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'When Patrick White claimed in 1977 'My MSS
are destroyed...', he was declaring truthfully
that he had burnt priceless drafts of his major
novels and plays. However, when the National
Library of Australia (NLA) acquired the 'lost'
Patrick White papers from his literary executor
Barbara Mobbs in 2006, a frisson of excitement
and shock rebounded through the scholarly,
literary and wider arts communities. More than
anyone, his biographer David Marr was astonished
to discover this cache of thirty-two boxes of
unknown material. 'Happy to let me dig about
in the entrails of his life' for almost a decade, it
now seemed to Marr that White had deliberately
kept him from 'trawling through this intimate
evidence of his work'. In 2012, the celebration of
the centenary of White's birth is the catalyst for
scholars and the custodians of cultural collections
to revisit the significance of White's entire body
of work, published and unpublished, and his
influence and place in Australia's artistic life.' (Author's introduction)
