Editing T. E. Lawrence (section)

==Writings==
{{further|English translations of Homer#Lawrence}}

Lawrence was a prolific writer throughout his life, a large portion of which was [[wikt:epistolary|epistolary]]; he often sent several letters a day, and a number of collections of his letters have been published. He corresponded with many notable figures, including [[George Bernard Shaw]], [[Edward Elgar]], Winston Churchill, Robert Graves, [[Noël Coward]], E. M. Forster, [[Siegfried Sassoon]], [[John Buchan, 1st Baron Tweedsmuir|John Buchan]], [[Augustus John]], and [[Henry Williamson]].{{sfn|Mack|1976|p=327}} He met [[Joseph Conrad]] and commented perceptively on his works. Lawrence sent many letters to Shaw's wife, [[Charlotte Payne-Townshend|Charlotte]].<ref name="C-Shaw-Letters">{{cite book|author= T. E. Lawrence| title= Correspondence with Bernard and Charlotte Shaw, 1922–1926 | volume= 1 |editor=Jeremy and Nicole Wilson |publisher= Castle Hill Press|year=2000}} Foreword by Jeremy Wilson.</ref>

Lawrence was a competent speaker of French and Arabic, and reader of Latin and [[Ancient Greek]].{{sfn|Korda|2010|p=137}} Lawrence published three major texts in his lifetime. The most significant was his account of the Arab Revolt in ''Seven Pillars of Wisdom''.{{sfn|Mack|1976|p=246}} [[Homer]]'s ''[[Odyssey]]'' and [[The Forest Giant (book)|''The Forest Giant'']] were translations, the latter an otherwise forgotten work of French fiction.{{sfn|Mack|1976|pp=319, 332}} He received a flat fee for the second translation, and negotiated a generous fee plus royalties for the first.{{sfn|Orlans|2002|p=132}}

===''Seven Pillars of Wisdom''===
{{main|Seven Pillars of Wisdom}}
[[File:Thomas Edward Lawrence-London Barton St.JPG|thumb|upright|left|14 [[Barton Street and Cowley Street, Westminster|Barton Street, Westminster]], London, where Lawrence lived while writing ''Seven Pillars'']]

Lawrence's major work is ''[[Seven Pillars of Wisdom]]'', an account of his war experiences. In 1919, he was elected to a seven-year research fellowship at [[All Souls College, Oxford]], providing him with support while he worked on the book.{{sfn|Wilson|1989|p=616}} Certain parts of the book also serve as essays on military strategy, Arabian culture and geography, and other topics. He rewrote ''Seven Pillars of Wisdom'' three times, once "blind" after he lost the manuscript.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/found-lawrence-of-arabias-lost-text-1266823.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220526/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/found-lawrence-of-arabias-lost-text-1266823.html |archive-date=26 May 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|title=Found: Lawrence of Arabia's lost text|date=13 April 1997|work=The Independent|access-date=18 January 2020}}</ref>

There are many alleged "embellishments" in ''Seven Pillars'', though some allegations have been disproved with time, most definitively in Jeremy Wilson's [[Lawrence of Arabia: The Authorised Biography of T. E. Lawrence|authorised biography]].{{sfn|Wilson|1989|p=4}} However, