently given by Vernon Watkins at the University College of Swansea.
The lecture notes contain references to various poets, in particular T. S. Eliot (ff. 2-16 passim), W. B. Yeats (ff. 3-31 passim), D. H. Lawrence (ff. 17-24), Wilfred Owen (ff. 24, 26-31) and David Jones (ff. 24-28). Excerpts from the notes were published in Poetry Wales, 12.4 (Spring 1977), 52-55.
Notebook, [?1948]-1967, of Vernon Watkins, containing bibliographical lists of his poems published in Italy (inside front cover, f. 1) and poems and translations sent for publication in America (ff. 1 verso-11).
Autograph and typescript drafts, 1937-1967, of poems by Vernon Watkins included in The Ballad of the Outer Dark (1979).
Exercise book containing a draft poem, 1928, by Vernon Watkins entitled 'Repton. An Epic', apparently unpublished.
Exercise book containing Vernon Watkins's journal of travels in Belgium and Germany in 1931, together with draft poems, 1931-1936, all apparently unpublished.
Exercise book containing drafts, 1933, by Vernon Watkins of apparently unpublished poems entitled 'Barents' and 'Pulchritudo'.
Notebook containing drafts, 1934, of poems by Vernon Watkins, all apparently unpublished.
Autograph and typescript drafts, [1950s]-1966, of a long, apparently unpublished poem by Vernon Watkins entitled 'Ballad of the Fall of Sodom'.
Typescript drafts, 1947-1951, of verse translations by Vernon Watkins of Heinrich Heine's cycle 'Die Nordsee', published as Heinrich Heine, The North Sea (London: Faber and Faber, 1955).
Exercise book containing autograph drafts, 1936-1937, by Vernon Watkins of verse translations from French, some of which were included in Selected Verse Translations (1977), and some being apparently unpublished.
Cyclostyled radio scripts, including poetry readings, and talks, 1949-1967, by Vernon Watkins or relating to him and his work.
Autograph and typescript notes and drafts, 1947-1967, for talks and lectures by Vernon Watkins on subjects including the translation of poetry, poetry in English, including his own, and the art of Ceri Richards.