Guide to the Papers of David Brooks [MSS 110]

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Manuscript Name Papers of David Brooks
Manuscript Number MSS 110
Last Updated May 2021
Extent 13 boxes + 5 oversize + 1 AV box
Location Special Collections, UNSW Canberra
Abstract Correspondence, photographs, drafts, and miscellaneous material relating to David Brooks and his work as a poet, author, and editor

Collection Subject Type

Literary

Scope and Content

The papers of David Brooks comprise correspondence, original drafts, proofs, proceedings of poetry seminars, galley proofs / lay sheets, financial records, and contributions for magazines Helix and The Phoenix Review, along with contributions, correspondence, and proofs for Poetry and Gender: Statements and Essays in Australian Women’s Poetry and Poetics (1989). The papers also include a small number of audio cassettes containing poetry seminars and material associated with Brooks’ exhibition titled ‘The Mooncalf’

Date Range of Content

1984-1994

Biographical Note

Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Brooks_(author)

David Brooks was born and educated in Canberra, graduating from the Australian National University in 1974. Whilst studying overseas for several years, he was an Overseas Contributing Editor to New Poetry and Poetry Australia. He returned to Australia to teach at the Royal Military College at Duntroon in 1981 whilst completing his PhD afterwards teaching at the University of Western Australia, ANU, and finally the University of Sydney.

Brooks’ first collection of poetry, The Cold Front (1983) won the Anne Elder Award, and his works of poetry and fiction have been anthologised both nationally and internationally. Beyond his own published works, Brooks was the editor, with Nicolette Stasko, of Helix,later The Phoenix Review, and in 1989, he edited and published Poetry and Gender with Brenda Walker. He has served on numerous boards and committees, including the editorial boards of Westerly and Southerly, and the management committee of the NSW Writers Centre

References:
Austlit : David Brooks https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/A14557 retrieved 8 September 2020

National Library of Australia : Guide to the Papers of David Brooks https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-297750253/findingaid retrieved 8 September 2020

 

Administrative Information

 

Access and Copying Conditions

Access: Check with Curator

This collection contains a variety of copyright material. Copyright is held by the creator of each item. Specific conditions for this collection are listed below. If no conditions are stipulated then the standard terms of the Copyright Act apply for published and unpublished items. Digitised material from manuscript collections is provided to clients by UNSW Canberra in good faith for private study and research only, and may not be published or re-purposed without the express and written permission of the individual legal holder of that copyright. Refer also to the UNSW copyright, disclaimer and takedown policy. 

Copying: Check with Curator

Preferred Citation

Papers of David Brooks, Special Collections, UNSW Canberra, Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra, MSS 110, Box [Number], Folder [Number].

Provenance

Check with Curator

Related Material

Further papers of David Brooks are held by the National Library of Australia at MS 8075

 

Subject Keywords

 

Subjects

David Brooks, 1953- — Archives

Australian literature — 20th century — Periodicals

Australian poetry — 20th century

Australian poetry — Women authors — History and criticism

Personal Names

David Brooks, 1953-

Corporate Names

Helix

The Phoenix Review

Occupations

Editors

Poets

Authors

 

Container List

 

Box 1

Folder 1

Helix : Open correspondence

Folder 2

Helix : Closed correspondence

Folder 3

Helix : Poetry, prose, interviews

Folder 4

Helix : 21/22 Poetry

Folder 5

Helix : 21/22 Poetry

Folder 6

Helix : Original copy 21/22

Folder 7

Helix : Original Copy 21/22

Folder 8

Helix : Addresses and correspondence, June 1985

Folder 9

Helix : Biographical notes

 

Box 2

Folders 10-11

Helix : Biographical notes

Folder 12

Helix : Perth office (subscriptions) and subscriptions (forms) and 1985 bills

Folder 13

Helix : Sub-editors

Folders 14-15

Helix : Poetry files

Folders 16-17

Helix 16 : Original copy and corrected proofs

Folder 18

Helix : Ledger

 

Box 3

Folder 19

Helix : Accounts

Folders 20-21

Helix : Literature Board

Folders 22-23

Helix : Harrop

Folder 24

Poetry and Gender : Miscellaneous papers forwarded by Brenda Walker from Western Australia, March 1989

Folder 25

Poetry and Gender : Bio notes and consent forms

Folder 26

Poetry and Gender : Poets’ statements

Folder 27

Poetry and Gender : Corrected statements

 

Box 4

Folder 28

Poetry and Gender : Poets’ statements (originals)

Folder 29

Poetry and Gender : Correspondence

Folder 30

Poetry and Gender : Script

Folder 31

Poetry and Gender : Proof read copy

Folders 32-33

‘Women’s Poetic Anthology’

Initial invitations and correspondence, essays

 

Box 5

Folder 34              

Poetry and Gender : Veronica Brady

Folder 35

Poetry and Gender : Dale; Gallagher

Folder 36

Poetry and Gender : Sneja Gunew

Folder 37

Poetry and Gender : Hampton; Hewett

Folder 38

Poetry and Gender : Joan Kirley

Folder 39

Poetry and Gender : Lawson

Folder 40

Poetry and Gender : Rose Lucas

Folder 41

Poetry and Gender : Phillip Martin

Folder 42

Poetry and Gender : Elizabeth Perkins

Folder 43

Poetry and Gender : Jennifer Strauss

Folder 44

Poetry and Gender : (Additional) essays received

Brenda Walters; Andrew Taylor; David Brooks; Delys Bird

Folder 45

Paper by David Brooks - ‘Literature and Forgetting’

 

Box 6

Folder 46

Correspondence

All correspondence listed here is addressed to or written by either David Brooks or Nicolette Stasko, who both edited Helix, which later became The Phoenix Review.

Australian Literature Board, concerned mainly with funding for and establishing Phoenix journal, July 1986 – October 1991;

Helix letters, March 1984 – March 1990 (?);

Helix letters, review-related communications, February 1985 – January 1986

Folder 47

Correspondence

Alec Hope-dedicated volume of Phoenix, with communications mainly on contributions from correspondents, January-September 1987: includes letters from noted poets such as Judith Wright, Les Murray, Elizabeth Riddell, Phillip Mead, John Tranter, Vivian Smith, Tom Shapcott, and Harold Stewart;

Phoenix letters, August 1986 – November 1987 (small collection);

Phoenix letters, January-December 1988

Folder 48

Correspondence

Phoenix letters, January-June 1989

Folder 49

Correspondence

Phoenix letters, July-December 1989

Folder 50

Correspondence

Phoenix letters, January-June 1990

Folder 51

Correspondence

Phoenix letters, July-December 1990;

Phoenix letters, January-July 1991

Folder 52

Correspondence

Phoenix letters, concerned with prose/poems accepted for publication, May 1989 – September 1991;

Phoenix letters, undated;

Phoenix subscriptions correspondence, 1986-1988;

Personal correspondence, April 1988 - August 1990

 

Box 7

Folder 53

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): A-B

Folder 54

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): C-D.

Folder 55

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): E-G.

Folder 56

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): H-K

Folder 57

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): L-M

Folder 58

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): N-R

Folder 59

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): S-T

 

Box 8

Folder 60

Correspondence

Alphabetised incoming and outgoing Phoenix correspondence (1980s and 1990s): U-Z

Folder 61

Correspondence

Postcards and greetings cards, sent to either David Brooks or Nicolette Stasko during the 1980s and 1990s

Folder 62

Helix

Documents and Notes

Mailing, editor, publication and subscription information, with Poetry and Gender addresses;

Drafts and handwritten, typed and annotated lists concerning book reviews and list of books received for issues of Helix (with galleys for no. 16), 1984-1985;

File: ‘Helix – MSS in Transit and Unresolved Controv’, 1984

Folder 63

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

Original working draft version for issue no. 2 (1987) with annotations to accepted poems, short stories, prose pieces, with editorial and authoring suggestions

 

Box 9

Folder 64

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Phoenix No. 2 Original Copy’, 1987, enclosing instructions for word processor/typesetting codes

