Waldo Frank Papers

The Waldo Frank Papers span the years from 1879 to 1977, comprising the documents of a prolific twentieth-century American novelist and writer who has largely faded into obscurity. This collection reveals the professional and personal life of Waldo Frank through a variety of materials. Frank was a critic of society and culture, writing of the psychological and social themes of man and his environment, while analyzing the self and searching for a cosmic unity. Frank described himself "as an outsider--yearning, struggling to get in. Into my home, into my own home, into N.Y. of the people, into France (later Spain), into literary America, into the Revolution (the People). I've never succeeded--whence the growing stress and importance of "into the Cosmos." Waldo Frank's papers contain 132 boxes and 3565 folders housing correspondence, writings, publicity, writings by others, memorabilia, photographs, scrapbooks, and clippings. The primary language in the collection is English, however there is a large amount of correspondence and writings in Spanish, particularly Spanish translations of Frank's works. There is correspondence in French and some material in Portuguese, German, Czechoslovakian, and Russian.

View the finding aid for the Waldo Frank papers