Thomas McGrath Papers, 1940-2003
Collection Overview
Title: Thomas McGrath Papers, 1940-2003
ID: OGLMC308
Primary Creator: McGrath, Thomas (1916-1990)
Extent: 7.5 Linear Feet
Date Acquired: 08/22/1975. More info below under Accruals.
Subjects: Literary - Poetry, University of North Dakota - Alumni
Languages: English
Abstract
Scope and Contents of the Materials
The Thomas McGrath Papers have been divided up into seven series:
Series 1: Biographical Materials
Series 2: Correspondence
Series 3: Written Works
Series 4: Screenplays/Scripts
Series 5: Audio and Video Cassette Tapes
Series 6: Photographs
Series 7: Oversized Materials
Collection Historical Note
"Thomas McGrath was born in 1916, the oldest son of James and Catherine (Shea) McGrath. There were four younger brothers, Jim (killed in World War II), Joe, Martin, and the youngest, Jack. His sister Kathleen was born between Joe and Martin. His parents were farmers, the second generation of them, working the land in Ransom County, North Dakota, near the town of Sheldon, about forty miles west of the Minnesota border, between the Maple and Sheyenne Rivers.
McGrath went to grade and high school in Sheldon, and then started somewhat delayed and intermittent University studies at Moorhead State University. Eventually, he attended the University of North Dakota at Grand Forks, where he earned a B.A. in 1939. Awarded a Rhodes Scholarship, he found that he could not use it immediately, because of the outbreak of World War II. He had received offers from a number of universities to begin work on an advanced degree - as had other Rhodes Scholars that year - and accepted an offer from Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge. There he studied, most intensely with Cleanth Brooks, was involved in radical political activity, wrote, and met Alan Swallow, who published McGrath's first book of poems as part of the development of The Swallow Press.
In the 1940-1941 academic year McGrath taught at Colby College in Maine, but did not find teaching there entirely satisfactory and thus left at the end of the academic year to go to New York City. There he wrote, organized, did legal research for attorneys engaged in "political" cases, and worked at the Kearney Shipyards, until he entered the armed forces in 1942. Most of his time in the service was spent on Amchitka Island. He was discharged with the rank of sergeant in 1945. After a period of adjustment he was finally able to undertake the year of study provided by the Rhodes Scholarship and spent 1947-1948 at New College, Oxford, England.
Returning from the United States after some travel, McGrath engaged in various occupations and eventually found a faculty position at Los Angeles State University, where he taught from 1951 to 1954. His dismissal from this institution was directly connected with his appearance as an unfriendly witness before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, when that infamous body brought its hearings to Los Angeles in 1953.
From 1954 to 1960 McGrath worked variously as a secondary school teacher at a private institution, for a company that manufactured carved wooden animals, and at other jobs that might earn him his keep. He wrote film and television scripts from time to time, several of the former for director Mike Cimino. In 1960 he resumed his academic career, teaching at C.W. Post College (now part of Long Island University) in New York. At about this time he founded, with his wife Genia, the journal Crazy Horse.
In 1962 he returned to North Dakota, where he taught for five years at North Dakota State University at Fargo. In 1969 McGrath accepted a faculty position at Moorhead State University where he had first begun his studies as an undergraduate. At the end of the 1982-1983 academic year he retired from Moorhead State and moved to Minneapolis, where he now lives. [Note: Thomas McGrath died on 19 September 1990 in Minneapolis]
McGrath has held a variety of significant editorial positions and has been awarded a variety of distinguished prizes and fellowships for his work as a poet. Among the former, in addition to his founding editorship of Crazy Horse, he has been a contributing editor of Mainstream (later Masses and Mainstream) and has served on the editorial board of the California Quarterly. He has held an Amy Lowell Travelling Fellowship in Poetry (1965), has twice been awarded National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships (1974, 1982), was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1967, and was twice a Bush Fellow (1976, 1981). In May 1981 the University of North Dakota awarded him a Doctorate of Letters. In 1977 he received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Society for Western Literature. In 1986, The Associated Writing Programs presented McGrath an award at a dinner in Chicago, at which tributes to him were presented by author "Studs" Terkel and poets Philip Levine and Michael Anania. In the same year, a "Ceili" was held by Minneapolis's "the Loft," at which many distinguished poets and writers celebrated McGrath's seventieth birthday.
McGrath has been married three times, to Marion, Alice, and Eugenia (Genia), all of whom appear in his poetry. He is the father of a son, Tomasito, to whom much poetry from McGrath's later work is addressed and dedicated."
Source:
Stern, Frederick. "A Biographical Sketch of Thomas McGrath." In The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath, edited by Frederick Stern. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1988.
