Call Number:

C1592

Repository:

Princeton University Library: Manuscripts Division

Extent:

3 boxes

Language:

French and English

Date:

1932-2005 (inclusive)

Creator:

Durrell, Françoise Kestsman and Durrell, Lawrence

Form:

Diaries. and Typescripts.

Abstract:

Consists primarily of Françoise Kestsman Durrell's collection of manuscripts, many of them unpublished, by British author Lawrence Durrell (1912-1990).

Françoise Kestsman Durrell, an author and translator of works by Lawrence Durrell (1912-1990), was the British author's final companion and literary executor. Born in France to Polish Jewish parents, she moved to Sommières and became the owner of a small restaurant. (Her business partner ended up absconding with the funds at a time when she was still supporting her five children.) Kestsman Durrell became acquainted with Lawrence Durrell through her friendship with his daughter, Sappho, and through her position as a restaurant proprietor. The two became very close during the last ten or so years of Durrell's life; and she played a significant role in the administration of his work.

After Durrell's death, Kestsman Durrell became affiliated with the International Lawrence Durrell Society, and in 1991, following the late author's wishes, facilitated in the creation of the Centre d'Etudes et Recherches Lawrence Durrell in Sommières in his home, La Maison de Mme Tartes. For the Centre's collection, Kestsman Durrell painstakingly collected copies of Durrell's rare early books and journal publications to replace those that he had given away, lost, or sold to Southern Illinois University. Her daughter, Nadia, Mary Byrne, and others helped Kestsman Durrell catalog the manuscripts and correspondence files still in the house at the time of Durrell's death. Due to a lack of funding, the research center closed and the house was sold in 1995. Most of its collection, including Durrell's books, papers, and manuscripts, were sold to the University of Paris X at Nanterre.

Kestsman Durrell published two works based on the writings and poems of Lawrence Durrell. Éditions Gallimard published her translation of Caesar's Vast Ghost as L'ombre infinie de César. Regards sur la Provence in 1994. In 2006, she published Too Far to Hear the Singing: Poems by Lawrence Durrell . She also authored a foreward to introduce the nine poems by Lawrence Durrell that she selected for inclusion in Anthony Astbury's The Tenth Muse, an anthology of poems by various British writers.

Lawrence George Durrell was an expatriate British novelist, poet, dramatist, and travel writer, most well-known for his cycle of novels, The Alexandria Quartet. Born in 1912 in Jullundur in northern India, near Tibet, Durrell lived in various places throughout a majority his life, most notably countries in and around the Mediterranean. A philhellene, Durrell spent years living on Cyprus and Corfu. He also held a number of jobs, including several diplomatic and government positions. In 1965, he finally settled in La Maison de Mme Tartes in Sommières, France, where he lived until his death in 1990. Durrell married four times. His final companion, Françoise Kestsman Durrell, whom he did not marry, became his literary executor. His final work, Caesar's Vast Ghost, published in 1990, was dedicated to her.

This collection primarily consists of manuscripts, specifically corrected typescripts, by British author and philhellene Lawrence Durrell (1912-1990). Many of the manuscripts, written during the final decades of Durrell's life, are unpublished. Also included is an autograph scrapbook entitled, "Diary and Rough Notes 1955," documenting his time living in Cyprus; it contains manuscript notes, photographs of his family, stamps, and other ephemera. There is also a copy of Otto Rank's Art and Artist with a lengthy inscription by Anaïs Nin to Lawrence Durrell on the front endpaper, dated Paris February 27, 1938, and scattered marginal annotations and underlining throughout.

Papers related to Françoise Kestsman Durrell include some correspondence, specifically letters received at the time of Lawrence Durrell's death, and a galley proof of her publication, Too Far to Hear the Singing: Poems by Lawrence Durrell (2005).

Though most materials are in English, some are written in French.