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Osiris Collection

 Collection
Identifier: PCMS-0050

Scope and Content Note

The Osiris Collection, 1972-2021, contains material related to the editorial and production business of the magazine, as well as the personal poetry career of Andrea Moorhead. The issues with production material start with issue 26 and span to issue 76, with some issues missing in the earlier years. The bulk of the material is correspondence, organized alphabetically, ranging from 1970-2012, with electronic mail at the end of the series. Electronic mail has been left in original order, organized in groups by country or language. Some correspondents of note include Anne Blonstein, Christian Arjonilla, Jean-Chapdelaine Gagnon, Philippe Haeck, Robert L. Lepper, Oliver Mechcatie, Harold Norse, Lyn Lifshin, Raymond Federman, James Laughlin, Charles Hadfield, Nicole Brossard, and Simon Perchik. Business records include subscription renewals and invoices from mostly library subscriptions.

The Andrea Moorhead series consists of her manuscript drafts organized in chronological order in five large notebooks. Also included are some theater draft material; French serials including Moorhead's photographs; and poetry career correspondence which includes acceptance letters for her poetry and reviews, and other professional acknowledgements. Accruals from 2021 include production and correspondence materials related to issue 87 and 88, as well as reviews dating from circa 1983-2003.

Dates

  • Majority of material found within 1972-2013
  • 1970-2021

Creator

Language of Materials

Material is mostly written in English and French with other material in Arabic, Bengali, Catalan, Danish, Dutch, Finland Swedish, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Romansch, Spanish, Swedish, Vietnamese, and Walloon.

Terms of Access and Use

The Osiris Collection is open for research.

Copyright

Copyright of papers in the collection may be held by their authors, or the authors' heirs or assigns. Researchers must obtain the written permission of the holder(s) of copyright and the Poetry Collection before requesting photocopies and/or publishing quotations from materials in the collection. Once permission is obtained, most papers may be copied in accordance with the library's usual procedures unless otherwise specified.

Historical Note

Osiris is an international literary journal published in Deerfield, Massachusetts until 2014, and now operates out of Greenfield, Massachusetts, edited by Andrea Moorhead and designed by Robert Moorhead. Since 1972, the Moorheads, who both taught at Deerfield Academy, have published two issues a year consistently and have featured mostly poetry and some prose and artwork. Languages published include English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Polish, and German, to name just a few. In all cases, except for English and French, works appear with translations. The journal has maintained a rotating and international editorial board. A description appearing in issue 2, 1973, states: "OSIRIS is an apolitical international journal, which seeks a human art, without intellectual or social categories. OSIRIS affirms Art as essential and vital to human tradition."

Osiris celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2012 and the Moorheads continue to publish two issues annually, in June and December.

Extent

13.761 Linear Feet (33 manuscript boxes)

0.007 Gigabytes (8 files)

Additional Description

Abstract

The Osiris Collection, 1972-2021, contains material related to the production of the magazine as well as Andrea Moorhead's personal career. The bulk of the material is correspondence. Other material includes business financial material and production material for Osiris; and manuscripts, correspondence, acceptance letters, and publications documenting Andrea Moorhead's poetry and translation career. Osiris is still an actively publishing magazine. The material in this collection documents the life of Osiris until 2013.

Arrangement

This collection has been arranged into three series based on subject: Osiris, Andrea Moorhead's personal poetry career, and Accruals. The original register for issues 1-72 and correspondence documenting each accrual, including lists of items sent, can be found at the end of the collection.

Preservica Internal URL

https://us.preservica.com/explorer/explorer.html#prop:4&77dd64ef-81cc-48f2-a198-59c42b3a8be5

Related Digital Material

https://buffalo.access.preservica.com/archive/sdb%3Acollection|77dd64ef-81cc-48f2-a198-59c42b3a8be5/

Acquisition Information

The Osiris Collection was donated by Robert and Andrea Moorhead. Digital files were transferred via email to Curator James Maynard and Digital Archivist Sarah Cogley in 2021.

Accruals donated by Robert and Andrea Moorhead in 2021.

Accruals and Additions

Further accruals are expected both to the series on Osiris and the series on Andrea Moorhead's career. Accruals to the series on Moorhead may be interfiled, particularly in the file on publications.

Processing Information

Collection processed by Elliot McNally and Allison Cardon.

Digital files created by Robert and Andrea Moorehead were transferred to the Poetry Collection via email. Where possible, digital content was normalized to standard preservation and access formats, and transferred to a stable preservation environment following the University Libraries' Digital Preservation guidelines.

Subjects

Related Names

Source

Finding Aid & Administrative Information

Title
Finding Aid for the Osiris Collection PCMS-0050
Status
Completed
Author
Finding Aid prepared by Elliot McNally and Allison Cardon.
Date
2015
Description rules
Finding Aid Prepared Using Local Best Practices
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin
Language of description note
Finding aid written in English.
Sponsor
The processing of this collection was made possible through generous funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, administered through the Council on Library and Information Resources' "Cataloging Hidden Special Collections and Archives" Project.

Revision Statements

  • 2022 April: Digital material added and finding aid revised by Sarah Cogley.

Repository Details

Repository Details

Part of the The Poetry Collection Repository

http://library.buffalo.edu/pl/
Contact:
420 Capen Hall
Buffalo New York 14260-1674 US
716-645-2917
716-645-3714 (Fax)