Subject/Index Terms
Administrative Information
Repository: Elwyn B. Robinson Department of Special Collections
Numerous donations to the collection have been received:
1970s: 8 January 1976; 1 April 1976; 1978 (78-492); 22 January 1979 (79-563)
1980s: Robert Lewis, English Department, University of North Dakota, in June 1985 (85-1394) and March 31, 1989 (89-1648); Dale Jacobson on 30 March 1987 (87-1526); James McKenzie, English Department, University of North Dakota on July 11, 1988 (88-1605); Robert Lewis, on March 31, 1989 (89-1648)
1990s: Lois Vossen, The Loft, St. Paul, Minnesota via Robert Lewis, English Department, University of North Dakota, on May 8, 1991 (91-7147); Jack Beeching, Menton, France, on April 16, 1992 (92-1816) and June 25, 1992 (92-1836); Robert Lewis, English Department, University of North Dakota, on August 15, 1991 (92-1818), March 24, 1992 (92-1817), on June 28, 1993 (93-1893), February 9, 1996 (96-2056) March 20, 1996 (96-2068) and June 16, 1999 (99-2318); Robert Edwards, St. Paul, Minnesota, on July 30, 1991 (92-1819); Naomi Stern, Gary, Indiana, on November 23, 1992; Richard F. Hampsten, English Department, University of North Dakota, on June 16, 1993 (93-1885); David Martinson, English Department, North Dakota State University, on 10 September 1993 (93-1910); Alice McGrath, Ventura, California, via Robert Lewis in January 1994 and February 9, 1996 (96-2055); Enid Smeall on September 29, 1994 (94-1998); Glenn Sheldon, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in October 1994 (94-1975); Lawrence Spingarn via Dale Jacobson on September 17, 1996; Richard Nickson of New York via Robert Lewis on May 13, 1996 (96-2075); James McKenzie, English Department, University of North Dakota, in May 1999 (99-2335); Richard Nickson, English Department, University of North Dakota, on July 27, 1999 (99-2358) and September 1, 1999 (99-2373)
2000s: Ellen Erickson, College of Art and Sciences, University of North Dakota, on July 5, 2000 (2000-2484); John Bye, Institute for Regional Studies at North Dakota State University on June 11, 2001 (2001-2505); Dr. Robert Lewis, English Department, University of North Dakota, on November 16, 2001 (2002-2543); Alice McGrath, Ventura, California, on May 27, 2004 (2004-2693) and August 31, 2004 (2005-2760); Mary Margaret Frank, Grand Forks, North Dakota, on August 17, 2006 (2006-2848); Glenn Sheldon, Department of Interdisciplinary and Special Programs, University of Toledo, on August 25, 2006 (2006-2849); Bjarne Male Chorus Records, on August 28, 2006 (2006-2847)
2010s: Holly Woolson, Ojai, California, on September 20, 2010 (2011-3074); Margo Robbins, Washington D.C., on January 23, 2017 (2017-3349)
Access Restrictions: Open for inspection under the rules and regulations of the Elwyn B. Robinson Department of Special Collections.
Acquisition Source: Thomas McGrath
Acquisition Method: Donation; the original acquisition records are unavailable
Related Publications: Please search the library catalog for a complete list.
Preferred Citation: (Description of Item). Thomas McGrath Papers. OGLMC 308, Box #, Folder #. Elwyn B. Robinson Department of Special Collections, Chester Fritz Library, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks.
Finding Aid Revision History: Re-processed by Hannah Naylor, Special Collections Intern, in Summer 2017.
Box and Folder Listing
Browse by Series:
[Series 1: Biographical Materials],
[Series 2: Correspondence],
[Series 3: Written Works],
[Series 4: Screenplays/Scripts],
[Series 5: Audio and Video Cassette Tapes],
[Series 6: Photographs],
[Series 7: Oversized Materials],
[All]
- Series 3: Written Works
- Series 3 contains a variety of written works both by McGrath and other authors and poets. The series begins with McGrath's written works (first the longer works organized by publication date, and then assorted poetry). The next section of the series contains written works by other authors, typically in reference to McGrath or in conversation with his writings (first the longer works organized chronologically when possible, and then assorted poetry).
- Box 4
- Folder 1: Copy of First Manifesto by Thomas McGrath, 1940
- Folder 2: Handwritten Manuscript of Letter to an Imaginary Friend Part I
- Folder 3: Typed Copy of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part II
- Folder 4: Typed Copy of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part II, with Corrections
- Folder 5: Typed Copy of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part II, with Handwritten Corrections
- Folder 6: Copy of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part II Manuscript
- Folder 7: Typed Copy of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part II Manuscript
- Folder 8: Drafts of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part III, and Various Poems
This folder contains the following poems which are listed by title or first line:
"Letter to an Imaginary Friend (Part III)" (typed with handwritten corrections)
"Totems MS VI" (handwritten)
"Totems VI" (typed)
"Afternoon of a McGrath" (handwritten)
"Afternoon of a McGrath" (typed)
"Late in the early dark"
"Totems V" (handwritten)
"Totems V" (typed with handwritten corrections)
"Totems V" (typed with handwritten corrections)
"Hard Bought"
"In Search"
"Remembering Loves and Deaths"
"Body of a woman, shadows of black and white"
"A Tomasito Poem"
"Revisionist Poem--Pope"
"Why We Love Wakan Tanka"
"Revisionist Poem--Machado"
"Next Door to the Poorhouse"
"Tomasito's Conundrum"
"A Tomasito Poem"
"John Grass Says"
"Night Work"
"For Tomasito"
"You, Yannis Ritsos"
"The true darkness of the forest"
"Somewhere Ahead"
"Footnote"
"Fallen chestnut blossoms"
"Comfort"
"Remembering Issa"
"My dandelions"
"Ghost Fire"
"End of a Season"
"In the Stoa of Attalus"
"Alas!"
