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Challenges of Cataloguing & Promoting a Literary Archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study

Explore the challenges faced in cataloguing and promoting the literary archive of Tyrone Guthrie, a renowned playwright. Discover the significance of his creative expressions and the need for proper organization and accessibility.

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Challenges of Cataloguing & Promoting a Literary Archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study

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  1. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI

  2. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI

  3. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI

  4. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI “The archive reflects realities as perceived by the archivers....” Eric Ketelaar. “Tacit Narratives: The meanings of archives.” Archival Science 1 (2001): 133

  5. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI [the archivist] “leaves fingerprints which are attributes to the archive’s infinite meaning.” Eric Ketelaar. “Tacit Narratives: The meanings of archives.” Archival Science 1 (2001): 137

  6. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI “the principles and techniques now applied to public records may be applied also, with some modifications, to private records.” Thomas Schellenberg. The Management of Archives (1965).

  7. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI Guthrie, throughout his career, wrote a variety of articles and texts, underpinning his views on producing Shakespeare, the space in which it was formed, etc. These creative expressions form an integral component within the archive: “If it is your business to prepare a difficult Shakespearean work for the stage, if you have to interpret some of the most interesting and mysterious aspects of his work, you become aware how inadequate to this tasks are the scholars as well as ourselves. They have wrought to notably untangle knots in the text; but again and again it is clear that the text alone is an inadequate guide to meaning. Over and above the lines, and in-between the lines, lies the real meaning, which is a theatrical meaning.” (PRONI Ref. D3585/F/5/6) “There can be no drastic improvement in Shakespearean performance until we return to architectural form which relate the player to his audience as the Elizabethan player was related to his contemporary audience – namely nearer to the people and in the middle of the people … The picture-framed theatre demands that the frame be filled with a picture; audiences conditioned to this form of theatre expect a rather high degree of scenic interest, even scenic illusion, which is irrelevant and even inimical to the effect aimed at by Elizabethan dramatists.” (PRONI Ref. D3585/F/7/5/27)

  8. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI This field is the only box where any real information can be inputted, including admin/biographical history, archival history, etc.

  9. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI Guthrie’s archive is ‘hidden’ within a larger family and estate archive.

  10. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI The finalised Catalogue Structure for the archive D3585 Main catalogue number for entire Annaghmakerrig collection D3585/F Tyrone Guthrie section of the archive, broken down as follows: D3585/F/1 Literary Writings by Tyrone Guthrie (scripts, plays, manuscripts) D3585/F/2 Scripts submitted by others to Tyrone Guthrie D3585/F/3 Lady Guthrie’s Papers (Judith, Tyrone’s wife) D3585/F/4 Photographs D3585/F/5 Correspondence D3585/F/6 Printed ephemera (including journals and magazines) D3585/F/7 Papers of Tyrone Guthrie (including D3585/F/7/5 = talks/articles) D3585/F/8 Family history

  11. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI Unlike an official collection of perhaps government records or those of an institution, akin to other private collections, the Tyrone Guthrie archive had no apparent internal structure upon accession into PRONI, and so an order and structure has been imposed onto the collection, so as to aid cataloguing and facilitate inclusion in finding aids. So, in the same way that an editor of a text might provide some editorial conventions for guidance to readers, I feel compelled to say that the collection has been split by document type, although there are some instances such as ‘printed ephemera’ where press cuttings, copies of magazines and journals have all been put together.

  12. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI “The archive arranges a chaotic and disparate range of materials into a single, homogenous text under the auspices of a single authorial name.” Robert McGill. “Negotiations with the Living Archive” in Margaret Attwood. The Open Eye. Eds. John Moss & Tobi Kozakweich. (2006) p.103

  13. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI “One of the first steps in the re-evaluation of creatorship was for archivists to consider their own complicity in archive creation ... the ways in which the archivist who acquires and processes an archive must also be viewed as a creator of that archive.” Jennifer Lynn Douglas: www.tspace.library.ca/bitstream/1807/35808/1/Douglas_Jennifer_l_201306_PhD_Thesis.pdf

  14. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI “The most important facet of arrangement is not physical but identifying archival relationships intellectually.” Terry Eastwood. “Fundamentally Speaking: The Third Version, a review of the Archival Fundamentals II.” American Archivist 71.1 (2008): 228-245, p.239

  15. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI [Archivists need to understand of the diary] “the diarist’s motivation for writing; the intended audience; the ... custodial history, and the role of the archivist in its representation.” Heather Beattie. “Where narratives meet: archival description, provenance and women’s writings.” Libraries and the Cultural Record 44.1 (2009): 82-100.

  16. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study by Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini, Research Archivist, PRONI Promoting the archive has been difficult too. I have given a few talks to the School of English at Queen’s University Belfast. I have written a couple of small articles for archival press, including the ARC Magazine and the Irish Society for Archives Newsletter. I have also given a lecture at the Linen Hall Library in Belfast to a more general audience.

  17. The challenges of cataloguing and promoting a literary archive: The Tyrone Guthrie Case Study Thank you for your attention. Dr Bethany Sinclair-Giardini Research Archivist Private Records Public Record Office of Northern Ireland 2 Titanic Boulevard Belfast BT3 9HQ Northern Ireland Email: bethany.sinclair@dcalni.gov.uk Visit us online at www.proni.gov.uk

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