Artists and writers have always been drawn to New Orleans. Some of the most prominent American writers have spent some portion of their lives in the city. Over the years, private collectors have amassed a great deal of manuscripts relating to New Orleans’s writers and artists. Their donations to the Louisiana Research Collection make it possible for scholars from all over the world to study and enjoy Louisiana’s rich cultural heritage.
One of the most prominent southern writers of the Reconstruction Era, George Washington Cable, was born in New Orleans and lived here for the majority of his life. His novels portray Creole life in New Orleans, and he was especially well known for his ability to capture the dialects of the city’s inhabitants. Mark Twain wrote of him “Mr. Cable is the only master in the writing of French dialects that the country has produced; and he reads them in perfection.” LaRC preserves an extensive collection of Cable’s papers, including early drafts of his manuscripts as well as his correspondence with Twain.
New Orleans has also been a refuge for visual artists, not the least of which was the painter Edgar Degas. The Degas-Musson Family papers offer an intimate portrait of Edgar Degas’ family life and their financial troubles following the Civil War, providing context and insight into the painter’s most productive years.
William B. Wisdom was a New Orleans advertising executive and book collector who also devoted his time to acquiring literary manuscripts. In 1970, Wisdom donated his collection of William Faulkner manuscripts to Tulane University, where they still serve as a rich resource for scholars. The Wisdom Collection of William Faulkner includes several typescript short stories edited in Faulkner’s hand. Of particular value is Mayday, an Arthurian romance that Faulkner wrote in 1926. This slim volume was hand-bound by Faulkner, and contains his original illustrations.
Perhaps the most beloved of New Orleans’s writers is John Kennedy Toole. Toole wrote A Confederacy of Dunces in 1963, while stationed in Puerto Rico during his military service. The novel, with its unlikely cast of misfit characters, is widely considered to be the the quintessential New Orleans novel. The novel wasn’t published until 1981, eleven years after Toole’s death. Toole’s mother, Thelma, tirelessly championed her son’s writing, and eventually convinced Walker Percy to help her publish Confederacy. Between 1980 and 1990, Thelma Toole donated her sons papers, as well as substantial amounts of material relating to his early life to Tulane University.