'I know I can do anything': new archive of AS Byatt's essays looks inside the author's extraordinary mind.

The Booker-winning author of Possession was known for his passionate research. Now, 68 boxes of her notebooks, letters and diaries, acquired by the British Library, reveal how she gathered the raw material for her story, which Antonia Susan Byatt, at 20, wasn't yet sure she could write. Do I take myself seriously as a writer? In September 1956, he wrote in his diary of

At the age of 20, Antonia Susan Bayat was still not sure that she could write. Do I take myself seriously as a writer? "No, I don't think so," he asked himself in his diary in September 1956.

The young Byatt - who went on to become one of Britain's best-known writers, best known for his 1990 novel Possession: A Romance - worried that his mind might not match his ambitions. However, his determination was already evident. "Today, I know I can do anything. But not yet," she wrote on her 20th birthday.

These intimate reflections can be found among the material in a major new archive of Byatt's works, acquired by the British Library. It provides an insight into the growth of the Booker Prize-winning author, who died in 2023 aged 87, whose complex and ambitious stories won her international acclaim.

This collection includes 68 office boxes, manuscripts, correspondence, personal memories and documents related to Bayat's early life. It includes manuscript drafts of Possession, which won the 1990 Booker Prize, and material on his 1978 novel The Virgin in the Garden and a children's book shortlisted for the 2009 Booker Prize. According to the curators of the British Library, this book is one of the most important books available in recent years.

"It's the other side of the tapestry," says Bayatt's editor Jenny Oglow, who worked closely with him on Possession. “In his books, you have these very complex plots, very complex characters with their fantastic names. "And when you really look at the back of it, there are hundreds, thousands of little threads."

Born in Sheffield in 1936, Byatt studied English at Cambridge before going on to study at Bryn Mawr College, Philadelphia and Oxford. He taught at universities and art schools for more than two decades before leaving academia in 1983 to write full-time. He was known for his passionate research and ability to weave seemingly disparate fields of knowledge into his stories. The archive allows researchers to follow Bayat as he collects the raw materials for his stories, testing ideas and repeatedly questioning their efficacy.

Oglu says the documents "reveal the workings of his mind." “He was a very quick thinker and had one of those racing minds, almost like three o'clock in the morning when everything was spinning. He'll say things like, "It's cute, but it's not right." I can't go on, it's not going to work.

Oglu adds: "If he was interrupted, or had to travel or was not well, he would be very cross. "I think what the archive does is it allows you to follow a very distinctive writer in the way he creates his work."

The manuscript drafts of Possession are particularly illuminating. Interweaving the stories of two contemporary academics investigating the lives of fictional Victorian poets, this novel is a masterpiece. The detailed layout of the hundreds of notebook pages that produced the book's drafts shows Byatt diligently working through questions of chronology and character relationships before the narrative takes its final shape.

"When he decided on a book, it would take him two, three or four years to write it," says Oglu. "He worked everything out scene by scene before he wrote the scene itself. He really thought about it, so when you get to the manuscript, there's not a lot of revisions."

Bayat continued to write by hand until the 2000s and 2010s. "It's more like craft work," Oglu says. "There is a connection between the brain, the imagination and the hand."

The diaries show that Bayat's intellectual confidence coexists with patches of self-doubt. At a young age, he described himself as an "intellectually slow developer" and wondered if he had a "second rate mind."

In another, he wondered if his abstract way of thinking prevented him from creating convincing characters—"characters with blood."

The collection also contains correspondence with other writers, including the novelist Iris Murdoch, with whom Byatt was friendly, and letters documenting her exchanges with younger writers.

"If he saw an up-and-coming young writer, he would be excited," Oglu says. "He enjoyed looking at their books and was loyal to them."

The articles also encountered Bayatt's scathing observations of the people he portrays. During her time in the United States as a young woman, she made an early assessment of the women around her. "American women—strangely, strangely efficient and childish," she wrote. "Most of these are 26, 27 - one would think less of them. Friendly though, and not unintelligent."

The library estimates that cataloging the 68 boxes will take up to two years. Once complete, the archive will be home to literary essays by authors including Angela Carter, Beryl Bainbridge, Hanif Qureshi and Graham Swift.

Helen Melody, Senior Curator of Contemporary Literary and Creative Archives, said: “The British Library is thrilled to acquire the AS Byatt Archive. "Beatt is at the heart of the British literary establishment and his importance to post-war British literature cannot be underestimated. This collection will be an invaluable resource for scholars seeking to learn more about his life and work."

Oglu thinks Bayat would have welcomed the purchase. "I think he would be very happy to take his job seriously," he said. "And he enjoyed the fact that people wanted to see it and that it was being carefully looked after."