"In fog..."
"A Theory"
"A Sound of One Hand"
"Solon's Song"
"Conundrum"
"Advice"
"In the smallest tidepool"
"Greek Wedding"
"Children's Games"
"The Children" (handwritten)
"Totems (I)"
"The Children" (typed with handwritten corrections)
"Totems (IV)" (typed with handwritten corrections)
"Totems (IV)" (handwritten)
"Next Door to the Poorhouse"
"Revisionist Poem"
"Toward Paradise"
"The Preterition of Aquarius"
"Preterition Again"
"A Sociology of Instincts"
"Totems (I)" (typed with handwritten corrections)
"Totems (I)" (typed)
"Totems (II)" (typed)
"Totems (III)" (typed)
"Mottoes for a Sampler on Historical Subjects"
"The Last War Poem of the War"
"Blues for Cisco Houston"
"Something is Dying Here"
"Driving Toward Boston I Run Across One Of Robert Bly's Old Poems" (typed)
"Long Distance From a War"
"Praises"
"The Return"
"In the Pentagon Parking Lot October '67"
"What Wakes Us"
"Travels of an American in Search of God"
"A Homecoming for Odysseus"
"Driving Toward Boston I Run Across One Of Bob Bly's Old Poems" (handwritten)
"People coming with their arms full of books"
"Crow Cry,"
"Children's Games"
"The Lineaments of Unsatisfied Desire"
"Sound of 1 Hand"
"Alas!"
"Children's Games"
"Driving Toward Boston I Run Across One of Robert Bly's Old Poems" (typed)
"The Little Judgment"
"Pictures from the Lost Continent of Currier & Ives"
"Salute"
"Eclipse"
"For Tomasito"
"For Tomasito"
"In the Sleep of Reason"
"Eclipse" (handwritten)
"Summer"
"The Cottonwood"
"A Million Puffs of Smoke!"
"Surprise"
"For Tomasito"
"The Scalping Knife"
"The Legends"
"A barbwire fence"
"The Sea Inside Us"
"The Scalping Knife"
"A barbwire fence interrupting"
"Where Janie Went In"
"Where Janie Went In"
"Where Janie Went In"
"Epitaph of a Man Devoured by Monsters"
"Epitaph of a Man Devoured by Monsters"
"Where Janie Went In"
"Terrors and Advantages"
"Summer lightening shivers in the high pine"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"What is Named"
"Horses of the Moon--"
"The Sound of One Hand I"
"The Sound of One Hand I"
"Horses of the Moon--"
"Horses of the Moon--"
"Arrivals"
"The thinning fog--"
"Arrivals"
"Summer night O Magnificent"
"Loon"
"Arrivals"
"The two--faced sea--"
"The Sound of One Hand XIII"
The two--faced sea--"
"Darkness of Winter Solstice"
"Everything vertical"
"Everything vertical"
"Sultry afternoon. The old dog"
"The high hunting hawk--" (4 Copies)
"The list of one thousand false addresses" (4 Copies)
"Everything Vertical"
"The Sound of One Hand (concl.)"
"Summer night O magnificent" (3 Copies)
"West wind sleet cold november breath"
"The stick of the blind man"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"The long wind of winter"
"Darkness of winter solstice"
"Summer Night O Magnificent"
"Ear to Hear"
"The Sound of One Hand II"
"Down the small and crooked road"
"Did you bring me a present? the little boy asks"
"Black"
"The rabbit dreams of hunting"
"To speak is the vice"
"Yes"
"Among the Trophies of Death"
"Empty Canvas"
"All is not Well?"
"Empty Canvas."
"The Sound of One Hand"
"Anonymity has a name;"
"After moondown"
"Down the small and crooked road"
"The Sound of One Hand IV"
"I am travelling, travelling;"
"The Sound of One Hand VIII"
"Umber Sundown"
"For Alvaro"
"Sleepy Birdsong..."
"Pheasant Season"
"The long wound of summer--"
"Across the winter-white coulee hills"
"Some Kinds of Knowledge"
"Hunter in the field,"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"Full moon and silence"
"Powers of Darkness"
"Route Song and Epitaph"
"Summer Lightening"
"I see the moon"
"Your Knife's..."
