A phone number of worthful , important , or rare holograph have been sneak from source or the individuals or institution task with taking care of them . Here ’s a sampling of them .
1. Hemingway’s Early Writing Projects
In 1922 , Ernest Hemingway was a new paper correspondent with big dreams , a fledgling wedding , and a prolific dead body of unpublished fabrication . The last twowere jeopardizedby an ill - plump out head trip to Lausanne , Switzerland : Hemingway was thereto cover an outside league , and his married woman , Hadley , planned to join him from Paris to go skiing . She packed Hemingway ’s manuscripts into a suitcase — including an attempt at a novel he ’d written about his experience as a World War I ambulance equipment driver — and set off for the slopes , thinking her husband could indite while on vacation and share his work with an editor / journalist he had met . But on the way , the suitcase was stolen , and most of Hemingway ’s hard work was lose to him forever .
Hemingwaydescribed the momenthe hear the unsound news in his 1964 memoir , A transferable Feast : “ I had never seen anyone hurt by a thing other than demise or unbearable suffering except Hadley when she differentiate me about the affair being gone . She had cried and cry and could not tell me . I told her that no matter what the dreadful thing was that had happen nothing could be that bad , and whatever it was , it was all right and not to worry . We could work it out . Then , eventually , she told me . I was sure she could not have brought the carbons too and I hired someone to cover for me on my paper job . I was make good money then at news media , and took the gearing for Paris . It was unfeigned alright and I remember what I did in the dark after I let myself into the flat and found it was true . ”
Hemingway never does reveal “ what he did ” ( opportunity are it involve crapulence ) , but “ he was very brave about it,”Hadley order a friendin the 1970s . That said , the ex-husband - married woman added , she “ could tell he was heartbroken . ”
2. Malcolm Lowry’s First Novel
English author Malcolm Lowry achieved literary fame withUnder the Volcano , his 1947 novel about the final consequence of an alcoholic British ex-husband - ambassador in Mexico . Before that , he had only published a single book — a mostly overlook work calledUltramarine .
release in 1933,Ultramarinewas base on Lowry ’s experiences working on a Far East steamer as a stripling , before studying at Cambridge University . The young author make out his holograph during his final condition of shoal , and a newspaper publisher accept it — but the novel ’s portion was thrust into endangerment when a publishing business firm director had his briefcase steal from his elevator car . Inside the display case was the only typescript version ofUltramarine .
It ’s undecipherable how the novel ultimately ended up getting publish , especially since Lowry claimed to have destroyed or thrown out all of his previous drafts . According to the author , a champion had rescue Lowry ’s last draught from the trash ( accounts differ whether it was the manuscript or a carbon transcript ) . Meanwhile , another chum claim that a version ofUltramarinehad been written and left at his house , and that Lowry know it was still there .
3. Franz Kafka’s Notebooks and Letters
After Franz Kafka exit of TB in 1924 , his buff Dora Diamantkept up to 20 of the author ’s notebooks — which contained jotted - down thoughts , thought , and sketches — and 35 of his letter of the alphabet . But when the Nazis amount into power , the Gestapo raided Diamant ’s house in Berlin . They were looking for communistic propaganda and confiscated all of her report , admit Kafka ’s whole shebang .
One of Kafka ’s friend , Max Brod , along with a valet de chambre named Klaus Wagenbach , tried to turn up the writings — but since the Gestapo had taken so many document , their search efforts were n’t successful . In later years , political turmoil in Germany preclude the two from pursuing the goods .
In the late ’ 90s , Diamant ’s biographer , Kathi Diamant , and San Diego State University set in motion theKafka Project , a search for these missing text file . They ’ve spent decades abrade Nazi archives in Prague and Berlin , confabulate with scholars and national archivist , and investigating a title that Kafka ’s stolen writings were last spotted on a train to the eastern United States so they would n’t be destroyed by air raids .
4. Stephenie Meyer’sMidnight Sun
When word got out in 2008 thatTwilightauthor Stephenie Meyer was writingMidnight Sun , a version of the series ’ first Word of God told from vampire Edward Cullen ’s linear perspective , an eager reader got hold of the bare muster andpublished it onlinewithout Meyer ’s consent or noesis .
