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The collection consists of 38 letters from Bessie to his friend, Loretta Frances Fokes Lish, about his life, political views, current writing, and Gordon Lish.

Correspondence, playscripts, screenplays, scenarios, short stories, and other manuscripts, drafts, photocopies, contracts and other documents, tearsheets, clippings, and other materials relating to his career as a screenwriter, playwright, and author of short stories. Correspondence with friends, students, admirers, and professional colleagues concern his teaching, playwriting, films, articles, photography, and literary topics. There are also two groups of letters from students and readers about his textbook, "The Human Nature of Playwriting" (1949). Among the cataloged correspondence are William Gibson, MacKinlay Kantor, Anna Louise Strong, Louis Untermeyer, and Carl Van Doren. Included are manuscripts, drafts, or photocopies of almost all his films, plays, and short stories, such as playscripts and drafts of his plays, "The Jazz Singer" (1922), "Skylark" (1939), "Jason" (1942), and others; screenplays and scenarios, many in photocopy, of "Trouble in Paradise" (1932), "The Merry Widow" (1934), "The Shop Aroung the Corner" (1940), "Suspicion" (1941), "Heaven Can Wait" (1943), and many other films; and manuscripts, drafts, tearsheets, and printed copies of his short stories and articles of film and television criticism. There are also many clippings and reviews, programs, and other printed materials about his plays and films.