"Man Attacked by Bear"
"The Exiles Epitaph"
"That's the Way It Goes"
"A Season"
"Presumptions"
"Peace! Land! Peyote!"
"Poem"
"At Fargo"
"After Moondown"
"In November empty fields"
"A Field of Sunflowers"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"Darkness of winter solstice;"
"The long wound of summer--"
"Pheasant Season"
"Sleepy birdsong..."
"For Alvaro"
"You out there, so secret."
"I am travelling, travelling..."
"The grand days,"
"Umber Sundown"
"Across the winter-white coulee hills"
"What we don't know kills us"
"Little old deer in the dry creek"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"Small things, soft,"
"Arrivals"
"After moondown"
"Anonymity has a name;"
"November empty fields:"
"One Farmhouse light--"
"To speak is the vice"
"The queen of Accident County"
"All is not well?"
"Empty canvas."
"Among the trophies of Death:"
"The stick of the blind man"
"Ear to hear:"
"Empty playground,"
"Down the small and crooked road"
"Did you bring me a present? the litte boy asks?"
"Black"
"The rabbit dreams of hunting."
"Surprise!"
"Summer"
"In the Sleep of Reason"
"The scarecrow shivering in November corn."
"Gloomy wood, and this highwayman"
"Moon"
"Full Moon"
"The Stars"
"Hunter in the cold field."
"Across a thousand miles of snow"
"The seas inside us"
"The Little Judgment"
"In the Sleep of Reason, Monsters are Born"
"Affirmation"
"Song"
"The Deaths of Poets"
"Sound of One Hand"
"Meanwhile like a tired magician, from his"
"Their darkness is not our darkness"
"Dawn song"
"Some Kinds of Knowledge"
"The Classics"
"The long wind of winter" (3 Copies)
"Hushed bright pond stillness" (3 Copies)
"Among the Things We Are Left to Do" (3 Copies)
"Loud November Rain." (3 Copies)
"From Old Days"
"What We Think We Know"
"The Sound of One Hand XII"
"A History of Language"
"The Sound of One Hand III"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"Half-life"
"Some Kinds of Knowledge"
"Terrors and Advantages"
"Resurrections"
"A Distant Republic Demands"
"After His Girl Cut Out"
"Proportions"
"Why I Never Married the Queen of--"
"Legislations of Darkness"
"The Sound of One Hand"
"A Sound of One Hand X"
"Faults of Darkness"
"loon"
"Cross Country Flight"
"Weights and Measures" (3 Copies)
"The Need for Dictionaries"
"Classicism"
"Classicism"
"Why I Never Married the Queen of----"
"Loon"
"Where Janie Went In"
"Epitaph of a Man Devoured by Monsters"
"Terrors and Advantages"
"Summer lightening shivers in the high pine"
"The Need for Dictionaries II"
"Horses of Moon"
"The two--faced sea--"
"Sultry afternoon. The old dog"
"Summer night O magnificent"
"Callings"
"In the list of one thousand false addresses"
"In Other Worlds"
"The slow sulphur"
"Full moon and silence."
"The stars"
"Hunter in the cold field."
"How it Feels to be Saved"
"The scarecrow shivering in November corn."
"Gloomy woods, and this highway"
"The Need for Dictionaries III"
"Moon"
"The Unfairness of It All"
"What We Don't Know Kills Us"
"Small things, soft,"
"Arrivals"
"Somewhere Ahead"
"Fallen chestnut blossoms"
"Comfort"
"Remembering Issa"
"My Dandelions"
"Ghost fire"
"In fog..."
"A Theory"
"Morning and Evening"
"Advice"
"In the smallest tidepool"
"Peace! Land! Peyote"
"Visitors"
"The true darkness of the forest"
"Greek Wedding"
"Alas!"
"Love Song"
"The Dream Range"
"Poem for the Front Door"
"Totems"
"Outside My Window"
"The Preterition of Aquarious"
"A Sociology of Instincts"
"A Tomasito Poem"
"Why We Love Wakan Tankan"
"Revisionist Poem: Machado"
"Next Door to the Poorhouse"
"Tomasito's Conundrum"
"Lament for Pablo Neruda"
"Peace! Land! Peyote!"
