Collections

The Marie Stiefel Laura Riding Jackson collection 1925-2024 contains materials created by and relating to poet and author, Laura Riding Jackson and Seizin Press including books, articles, manuscripts, and correspondence. This collection also includes materials created by Robert Graves, Shuyler Jackson, and Susan Morris, Riding Jackson's secretary. These materials are useful to historical, biographical, and literary research into the life and work of Laura Riding Jackson and Seizin Press. The collection is divided into five series as follows: Works about Laura Riding Jackson, 1963–2017 Works by Laura Riding Jackson, 1935–1984 Correspondence, 1941–1993 Materials from Laura's Kitchen, undated Books 1925-2024 Laura Riding Jackson, best known as Laura Riding, an American poet and author was born on January 16, 1901 in New York City, NY and died on September 2, 1991 in Wabasso, Florida. She was born Laura Reichenthal and began publishing under her married name, Gottschalk. Riding Jackson graduated Cornell University in 1921 and published her first poem in 1923 in the literary magazine The Fugitive and her first collection of poetry, The Close Chaplet in 1926. After her divorce in 1925, she assumed the surname Riding and moved to England to live with Robert Graves and his wife, Nancy Nicholson. She remained in Europe for 14 years, mainly England and Majorca, Spain, where Riding Jackson and Graves founded Seizin Press in 1927. In 1939, Riding and Graves left Europe for New Hope, Pennsylvania. In 1941, Riding Jackson married Schuyler B. Jackson and they moved to Wabasso, Florida, where she lived until her death in 1991. The Jackson's posthumously published a dictionary titled Rational Meaning: A New Foundation for the Definition of World and Supplementary Essays in 1997. Laura Riding's Florida house has been preserved by the Laura Riding Jackson Foundation and now sits at the Vero Beach campus of Indian River State College. The Foundation supports the legacy of Riding by offering educational events and workshops for writers of all ages, as well as preserving her home.