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Dateline: 8th July, 2009
Morley Collection: Now Open! "It is difficult to have a friend who is a critic," said theatre director Sir Peter Hall, Chancellor of Kingston University, in formally opening the collection assembled during a lifetime by Sheridan Morley which has been gifted by his widow to the university and now forms part of its 'Learning Resources Centre' (Library to those not yet with up to date with the jargon). But Morley was different: "Sherry straddled the fence," said Hall, "He managed to be on both sides at once: a critic, which can be quite demanding, but also he could direct, perform, appear on television and radio -- how did he have time to write!" In fact he wrote more than fifty theatrical biographies and books on theatre which form part of the 5,000 volumes that make up just part of this collection, along with posters, playbills, pictures, scripts, eleven boxes of programmes and 1,792 letters that, while largely relating to his own work and his family's, range much wider with documents dating from 1704 to 2007. Hall was obviously delighted to have this material as a resource at his university which he felt would be a wonderful home for it. "We are lucky to have it, and were lucky to have him in our theatre." Professor Gail Cunningham, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, who opened the proceedings, described it as "a most generous gift" and spoke of broadcaster David Jacobs as the prime mover in getting the collection to Kingston. Indeed, for as Morley's wife and frequent co-author Ruth Leon went on to tell the gathering, during Sheridan's lifetime the intention had been to sell the collection to a US University - "We were writers, we were broke." "But the bugger died on me and then I realised he was too English for his collection to go abroad without him to talk about it." She wanted to keep the collection together and she wanted it to be named after him to keep his work remembered, for the daily journalism to which he devoted so much of his life is fleeting. To chose a home she visited nine universities with first class drama departments and libraries. "I returned to London having made my choice," Ruth said, "when I got a call from David Jacobs saying 'Take a look at Kingston.' I didn't know they had a university! But once I got here - ignoring the architecture - I knew it was the place." The collection is housed in its own gallery just off the University Library where there is an exhibition of some representative material that guests were invited to view. As well as the Drama Department's Professor Colin Chambers, the Mayor of Kingston, David Jacobs and others closely linked with the university, the guests included the Chairman and other representatives of the Society for Theatre Research and many well-known members of the profession. I chatted briefly with Sam Walters and Auriol Smith from Richmond's Orange Tree Theatre, Miriam Margolyes and Annabel Leverton, and was delighted to see Corin Redgrave, who appeared with his sister Vanessa and wife Kika Markham in Morley's 1999 production of Coward's Song at Twilight. Corin is giving his performance of Wilde's De Profundis as part of the Performing Lives Conference which coincides with the opening of the collection. He told me that Merlin Holland, Wilde's grandson, has discovered some previously unknown correspondence between Wilde and Lord Alfred Douglas (Bosie) which he hopes may form the basis for another Wilde performance. They were all impressed by the material now in Kingston's care - and I was equally impressed by the commitment being shown by those responsible for it. The exhibition is open to any one who drops in to see it until 9th July (as explained in an earlier news item), but thereafter the collection will be available by appointment to anyone who wants to see it whenever the library is open: 8.30am - 9pm Monday to Thursday, until 5pm Fridays and 10am - 5pm at weekends. It will be closed Bank Holiday weekends and for a couple of days at the end of July for maintenance work. You can only study material in the library, you can't take things out on loan, but with a staff happy to look material out for you this will be a very useful resource for people from outside the university as well as a great asset to students at Kingston. Howard Loxton
Please note that all three Archive indices are very long and will therefore take some time to download.
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