"Yes"
"Westwind sleet cold November breath:" (2 Copies)
"After moondown" (2 Copies)
"The Sound of One Hand" (2 Copies)
"Summer lightening shivers the high pine." (2 Copies)
"Terrors and Advantages" (2 Copies)
"Some Kinds of Knowledge" (2 Copies)
"Loon" (2 Copies)
"Why I Never Married the Queen of--------" (2 Copies)
"Full Moon and Silence"
"Summer Night O Magnificent" (2 Copies)
"October leaf-fall" (2 Copies)
"Hunter in the field," (2 Copies)
"In November empty fields:"
"Classecism" (2 Copies)
"The Sound of One Hand" (2 Copies)
"Be Careful"
- Folder 9: Manuscript Drafts of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part III
- Folder 10: Final Manuscript of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part III
- Folder 11: Notebook Containing Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part IV, Section III
- Folder 12: Final Manuscript of Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Part IV
- Folder 13: Movie at the End of the World Poems and Addressed Individuals to Receive Copies/Acknowledgements
- Folder 14: Documents Relating to The Movie at the End of the World
- Folder 15: Manuscript of Echoes Inside the Labyrinth
- Folder 16: Manuscript of This Coffin Has No Handles, "All but the Last" (Pages 1-150)
- Folder 17: Manuscript of This Coffin Has No Handles (Pages 1-150), Printed in the North Dakota Quarterly, Vo. 52, No. 4, 1984
- Folder 18: Manuscript of This Coffin Has No Handles (Pages 151-300)
- Folder 19: Manuscript of This Coffin Has No Handles, "All But the Last" (Pages 151-300)
- Folder 20: Manuscript of This Coffin Has No Handles (Pages 301-435)
- Folder 21: Manuscript of This Coffin Has No Handles, "All But the Last" (Pages 301-435), Including Editor's Comments
- Folder 22: Voices from Beyond the Wall by Thomas McGrath
- Folder 23: Waiting for the Angel by Thomas McGrath
- Folder 24: Copy (In Russian) of the Newspaper "The Union Administration of Authors of the U.S.S.R," Including a Poem by Thomas McGrath, August 1, 1963
- Folder 25: Dakota Arts Quarterly, Vol. 1, No. 1, Including 6 Poems by McGrath, 1977
- Folder 26: Manuscript of Seven Poems by Thomas McGrath, Published in North Dakota Quarterly, Vol. 53, No. 1
- Folder 27: Four Poems by Thomas McGrath (Proofs), Printed in North Dakota Quarterly, 1988
- Folder 28: Letters to Tomasito (Proofs)
- Folder 29: Drafts/Proofs
- Folder 30: Handwritten Notes and Typed Drafts
- Folder 31: Poem: "Lear's Murzzuschlag Song: Allegro Energico E Passionato" for Edward Dahlberg, September, 1968
- Folder 32: Poems
This folder contains the following poems (listed by title or first line):
"7 Choruses on Unemployment"
"Child"
"Poem for the Front Door"
"Hard Bought"
"Definition"
"When We Say Goodbye"
"Little miracle,"
"My little son, laughing, singing..."
"Imagining Foreign Lands"
"Travelling West with Tomasito"
"Hard Bought"
"The Orphan"
"Why We Love Wakan Tanka"
"During the Fall"
"How could I have come so far?"
"Tomasito's World"
"For Genia and Tomasito"
"When I carry my little son in the cold"
"How to be so small"
"Tomasito's Mantra"
"Definition"
"Poem-Unfinished Poem"
"To Be Continued"
"The Changeling"
"You Taught Me"
"How wonderful, Tomasito!"
"The Present"
"Afternoon of a McGrath"
"Travelling West with Tomasito"
"During the Fall"
"Why We Love Wakan Tanka"
"When We Say Goodbye"
"Advice"
"Definition" (2 Copies)
"My little son, laughing, singing..." (2 Copies)
"Imagining Foreign Lands"(2 Copies)
"The Orphan" (2 Copies)
"Little miracle," (2 Copies)
"How could I have come so far?" (2 Copies)
"Tomasito's World"
"Let me show you"
"For Genia and Tomasito" (2 Copies)
"When I carry my little son in the cold" (2 Copies)
"Poem-Unfinished Poem" (2 Copies)
"How to be so small" (2 Copies)
"Tomasito's Mantra" (2 Copies)
"The Enemy"
"The empty field..."
"For Jack Beeching"
"People say after death:"
"Light flares from the tombstones..."
"Another Season"
"Barnacle-pocked abalone shell--"
"All night long I heard the owls"
"The wind groans through the trees,"
"Through the fog"
"Midnight."
"The cat bird"
"The News and the Weather"
"Where Rome was burning"
"Across the narrow road"
"Building his house"
"Moonlight"
"Callings"
"Loud November Rain"
"Moon"
"Faults of Darkness"
"Weights and Measures"
"Somewhere Ahead"
"The stick of the blind man"
"How it feels to be saved"
The queen of Accident County"
"Visitors"
"Be Careful"
"Hushed bright pond stillness."
"The Need for Dictionaries II"
"Eclipse"
"Small things, soft,"
"In the smallest tidepool"
"The grand days"
"Where Janie Went In"
"The slow sulfur"
"A Distant Republic Demands"
"Gross Country Flight"
"Horses of the moon--"
"The long wound of the summer--"
"Half-life"
"Lightcrackle"
"What We Think We Know"
Poem"
"A Season"
"Your knife's a most particular guest"
"Loon"
"The rabbit dreams of hunting"
"Empty playground"
"Ear to hear;"
"Empty Canvas"
"All is not well"
"To speak is the vice"
"Anonymity has a name;"
"I am travelling, travelling..."
