Call Number:

C0263

Repository:

Princeton University Library: Manuscripts Division

Extent:

• 13 boxes
• 2 items
• 5.9 linear feet

Language:

English

Preferred Citation:

Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Naumburg Collection of Ford Madox Ford, Box and Folder Number; Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

Date:

1871-1992 (inclusive) and 1910-1970 (bulk)

Creator:

Ford, Ford Madox, 1873-1939

Form:

Photoprints., Correspondence, Articles., and Drafts (preliminary versions)

Abstract:

Ford Madox Ford, formerly "Ford Madox Hueffer", founded The English Review, a literary journal, in 1908 and published novels (such as The Good Soldier, 1915) and critical works. The collection consists jointly of letters and works of Ford and letters and works about Ford collected by Edward Naumburg (Princeton Class of 1924).

Ford Madox Ford was a noted British author, poet, and editor. Born Ford Madox Hueffer in Merton, Surrey, England, in 1873, Ford was educated at the University College School and wrote his first book, a children's fairy tale called The Brown Owl, when he was seventeen. He traveled widely throughout Germany and France and was strongly influenced by writers he met along the way. His first major work of fiction was The Fifth Queen Trilogy, based on the life of Catherine Howard, the fifth wife of Henry VIII. In 1908, Ford launched the English Review, a literary journal that attracted such notable contributors as H.G. Wells and Henry James. However, scandal in his personal and professional life forced him to sell the journal after only one year. In 1915, Ford published The Good Soldier, which is recognized both as his best novel and as one of the masterpieces of the twentieth century. He served as a lieutenant during World War I in France and decided to remain in Paris after the war, where he founded another literary journal, the Transatlantic Review, which published works by such talented writers as Ernest Hemingway, D.H. Lawrence, and James Joyce. He also published a four-part saga called Parade's End, which is often thought to be his most ambitious work. He spent the remainder of his life living in Paris, Provence, and the United States. Ford died in 1939.

Consists jointly of letters and works of Ford and letters and works about Ford collected by Edward Naumburg (Princeton Class of 1924). Ford's papers contain letters to Joseph Conrad, Douglas Goldring, W. H. Hudson, Edgar Jepson, James B. Pinker, and others, spanning the years from 1910 to 1935. There are manuscripts for "Conrad and the Sea," "Dedicatory Letter to Isabel Paterson," The Good Soldier" (title page only), "The Nature of a Crime" (co-authored with Joseph Conrad), and "Romance: An Analysis," and miscellaneous typescripts and proofs for the Transatlantic Review. Also included are photographs and caricatures of Ford and clippings and tearsheets of his articles.

Naumburg's papers include his correspondence (1940-1983) with authors, Ford's relatives, and others about Ford, such as Paul A. Bartlett, Janice Biala, David D. Harvey, Katharine Lamb, Frank MacShane, and Sondra Stang. His notes and typescripts for his articles, including "A Collector Looks at Ford Madox Ford," are also present. Papers of other persons contain letters and works related to Ford by Ford Madox Brown, Herbert Gorman, Julian Mitchell (his TV adaptation of The Good Soldier), and Elsie M. Hueffer, and letters by Violet Hunt to Edgar Jepson, Ethel Mayne, and others concerning her relationship with Ford.