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Re: fictional archives--Robertson Davies



"The Lyre of Orpheus," which I read last summer, contains a scene where scholar/priest Simon Darcourt steals some sketches of Francis Cornish, the late Canadian arts patron and philanthropist.  Darcourt was Cornish's friend and confidant, as well as his literary executor, and in this novel he is working on a biography of Cornish.  However, in order to get his hands on some secret information about Cornish that will fill an important gap in his biography, Darcourt is pressed to steal these sketches from Cornish's papers and give them to his "source" as a quid pro quo.  Darcourt justifies his theft by noting that nobody at the archives has processed these papers, and no scholars had used them, so who would miss them?
 
Anyway, read the novel yourselves....it's the final volume in Davies' Cornish Trilogy.  Excellent book, excellent series, excellent novelist!
Now it's back to lurking.....
 
Brad Bauer
Archivist
Herbert Hoover Presidential Library-Museum
 
 
>>> "Linda C. Morrison" <lcmorrison@MINDSPRING.COM> 04/05/02 02:56PM >>>
There is a lengthy section of a novel by the Canadian writer Robertson
Davies that takes place in an archives--stealing, coffee cup etc.!!! and
world of rare books, art, etc.   I just went thru the list of his books, and
I can't remember which one it was.  Several touch on art world/forgeries,
etc.  Good reading!
\Linda Morrison, boston area.

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