MS 340

Reference code

MS 340

Title

Frederic Kenyon: Browning papers

Level

Sub-fonds

Administrative / Biographical history

Sir Frederic Kenyon (1863-1953) was a biblical scholar and Director of the British Museum.

He was educated at Winchester school before going on to study at Magdalen College, Oxford. While at school he was introduced to the poems of Robert Browning and by the time Kenyon reached Oxford he had read all of Browning's works apart from Sordello. He became one of Browning's chief promoters in the early twentieth century and the first important editor of Browning's poems.

Date

1897-1913

Extent & medium

3 boxes; 7 series

Content description

The papers consist of working papers and correspondence relating to Kenyon’s publications and the Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning ‘Love Letter’ controversy.

Arrangement

There was no discernible original order when the library acquired the papers, and the current order was imposed on the collection prior to cataloguing.

The papers are arranged into seven series according to the nature of the material. The first four relating to publications by Kenyon, the fifth relating to the ‘Love letter’ controversy, and the final two series containing additional related correspondence and material:

01: Correspondence and papers relating to ‘The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’ publication by Frederick Kenyon
02: Correspondence relating to ‘Robert Browning and Alfred Domett’ publication by Frederick Kenyon
03: Correspondence and papers relating to Frederick Kenyon’s revision and partial rewriting of Mrs Sutherland’s Orr’s ‘Life and Letters of Robert Browning’
04: Correspondence and papers relating to Frederick Kenyon’s ‘The Centenary Edition of the Poems of Robert Browning’
05: Correspondence and papers relating to Frederick Kenyon’s involvement with the 'Browning Sale' and the 'Love Letters controversy'
06: Miscellaneous correspondence and papers
07: Printed material