Collection of autograph poems, essays and letters, together with autograph letters from various persons addressed to Thoreau : Concord, Cambridge, and New York, 1835-1860.

Record ID: 
145259
Accession number: 
MA 920.1-37
Author: 
Thoreau, Henry David, 1817-1862.
Date: 
1835-1860.
Credit: 
Purchased by Pierpont Morgan, 1909.
Description: 
37 items, unbound ; various sizes
Notes: 

Essays included in this collection: The ways in which a man's style ..., The love of stories ..., I live like a prince ..., Show how it is that a writer's nationality ..., Musings, Apr. 20th 1835.
Many of the letters with postmark and seal.
Poems included in this collection: What sought th[e]y th[u]s afar, To a stray fowl, The peal of the bells, Upon the bank at early dawn, Farewell (2 copies), Guido's Aurora, I'm not alone, Poverty, Travelling, Greece, Nature, Life, Music, I'm thankful that my life doth not deceive, and Speech of a Saxon Ealderman.

Summary: 

This collection of materials related to Thoreau includes Thoreau's autograph manuscripts of 15 poems and 5 essays; his autograph letters to his mother, sisters, Daniel Ricketson, and Horace Greeley; and letters written to Thoreau by Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry James, Nathaniel and Sophia Hawthorne, Horace Greeley, and others. The collection also includes a signed receipt for Thoreau's surveying work. Items in the collection are described in 37 individual records (MA 920.1-37). Some items contain several poems.

Binding: 
Brown leather with gilt decoration, lettered "Poems / Essays / and Autograph letters of Henry D. Thoreau / including originals letters from his contemporaries"; bound by Bradstreet's in 1914. Disbound in 2016; binding retained and stored separately as MA 920A.
Provenance: 
Some items were owned by Stephen H. Wakeman; the collection was purchased by Pierpont Morgan from Dodd Livingston, 1909. See individual records for complete provenance information.
Catalog Link: 
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Department: 
Literary and Historical Manuscripts