Considered a coup by U M Librarian, Bly's personal papers will remain in his home state. He turned over 80,000 handwritten pages for $775,000.
Earlier this month the University of Minnesota Libraries paid $775,000 for the manuscripts, correspondence, and personal papers of Robert Bly, native of Minnesota. A spokesman for the libraries, University of Minnesota Librarian Wendy Pradt Lougee, said, “Acquiring Robert Bly’s archive is really a coup for the University of Minnesota Libraries. Several other prominent libraries vied for the archive, but we are so pleased that we can keep his works and personal papers in his home state.”
This collection contains approximately 80,000 handwritten pages and a journal spanning 50 years. It also includes notebooks of Bly’s “morning poems” as well as numerous drafts of his “translations.” The archive also holds his many letters from writers such as James Wright, Donald Hall, and James Dickey. Any other material produced from now on will become part of this archive.
Allen Ginsberg’s personal archive brought a million dollars in 1994, bought by Stanford University.