"The scarecrow shivering in November corn."
"You out there, so secret."
"The stars"
"What We Don't Know Kills Us"
"The Cottonwood"
"Comfort"
"In fog..."
"Advice"
"A Theory"
- Folder 33: Poetry by Thomas McGrath
This folder contains the following poems (listed according to title or first line):
"Yes"
"Be Careful"
"All month long I have heard the owls"
"Among the Things We Are Left to Do"
"The stars! The stars!"
"You, Yannis Ritsos"
"Affirmation"
"Peace! Land! Peyote!"
"Visitors"
"The true darkness of the forest"
"Greek Wedding"
"Alas!"
"Eclipse"
"ON THE OCCASION of the launching of the Red"
"In the smallest tidepool"
"Advice"
"Morning and evening"
"A Theory"
"In fog..."
"Ghost fire"
"My dandelions"
"Remembering Issa"
"Comfort"
"Fallen chestnut blossoms"
"Somewhere Ahead"
"Surprise"
"A barbwire fence"
"The Scalping Knife"
"Summer"
"The Cottonwood"
"A million puffs of smoke!"
"Arrivals"
"What We Don't Know Kills Us"
"THE UNFAIRNESS OF IT ALL"
"Moon"
"The Need for Dictionaries III"
"Gloomy woods, and this highwayman"
"The scarecrow shivering in November corn."
"The stars"
"Darkness of winter solstice"
"The long wound of summer--"
"Pheasant Season"
"Sleepy Birdsong..."
"For Alvaro"
"You out there, so secret."
"I am travelling, travelling"
"The Grand days,"
"Umber sundown."
"Across the winter-white coulee hills"
"Anonymity has a name"
"One farmhouse light--"
"To speak is the vice"
"The queen of Accident County"
"All is not well?"
"Empty canvas."
"The stick of the blind man"
"Ear to hear;"
"Empty playground,"
"Down the small and crooked road"
"Did you bring me a present? the little boy asks."
"Black"
"The rabbit dreams of hunting."
"Why I never married"
"Loon"
"Where Janie Went In"
"Epitaph of a Man Devoured by Monsters"
"Full moon and silence"
"Powers of Darkness"
"Route Song and Epitaph"
"Summer Lightening"
"I see the moon."
"Your knife's a most particular guest,"
"The man attacked"
"The Exiles Epitaph"
"That's the Way it Goes"
"A Season"
"Presumptions"
"Poem"
"At Fargo"
"The Need for Dictionaries II"
"Horses of the moon--"
"The two-faced sea--"
Sultry afternoon. The old dog"
"Callings"
"In the list of one thousand false addresses"
"In Other Worlds"
"After moondown"
"A Field of Sunflowers"
"The slow sulfur"
"The Need for Dictionaries"
"Legislators of Darkness"
"Loud November Rain"
"Faults of Darkness"
"A Distant Republic Demands"
"A History of Language"
"Hushed bright pond stillness."
"Cross Country Flight"
"Solidarity"
"Proportions"
"Resurrections"
"Terrors and Advantages"
"Some Kinds of Knowledge"
"Half-life"
"What We Think We Know"
"Lightcrackle."
"Among the trophies of Death"
"Small things, soft,"
"Nothing is lost"
"From Old Days"
"Weights and Measures"
"In a Landscape West of Eden"
"Hunter in the cold field."
"The Classics"
"How it Feels to be Saved"
- Folder 34: Miscellaneous Poems (A-M), Arranged Alphabetically
The following poems may be found in this folder (listed by title or first line):
"Anniversaries: for Don and Henrie Gordon" (2 Copies)
"Another Christmas Carol" (3 Copies)
"Another Quandry"
"At Momentary Loss of Belief in the Wisdom of the Common People and, of course, the Bastards Who Own and Operate Them" (2 Copies)
"At Port Townsend: for Sam and Tree"
"Behold the Woman" (2 Copies)
"Birthday Poem"
"Birthdays"
"Both Camps"
"Blues for the Old Revolutionary Woman"
"The Bravest Boat" (3 Copies)
"Burdens"
"Butterfly or Emperor?"
