The Harvey Penick Reader, 1997

Though essentially consisting of only three projects, all published, this sub-series contains a voluminous amount of research on its subjects, especially Willie Nelson. Included in the Willie materials are numerous tapes and transcripts of interviews Shrake and others did with Nelson and his acquaintances. Also included are clipping files on Nelson and country music going back to 1978 (when Shrake was writing the Songwriter screenplay), and many files of corrected draft fragments. Notably, the opposite is true for the Barry Switzer book, Bootlegger’s Boy—no research files are present in the papers, except for some clippings on Switzer gathered post-publication. The sub-series Harvey Penick Books contains drafts for all five Penick/Shrake books, plus research on Penick and golf, interviews, contracts, photographs, and all kinds of marketing materials. As with the files on Willie Nelson, the Harvey Penick files are ample with biographical information on their subject and insight into their subject’s craft.