Folder 65

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Phoenix No. 3 Original Copy’, 1988

Folder 66

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Phoenix No. 3 word processing proofs’, 1987-1988

Folder 67

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Phoenix No. 4 word processing proofs’, 1988

Folder 68

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Phoenix No. 4 copy’: contains short story drafts – ‘Noel Stock, ‘Ezra in Exile’, Gerhard Roepf, ‘Does literature need criticism? On the importance of literary criticism for contemporary literature in German’ – ‘David King, ‘The Crystal Bougainvillea’ – Craig McCormick, ‘Going Nowhere’ – A. Rollings, ‘The Light of Bright Interiors’

 

Box 10

Folder 69

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Phoenix No. 5 typing: Poetry’, 1989-1990: poems accepted for publication with their author’s correspondence appended

Folder 70

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Phoenix No. 6 copy’, 1988-1990: poems and prose pieces, short stories accepted for publication with their author’s correspondence appended

Folder 71

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘Accepted Phoenix 7-8’, 1988-1990: poems, prose pieces and reviews accepted for publication with some author’s correspondence appended

Folder 72

The Phoenix Review

Documents and Notes

‘[Phoenix Review] 7/8 Poetry/Proofed’, 1989-1991: poems, prose pieces and reviews accepted for publication with some author’s correspondence appended; also attached are three brief letters for 1990-1992;

Two 1991 newspaper articles/reviews of The Phoenix Review, from The Age (16 March) and The Canberra Times (26 May)

Folder 73

A.D. Hope Project

Documents and Notes

File: ‘Hope Project – Poems (Phoenix no. 3)’ – materials for Security of Allusion: Essays in Honour of A.D. Hope, editor David Brooks (Canberra, 1992): includes preface, lists of poets invited to contribute to book, drafts and annotated versions of contributions; and unbound copy of Security of Allusion: Essays in Honour of A.D. Hope, editor David Brooks

 

Box 11

Folder 74

Literary Drafts

Contributions (poems, prose pieces, reviews, and short stories) to Helix and The Phoenix Review during the 1980s and 1990s, arranged as follows:

(i) dated: [untitled essay on Russell Hoban] (August 1984) – Robert Kimber, ‘Thoughts That Catch the Eye’ (1986?) – Fiona Place, ‘Peripatetic Periscope’, ‘Categorically No’, ‘XXXI’, ‘Sapphires, Hunger, and the Lips of Waves’, ‘Matter’, ‘A gentle Nest’, ‘The Rewebbing of gallery Threads’ (1987) – Mark Truslove, ‘Mofflyn Childrens Home’ (July 1987) – Robert Kimber, ‘A Selection of Poems’ (May 1989) – Stephen Murray, [untitled essay] – ‘This Quieting Moment’ (August 1990) – Judy Parrott, ‘Pictures Lost’, ‘Incompatible Parallels’, ‘Australia: Dawn to Dust’, ‘Tennis’, ‘Their News’, ‘Aborigines’, ‘Death Sentence’, ‘Effigy of Hope’, ‘”Stranger’, Enigma’, ‘Judgement’, ‘Ocean Blue’, ‘Odysseas Prasos’, ‘Parallels’, ‘See What They’ve Done?’ (October 1991); Toula Nikolaou, ‘Arthur’ (July 1992) – Julian Deane-Johns, ‘The Batting Wizard from the City’, ‘Orange Trees’ (August 1992) – Jo-Ann Stubbings, ‘Hot Rocks, Cool Castellano’ (September 1992) – Lynette Wilson, ‘Misty Morning’ (February 1993)

(ii) dated: Deborah Abela (July 1992) on behalf of the following: Marina Pozzi, ‘Favourite Things’ – Dom Della Libera, ‘Thinking ‘Bout Horses When Stoned’ – Deborah Abela, ‘Mr. Lindberg’ – Eleni Prineaf, ‘Passing’ – Margaret McCarthy, ‘Aunt Vinnie’ – Deborah Abela, ‘Unreasoning Farewell’ – Anthony Morgan, ‘Bloodsport’, ‘A Vision of Coal’, ‘Dust’, ‘Dinosaur’

