This collection correspondence between Kenneth Patchen, Miriam Patchen and James Boyer May between 1956-1972, as well as a small collection of printed material documenting Kenneth Patchen's jazz-poetry period and his degenerating medical condition.

James Boyer May,(December 30,1904 - February 21,1981), was a minor poet, essayist and a publisher. He ran the small but influential literary magazine Trace from 1952 through 1970 in Los Angeles. Trace printed listings of small press activities connecting Alan Swallow of Denver to Len Fulton's Dustbooks in Northern California. May recollected, "Trace was called a 'Bridge' by various people - and it was - between people in many parts of the world... It's my belief, and I think it could be documented, that we had an influence on the language itself."

2 document boxes

Property rights reside with the University of California. Literary rights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. For permission to publish or to reproduce the material, please contact the Head of Special Collections and Archives.

Collection open for research.