International Anthony Burgess Foundation
Encyclopedia
The International Anthony Burgess Foundation is a UK charity set up to back research into the life and achievements of the 20th-century novelist Anthony Burgess
Anthony Burgess
John Burgess Wilson  – who published under the pen name Anthony Burgess – was an English author, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator and critic. The dystopian satire A Clockwork Orange is Burgess's most famous novel, though he dismissed it as one of his lesser works...

. The foundation's Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

 premises house a collection of books from Burgess's library along with the writer's musical instruments and many of his scores and manuscripts. The site is open to the public, and scholars can take advantage of the library and archives.

Ground floor: cafe where many Burgess titles are available to buy. On the wall are photographs, believed to have been taken in their Chiswick
Chiswick
Chiswick is a large suburb of west London, England and part of the London Borough of Hounslow. It is located on a meander of the River Thames, west of Charing Cross and is one of 35 major centres identified in the London Plan. It was historically an ancient parish in the county of Middlesex, with...

 home in the early 1960s, of Burgess with his second wife and their son. Anteroom of foundation's offices: several shelves of translations of Burgess books into Japanese
Japanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...

 and other languages. Performance venue: articles of furniture, and a grand piano, that belonged to the writer.

Basement: a selection of typewriters owned by Burgess, tins of the brands of cigarillo
Cigarillo
A cigarillo is a short, narrow cigar. Unlike cigarettes, cigarillos are wrapped not in paper but in whole-leaf tobacco. Cigarillos can be found for purchase alone or in packs, and are often made without filters...

 he favoured (Panatela and Henri Wintermans), an ashtray, matchbooks, musical instruments, etc. Display cabinets: a range of Burgess material such as the hard-to-find pamphlet Obscenity and the Arts (the text of a lecture delivered in Malta
Malta
Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...

) and a copy of the Hockney's Alphabet compilation containing the Burgess poem Elegy for X. Study centre: visible through a glass panel. Entry by arrangement. Books, manuscripts, papers, paintings, drawings and other matter associated with Burgess may be consulted. The shelves here house copies of works reviewed by Burgess for newspapers and magazines. A highlight is a painting of what appears to be the goings-on in a Sarawak
Sarawak
Sarawak is one of two Malaysian states on the island of Borneo. Known as Bumi Kenyalang , Sarawak is situated on the north-west of the island. It is the largest state in Malaysia followed by Sabah, the second largest state located to the North- East.The administrative capital is Kuching, which...

 Iban longhouse. The picture, dated 1957, is the one seen hanging in Burgess's house in Etchingham
Etchingham
Etchingham is a village and civil parish in the Rother District in East Sussex, southern England. The village is approximately twelve miles north-west of Hastings, on the A265, half a mile west of its junction with the A21....

 in an early television documentary. It can also be seen (same 1960s footage) in the more recent documentary The Burgess Variations. Among many other items, one of the writer's passports may be viewed (unfortunately the passport photo is no longer extant), and some of his cheque stubs (e.g. "Gin
Gin
Gin is a spirit which derives its predominant flavour from juniper berries . Although several different styles of gin have existed since its origins, it is broadly differentiated into two basic legal categories...

, £60"). A copy of the rare Will and Testament edition can be inspected.

Location and hours: International Anthony Burgess Foundation, the Engine House, Chorlton Mill, 3 Cambridge Street, Manchester M1 5BY. Open to the public 10am to 4pm weekdays.

Burgess's birthplace in 91 Carisbrook Street (the house is demolished) is approximately three miles to the northeast. The foundation was formerly housed in a Victorian-era villa in Withington
Withington
Withington is a suburban area of the City of Manchester, in Greater Manchester, England. It lies south of Manchester city centre, about south of Fallowfield, north-east of Didsbury, and east of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, near the centre-to-south edges of the Greater Manchester Urban Area; in the...

nearby.
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