Folder 75

Literary Drafts

(iii) undated: Wilma Spence, ‘The Pub’, ‘Saturday Night’, ‘Toohey’ – Elspeth Sandys, ‘Love’s Old Dream: A Short Story’ – David King, ‘The Sir Frederick Samson Park’, ‘Preoccupations’, ‘Crystal Shit’, ‘Meddle’ – Geneviève Laigle, ‘Alex Xenophon Demirjian Gray’s journey towards humility’ – Serge Liberman, ‘From Olympus the Laughter’, ‘The Poet Walks Along High Street’, ‘From the Rock the View and the Vision’ – Peter Skrzynecki, ‘The Wild Dogs’, ‘R.F. Brissenden, ‘Sacred Sites: poems of people and places’  with cover note by John Olsen – Aleksander Zorn, ‘Literature, History and Democracy’, ‘Slovenes and Literature’ – Sydney Lea, ‘Issues of the Fall’ – J. Parrott, ‘Their Place’ – [no author cited], ‘The Car’

Folder 76

Financial Records

Helix – quotations, costs, invoices, estimates, for typesetting, printing, 1984;

Helix – subscriptions, standing orders and related invoices, 1985-1986;

Helix  / The Phoenix Review – subscriptions, standing orders and related invoices, 1986-1988;

The Phoenix Review – mainly university (national and international) and town council subscriptions, standing orders and related invoices, 1987;

The Phoenix Review –subscriptions, standing orders and related invoices, 1988;

File: ‘Processed Subscription and Invoice Payments for Filing 9/12/89’ – covers the period 1986 to 1989; subscriptions, standing orders and renewals, and related invoices, remittance advices, grant application submissions;

Literary Arts Board-Australia Council – grant applications and records of subsidies, 1987-1990;

ANUTECH Pty Ltd – invoices, remittances, correspondence regarding payments, 1991-1992;

University Co-operative Credit Society Limited – records of cheques, account balances, 1992

Folder 77

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

Helix – consignments and advertising, 1985;

The Phoenix Review, no. 2 – first proofs, 12 January 1988;

The Phoenix Review, no. 2 – second proofs, 23 January 1988

 

Box 12

Folder 78

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, Special Issue – Winter 1987

Folder 79

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, no. 4 – Spring 1989

Folder 80

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, no. 4 – Spring/Summer 1988

Folder 81

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, no. 6 Spring/Summer 1990

 

Box 13

Folder 82

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, nos. 7 and 8 – Winter 1992

Folder 83

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

R.F. Brissenden, Sacred Sites, The Phoenix Review / Bistro Editions, 1990

Folder 84

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

David Brooks (ed.), Security of Allusion: Essays in Honour of A.D. Hope, The Phoenix Review / Bistro Editions with Australian National University, Faculty of Arts (Canberra, 1992)

 

Oversize material

Folder 85

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, no. 1 – Summer 1986/1987

Folder 86

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, no. 2 – Summer 1987/1988;

The Phoenix Review, Special Issue – Winter 1987

Folder 87

Galley Proofs / Lay Sheets

The Phoenix Review, nos. 3. 4 and Special Issue – mock-up galley proofs, illustrations, off-cuts;

Large ‘wedge’ of unsorted galley proofs interspersed with lay sheets, for various issues of The Phoenix Review, with editor’s annotations on some pages, 1988-1989

Folders 88 and 89

Exhibition ‘The Mooncalf’

Exhibition for David Brooks’ ‘The Mooncalf’ (1994), of which the text is etched onto 12 transparent plastic display ‘blocks’, to be displayed at random points in an art gallery

 

Audiovisual material

Box 14 (AV)

Two ink stamps – ‘Phoenix Review’ and ‘Nicolette Stasko’

Set of untitled black and white photographs and negatives

Audio cassette: Poets Seminar I
Audio cassette: Poets Seminar II

Audio cassette: Poets Seminar II

Audio cassette: Poets Seminar II