Scope and arrangement
The W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman letters to Irving and Anne Weiss date from the 1940s to 2000, and consist primarily of handwritten and typed personal correspondence between the two couples. Most of the letters, dating from the 1940s to the 1970s, are addressed from Auden and/or Kallman to the Weisses. There are letters from the Weisses to Auden; a letter from the Weisses to Edward Mendelson regarding Auden's poems; as well as a letter from Alan Ansen to Wayne D. Cogswell about W.H. Auden's death. In addition to the letters, the collection includes exchanged birthday invitation cards from Auden to the Weisses; drafts of poems; newspaper clippings; and photographs of Kallman and Auden. Of note are drafts of Auden's poems Up There and Down There and drafts of various poems by Kallman.
The collection also features a folder of posthumous newspaper articles and clippings, dating from the 1970s to 2000, that the Weisses compiled about Auden and Kallman's personal lives.