"The Children of Contemporary Cities"
"The Citizens: Dreaming" (3 Copies)
"Cold Ceremony"
"The Defeat of the Novelist"
"Definition"
"The Dream Range"
"The End of the Line"
"Epitaph for a Pythagorean"
"Even Song" (2 Copies)
"A Field of Sunflowers"
"Flight"
"Flint and Steel"
"Flying Home"
"For a Book by Charles Humbolt"
"For a Dancer"
"For Alvaro"
"For Joe McGrath"
"For Lyla--Ada, Minnesota, Oct. '85" (2 Copies)
"Waiting to Die All Over (after cutting daylillies at dusk)" by David Martinson
"For Naomi Replansky, Poet and Cartographer, Recently Departed From Los Angeles: Upon the Occasion of Receiving From Her a Poem in Most Shameless Praise of San Francisco"
"The Ghost"
"Fiesta"
"Bad Cess"
"The Owl"
"Graveyard Shift"
"Tomasito Says"
"Flying Home"
"Let Us Turn Over the Page"
"Guerillas (I)" (4 Copies)
"How the Revolution was Betrayed: for Att. Benjy Muggles"
"In the Dream Time"
"In the High Country"
"In the Papal Ring" (6 Copies)
"Instructions for the Dead"
"Invitation" (2 Copies)
"Joe Hill at Harvard" (2 Copies)
"A Kind of Dedication"
"Lament for Pablo Neruda"
"Landscape With Birds" (4 Copies)
"To His Muse: Or Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gave Me"
"The Language of the Dead" (2 Copies)
"Last Will and Testament" (2 Copies)
"Long Distance From a War"
"Long Goodbye"
"Look on My Works!" (2 Copies)
"Loon" (2 Copies)
"The Fatigue of Objects"
"At Lost Lake"
"Newtonian Law"
"Illumination"
"Mediterranean" (2 Copies)
"Mediation"
"The Migration of Cities" (4 Copies)
"Mystery"
- Folder 35: Miscellaneous Poems (N-Z), Arranged Alphabetically
The following poems may be found in this folder (arranged by title or first line):
"Near Pah-Gotzin-Kay" (2 Copies)
"NOTES ON THE REVOLUTION"
"Wayfaring Stranger"
"Nuclear Winter" (2 Copies)
"Offering"
"Old Times"
"On Moving Into a New House"
"Ontology"
"Why He Can't Tell You Where Nicaragua Is--Not Even the Continent"
"Poem"
"Pieces of String"
"Poem at the Winter Solistice" (2 Copies)
"Poems by Tomasito"
"Power"
"Praises IV" (4 Copies)
"Presumptions"
"Rediscovery" (3 Copies)
"Rune"
"Four Poems Thomas McGrath Salute #2" (2 Copies)
"Senior Citizens"
"A Sixth Heresy of Parson Chance"
"Song"
"Spiritual Exercises"
"Suspicion of Some Kinds of Solitude"
"Than Never" (2 Copies)
"To His Muse: or Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gave Me"
"Too Bad"
"Towards the End" (3 Copies)
"Trail Blazers" (2 Copies)
"Transformations of Old Silver Crossing the Continent" (2 Copies)
"The Underground" (6 Copies)
"The Unfairness of it All"
"The Useless Passions"
"At Sunrise"
"Watchman! What of the Night?"
"Welcome"
- Folder 1: Copy of First Manifesto by Thomas McGrath, 1940
- Box 5
- Folder 1: Untitled Manuscript of Selected Poems by Thomas McGrath, 1942-1962
The following poems may be found in this folder:
Part One Wartime
"The Odor of Blood"
"Homecoming"
"Remembering that Island"
"Sailing North on a Troop Ship"
"Night in Wartime"
"War in the Aleutians"
"Here is a Skeleton"
"Encounter"
"The Spectators"
"Crash Report"
"How it All Looked After the War"
"The Repeated Journey"
Part Two Memories of the Depression
"Cal the Last of the Real Wobs"
"Fords Leaving"
"Gate to the Dream"
"The Depression"
"Strike Days"
"Going to College"
"Depression in Baton Rouge"
"Studying the Metaphysicals in Baton Rouge"
"Stealing from the President of the University of North Dakota"
Part Three Something Permanently Good
"Love in a Bug"
"Hot, Great-Hearted Women"
"Such a Simple Love"
"Chaos"
"Legend"
"Fanfare for a Procession of Heroes"
"Pueblo! Pueblo!"
