Archive of author of The Cruel Sea will prove a magnet for Liverpool scholars

Sep 11 2008 by Peter Elson, Liverpool Daily Post

Max Monsarrat with his father's scrapbook at Liverpool Athenaeum with Peter Elson _320

SUPPORT for the Daily Post campaign to bring the archive of The Cruel Sea author Nicholas Monsarrat to Liverpool has come from a most important source – his eldest son, Max.

Max Monsarrat, 65, and his wife, Rachel, were guests of honour at a lunch held at Liverpool Athenaeum, which will be the archive’s new permanent home.

The Nicholas Monsarrat Archive is being donated by the writer’s third wife and widow, Ann, who wanted it to be located in the novelist’s home city.

Max Monsarrat, who was born in Heswall, gave his blessing to his stepmother Ann’s gift and endorsed it by donating his father’s hand-written manuscripts, bequeathed to him by his mother (the novelist’s first wife).

These include The Visitor, the novelist’s only play, his Corvette story series, wartime Royal Naval patrol and night order logbooks, plus his work in progress rough books.

Until the writer’s death in 1979, Nicholas and Ann Monsarrat lived on the Maltese island of Gozo. When Ann Monsarrat moved to a smaller home on Malta last year, she offered the archive ex-gratis to Liverpool Athenaeum.

Nicholas Monsarrat was born in 1910 and brought up at 11 Rodney Street. His father, Keith, was an eminent surgeon and a member of Liverpool Athen-aeum from 1910 until 1914. During the Battle of the Atlantic, Nicholas Mons-arrat served as a Royal Naval officer based at Albert Dock, Liverpool.

These wartime experiences provided raw material for The Cruel Sea and many other stories.

Max Monsarrat, a retired farmer and property restorer who has lived in France since 1976, was very pleased with the archive campaign’s outcome.

He said: “This seems to be a very solid and strong project, which will be a great honour to both my father and the Liverpool Athenaeum.

“I am very pleased that the archive has come to the city of his birth, as Liverpool is the best place for it to be. I am so glad this has all worked out.”

Ann Monsarrat said: “I wanted the archive to come to Liverpool, as it’s what Nicholas would have wanted. He retained deep affection for his home city and Liverpool Athenaeum is ideal as his father was a proprietor there.”

Dr John Edmondson, of National Museums Liverpool, who will lead the Monsarrat archive’s cataloguing at the Athenaeum library, said: “This is very exciting for us. With material donated by Ann and Max Monsarrat, it will make the archive a real magnet for 20th-century literature scholars.”

Pamela Brown, Athenaeum general manager, is masterminding the arch-ive’s transfer from Malta, with gener-ous help from Cube Relocations of Malta, CMA/CGM Container Line and the Royal Navy. “It will take about three weeks and we hope it will arrive by late October,” said Mrs Brown.

peter.elson@dailypost.co.uk