Meyer was so upset that she finish work onMidnight Sun , secernate fans that the unauthorized escape had destroy her creative process . in the beginning , Meyer had shared a teaser chapter of the body of work on her personal website — but after putting brake system on the project , she posted the entire incomplete study for fans to interpret .
“ I rather my fans not study this version . … It was only an uncompleted draft , ” Meyer wrote . “ But to end the confusion , I ’ve decided to make the draft usable . … I desire this fragment gives you further insight into Edward ’s promontory and add together a fresh dimension to theTwilightstory . That ’s what inspired me to spell it in the first place . " Meyereventually finishedMidnight Sunand published it in 2020 .
5. Walt Whitman’s Notebooks
consort toThe New York Times , in 1918 , Walt Whitman ’s friend and literary executor Thomas B. Harned gave the Library of Congress a collection of 24 notebooks that had once belong to to the author . They hold back note from when the 19th - C poet worked as a Civil War army nanny , an early adaptation of his iconic verse form “ Song of Myself , ” and a draft of the wartime poem “ Cavalry Crossing a Ford . ”
In 1942 , many worthful depository library items , include Whitman ’s notebook , weresent off to Ohiofor safekeeping asWorld War IIraged on . Several years afterwards , a software that supposedly contained 10 of the writer ’s composition pad arrived back in Washington , D.C.—but the notebook themselves were pretermit . ( The loge ’s sealwas unbroken , suggesting that the full treatment were stolen before the box was shipped . )
The notebook were assume lost for decades , until an anon. adult male discovered four of the pocket - sized books among his founding father ’s paper after his death . He tried to deal them at Sotheby ’s auction bridge star sign in New York , as all he knew about the work was that his late father had received them as a gift around 30 years prior . But since the works were steal property , they could n’t be resold .
Sotheby ’s give the rediscovered notebook to the Library of Congress , much to the delectation of historians , conservationist , and scholars . ( The other sixare still miss . ) “ This is definitely the most important literary cloth we could have hope to recover of anything known in American literature , ” David Wigdor , who was then assistant chief of the Library of Congress ’s holograph division , toldThe Washington Post . “ This material will actually be used by scholars . Their utility is quite transcendent . ”
6. One of Shakespeare’s First Folios
Before William Shakespeare ’s death in 1616 , only half of his theatrical body of work had been printed , in small books called quartos ; no declamatory - scale anthology of the Bard ’s plays exist yet . Two of Shakespeare ’s friend , John Heminge and Henry Condell , who go to his acting company The King ’s Men , decided to change this : They took36 of his playsand move over them to publisher Edward Blount and Isaac Jaggard .
In 1623 , the first take in edition of Shakespeare ’s playing period was ultimately nail . Its give name isMr . William Shakespeares Comedies , Histories , & Tragedies , but most scholars just denote to it as the “ First Folio , ” in reference to the magnanimous - sized newspaper the work were printed on . ( In those days , this kind of paper was usually reserved for royal proclamation and for important whole kit and boodle , like theology and history . ) Since multiple versions existed of some plays , Shakespeare ’s supporter take to have used “ original ” copies for the First Folio , although nobody cognize for certain if this is true .
expert believe that only 750 or few written matter of the First Folio were published , and today , only 235 bed copies survive worldwide . These books are worth millions of dollar each — which is likely the reason why in 1998 , someonestole a First Foliofrom the Durham Cathedral subroutine library in England .
In 2008 , a decade after the Holy Writ ’s larceny , a man named Raymond Scott brought it to the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington , D.C. , and requested an rating and appraisal . Scottclaimed he ’d been given the oeuvre as a gift in Cuba , from a Quaker whose mother had safeguard the “ old English Book ” in a chest .
Right off the bat , Folger stave have sex that the work was a First Folio , and Stephen C. Massey , a famous rare - book appraiser , substantiate it was the one steal from Durham . The Folger get hold of authorities , and police eventually arrested Scott . Nobody could prove if he was , in fact , the somebody who originally stole the Durham First Folio , but in 2010 , Scott was convicted of handling stolen trade good and smuggling the worthful work out of England . Hedied in prisonin 2012 .
7. An Untitled Harry Potter Prequel by J.K. Rowling
A version of this story run in 2017 ; it has been updated for 2022 .
