Correspondence with and relating to English poet and critic Elizabeth Jennings. Other correspondents include: staff at David Higham Associates, Jennings's literary agents; C.V. Wedgewood, historian and close friend of Jennings; two copy letters to Fraser Steel of the BBC in Manchester; and one copy letter to Jonathan Parker of the Poetry Book Society. Much of the correspondence relates to Jennings's collection Moments of grace (Carcanet, 1979). This was largely compiled by Schmidt who made a preliminary selection of poems from holograph notebooks passed on to him by Jennings; she sent further notebooks and loose typed poems to him over time, and also suggested some specific poems she would like to be included; he then returned copies of the chosen contents to her and the arrangement of the material was discussed, although Jennings left the final decisions to Schmidt. The letters chart this process, and also contain references to: Jennings's instructions on how the printed versions of her poems should be laid out on the page; the proofing process; her initial plan to dedicate the book to Richard Pasco and Barbara Leigh Hunt; advance and royalties; the submission of the book to the Poetry Book Society for possible recommendation; Schmidt's satisfaction with the book; the pre-publication of some of the poems in PN Review; review copies; Jennings's deep concern over reviews; and sales of the book (see /1-8, /10-12, /14-15, /17-23, /25, /46, /56, /59-66 and /69-70). There are also references to the preparation and publication of Jennings's Selected poems, also published by Carcanet in 1979 (see /1, /3-4, /8-10, /12, /15, /19-22, /56, /59-65 and /69-70).
Other topics include: Jennings's plans to publish a book of sea poems for children; royalties for Jennings's earlier Carcanet collections Consequently I rejoice and Growing-points (/8, 15 and /57-58); early plans for her next collection Celebrations and elegies (1982), for which Schmidt suggests Jennings send him a batch of new poems every few weeks from which to make his selection (/63, /65 and /67-69); plans for a limited edition of her poems to be illustrated by Anthony Rossiter [A dream of spring (Celandine, 1980)] (/66); Jennings's inclusion in various anthologies edited by Schmidt (/18 and /66-67); her inclusion in other anthologies, and her concern about being omitted from D.J. Enright's Oxford book of contemporary verse 1945-1980 (/67-69); her participation in poetry events in Oxford during 1979, with reference to other writers taking part, including Laurie Lee, a friend of hers (/3-4 and /66); her reliance on her literary work for financial support, and her emotional reliance on Schmidt's support for her work; her hope of undertaking broadcasting work for Fraser Steel at the BBC (/3, /6, /59 and /67-68); a meeting with Anne Stevenson (/25); P[eter] Porter (/46); a meeting with Kingsley Amis (/66); Jennings's thoughts on PN Review [12] (/65); an exhibition by Roger Pringle in Stratford in which she was featured in 1978 (/66); her receipt of two fan letters, including one from a teacher in Brooklyn whose pupils had enjoyed her poems (/4); the collapse of the New Review (/4); a bursary received from Southern Arts (/16 and /23); and Jennings's experiences in an Oxford nursing home.
The file includes numerous poems by Jennings, a number of them torn from holograph notebooks and others in typescript, presumably reflecting the way the two 1979 publications were put together from poems submitted to Schmidt over time. The poems are as follows:
- /13 'Legend Told Again for Any Child' (photocopy typescript)
- /24 'Summer has Come' (annotated typescript)
- /26 'On the Way' (photocopy of holograph manuscript)
- /27 'A War at Hand' (photocopy of holograph manuscript)
- /28 'Santa Sabina, The Aventine Hill, Rome' (photocopy of holograph manuscript)
- /29 'Destiny' (holograph)
- /30 'Pastoral' (photocopy of holograph manuscript)
- /31 'Unselfconsciousness' (photocopy of holograph manuscript, with holograph emendations)
- /32 'Speeches' (photocopy of holograph manuscript)
- /33 'Looking Ahead' (annotated typescript)
- /34 'Here and Again' (typescript)
- /35 'After Seven Years' (annotated typescript)
- /36 'A Proustian Moment' (annotated typescript)
- /37 'Down to Earth' (annotated typescript)
- /38 Incomplete poem, probably the latter half; begins "Of gulls. On every wave / Somebody floats..." (holograph); on the reverse, Chorus and Invocation' (holograph; crossed through by Jennings)
- /39 'Staying and Going' (holograph), with, on the reverse 'Arriving' (marked as "for children")
- /40 'An Autumn Song' (holograph)
- /41 'A Song to Cheer' (holograph)
- /42 'Boy Looking at the Night Sky' (holograph; on the reverse of the first sheet is an incomplete poem beginning "A lesser way. I try / To emulate them knowing I shall never..."; and on the reverse of the second is 'Springtime, Ring-Time' which has been crossed through by Jennings)
- /43 'To be the Tide' (holograph)
- /44 'Winds (a sonnet)' (holograph)
- /45 'A Chorus of Childhood' (holograph; with 'North Devon in Childhood' on the reverse of the second sheet, crossed through by Jennings)
- /47 'Composer' (annotated typescript)
- /48 'For My Mother' (annotated carbon typescript)
- /49 'Elegance' (annotated photocopy of holograph manuscript)
- /50 'Up to the Stars' (annotated photocopy of holograph manuscript)
- /51 'The Face of Christ' (annotated photocopy of holograph manuscript; the final stanza has been written out again in a hand other than Jennings's because the copy of this sheet was faint)
- /52 'A Letter after a Loss' (annotated carbon typescript)
- /53 'A Winter Walk' (annotated carbon typescript)
- /54 'Play' (annotated carbon typescript)
- /55 'Spring Fever (a sonnet)' (photocopy typescript signed by Jennings)
Jennings's letters are all holograph and were dated at Oxford.