"Ode for the American Dead in Korea"
"The Tourists"
"Like the Watchman in Agamemnon"
"One Who Has Looked at the Dark"
"In Los Angeles"
"Epitaph"
- Folder 2: Drafts and Proof Sheets of "What is there to Celebrate?" by Thomas McGrath
- Folder 3: Poems by McGrath (Numbered and Organized by Jack Beeching)
- Folder 4: Crazy Horse (Edited by Tom and Eugenia McGrath)
- Folder 5: The Subversive Agent
- Folder 6: Title Pages of McGrath's Books
- Folder 7: Book Cover to Staves: A Book of Songs
- Folder 8: Essay by Jack Beeching and corresponding letter written to McGrath
- Folder 9: Ms. "NYC" (Probably by Gene Frunkin)
- Folder 10: Photocopy of Disenchantment or Default? A Lay Sermon by E.P. Thompson
- Folder 11: The Grass Eats the Horse by Eric Blau
- Folder 12: McGrath at a Biblical Age by Fred Whitehead
- Folder 13: Revolution: The Significance of The Fifth Season in the Poems of Thomas McGrath by Glenn Sheldon
- Folder 14: Book Review of The Disinherited
- Folder 15: Manuscript and Correspondence from Mel Weisburg, January, 1963
- Folder 16: Sun Dance by Vahan Gregory, Including a letter to Thomas McGrath, 1965
- Folder 17: The Incidence of War and Other Poems by R.P. Kingston, 1971
- Folder 18: Manuscripts for Tomasito Songs by Tomasito McGrath, 1975
This folder contains the following poems (listed by title or first line):
"Lakes"
"A swan of wool and buffalo hides"
"Near the Rum River"
"A Journey"
"Poem"
"Someone has lost"
"Counting Song"
"Big Snow I"
"Tongue Twister"
"Big Snow II"
"Manifesto"
"Tomasito's Poem For His Father"
"Waking"
"December 24, 1974"
"Lakes"
"Tomasito's Conundrum"
"Counting Song"
"December 24, 1974"
"Manifesto"
"Tomasito's Poem for His Father"
"Tomasito's Poem for His Mother"
"The Runaway Hamburger (A Delicious Story)"
"Someone has lost"
"The Crocuses my"
"Tomasito's Conundrum"
"Big Snow I"
"Big Snow II"
"Tomasito's Conundrums"
"Waking"
"Someone has lost"
"Lakes"
"Near the Rum River"
"Poem"
"A Journey"
"A swan of wool and buffalo hides"
- Folder 19: Dummies of Tomasito Songs by Tomasito McGrath, 1975
- Folder 20: Review of Thomas McGrath's Passages Toward the Dark, Submitted to Western American Literature by Frederick Stern, 1983
- Folder 21: Manuscript of Letters and Leaves: McGrath's Indian Culture Versus Whitman's Poetic Tradition by Thomas Matchie, Published in North Dakota Quarterly, Vol. 53, No. 1, 1985
- Folder 22: Manuscript of Thomas McGrath and the Long Poem by Frederick Stern, 1986
- Folder 23: Proofs for North Dakota Quarterly "Conversations with Thomas McGrath" by James Mckenzie, 1988
- Folder 24: Revised Copy of North Dakota Quarterly "Conversations with Thomas McGrath" by James Mckenzie, 1988
- Folder 25: Manuscript for The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath, Edited by Frederick Stern, 1988
- Folder 26: Manuscript Continued, The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath, Edited by Frederick Stern, 1988
- Folder 27: Manuscript Submitted for Copy-Editing; The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath, by Frederick Stern, 1988
- Folder 28: Copy-Edited Page Proofs of The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath by Frederick Stern, 1988
- Folder 29: Continuation of Copy-Edited Proofs of The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath by Frederick Stern, 1988
- Folder 30: Edited Printout of The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath by Frederick Stern, June 22, 1988
- Folder 31: Proofs for The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath by Frederick Stern, September 8, 1988
- Folder 32: Advertisements and Book Reviews of The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath by Frederick Stern, 1989
- Folder 1: Untitled Manuscript of Selected Poems by Thomas McGrath, 1942-1962
- Box 6
- Folder 1: Frederick Stern Miscellaneous; Related to His Book The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath
- Folder 2: Assorted Manuscript Versions of "The Delegate for Poetry": McGrath as Communist Poet by Frederick Stern, 1988
- Folder 3: Final Page Proofs of Thomas McGrath: A People's Poet by Frederick Stern, 1991
- Folder 4: Review of Thomas McGrath's Death Song Submitted to Western American Literature, 1991
- Folder 5: Thomas McGrath: A Memoir by Jack Beeching for the Chester Fritz Library Department of Special Collections, 1992
- Folder 6: Teaching Tom McGrath: Imaginary Friends and Real Students by Rane Arroyo, 1994
- Folder 7: Poem; "Elegy on Fortification's Illusions" for Truman Nelson by David Cumberland
- Folder 8: Poetry Submitted to Thomas McGrath by Mel Weisburg and Others
- Folder 9: Poems from Sid Gershgorem
- Folder 10: Poem; "Late Report from Agent of the Worker's Revolution Temporarily Detained Behind Class Enemy Lines: Longshot Says Carry On," In Memory Of Thomas McGrath
- Folder 11: Poems from Arnold Rattenburg, 1964?
- Folder 12: Poems by Robert Hazel, 1966?
- Folder 13: "It #9" by Robert Bly (Featured Poet in Small Magazine of Poetry), 1967
- Folder 14: Poems from Henry Wolff, 1969
- Folder 15: Poetry Submitted to Crazy Horse, 1970
- Folder 1: Frederick Stern Miscellaneous; Related to His Book The Revolutionary Poet in the United States: The Poetry of Thomas McGrath
- Box 4
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[Series 1: Biographical Materials],
[Series 2: Correspondence],
[Series 3: Written Works],
[Series 4: Screenplays/Scripts],
[Series 5: Audio and Video Cassette Tapes],
[Series 6: Photographs],
[Series 7: Oversized Materials],
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