The Brautigan Library, a unique collection of nearly 400 unpublished manuscripts written by everyday authors, will soon have a new home in
Vancouver, Washington, thanks to a partnership between the
Digital Technology and Culture Program at Washington State University and the
Clark County Historical Museum.
John F. Barber, Ph.D., faculty member in the Digital Technology and Culture Program at WSU Vancouver, and developer and curator of
Brautigan Bibliography and Archive, will coordinate students and a team of local and international volunteers, to reopen The Brautigan Library and continue its original mission of connecting writers and readers of personal narratives.
The Library will become a permanent collection of the Historical Museum, the former 1909 Andrew Carnegie library building in downtown Vancouver, according to Susan Tissot, Executive Director.
Inspired by a fictional library described by Richard Brautigan, a Washington native son (1935-1984), in his 1971 novel,
The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966, The Brautigan Library provides everyday writers a public shelf where their unpublished manuscripts, free of restrictions on content or quality, are available for anyone to read.
Future plans call for The Brautigan Library to collect and circulate unpublished digital manscripts and to provide opportunities for research, conferences, exhibits, and creative activities, according to Barber.
Says Barber, "The Brautigan Library is not about publishing, or even about literature. It's about people telling their stories in a democratic way. It is a public home for personal narratives in a digital age."
The Brautigan Library was first opened in 1990 in Burlington, Vermont, by Todd R. Lockwood, a Brautigan fan. Inspired by a fictional library described by Richard Brautigan in his 1971 novel,
The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966, Lockwood founded a library that, true to Brautigan's vision, accepted manuscripts from authors keen to tell their stories. Manuscripts were accepted regardless of quality or content and made available to any interested readers. The only requirement was that the work had to be unpublished at the time it was received by the Library.
The Brautigan Library collection will become a permanent collection within the
Clark County Historical Museum, according to Susan Tissot, Executive Director.
Efforts to reopen the Library and continue its original mission of connecting writers and readers of personal narratives will be coordinated by Dr. John F. Barber, faculty member of the
Digital Technology and Culture Program at Washington State University Vancouver.
Barber, a renown Brautigan scholar, is the developer and curator of
Brautigan Bibliography and Archive, an interactive, online resource generally acknowledged as the premier information source for the life and works of Richard Brautigan (1935-1984), the Washington-born author who rose to international prominence as the author said to best capture the zeitgeist of the counterculture during the late 1960s and early 1970s.
The original Brautigan Library collection consists of nearly 400 manuscripts and assorted papers. The bound manuscripts will be permanently housed at the
Clark County Historical Museum, the 1909 Andrew Carnegie Library building in downtown
Vancouver, Washington, and may be read there by anyone interested.
A new book cataloging system, the first since the Dewey Decimal Classification (1876), will be used to catalog manuscripts held in The Brautigan Library.
Called The Mayonnaise System, manuscripts will be cataloged according to subject and then by the order in which they were received.
The categories include: Family, Natural World, Spirituality, Love, Humor, Future, Adventure, Street Life, War and Peace, Social/Political/Cultural, Meaning of Life, Poetry, and All the Rest.
*** Catalog information forthcoming ***
Future plans call for submission of digital manuscripts that will be cataloged, added to the collection, and circulated using contemporary digital technologies. True to Brautigan's vision, The Library will accept and share manuscripts from authors keen to tell their stories.
*** Submission information forthcoming ***
Media Focus on The Brautigan Library
Press Releases
Richard Gary Brautigan (1935-1984) was a 20th Century American writer whose novels, stories, and poetry are often cited as the best to depict the zeitgeist of the counterculture in San Francisco, California, during the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Brautigan, born in Tacoma, Washington, moved to San Francisco in 1956 after spending his childhood in Washington and Oregon. In San Francisco he rose to international prominence with the publication of his novel
Trout Fishing in America (1967), his collection of poetry,
The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster (1968) and his collection of stories,
Revenge of the Lawn (1971).
In each, Brautigan is noted for his detached, anonymous first person point of view, his idiosyncratic, autobiographical, quirky, yet easy-to-read prose style and episodic narrative structure full of unconventional but vivid images powered by imagination, strange and detailed observational metaphors, humor, and satire, all presented in a seemingly simplistic, childlike manner.
Although Brautigan died in 1984, his legacy continues as scholars and researchers find his work central to any study of The Sixties while writers, readers, artists, musicians, and others find inspiration and insight in the works of Richard Brautigan.
John F. Barber, Ph.D.
Digital Technology and Culture Program
Washington State University Vancouver
14204 NE Salmon Creek Avenue
Vancouver, WA 98686-9600
www.thebrautiganlibrary.org
Brautigan Bibliography and Archive website
Susan Tissot
Executive Director
Clark County Historical Society
1511 Main Street
Vancouver, WA 98600-2945
+1-360-993-5679
Clark County Historical Museum website
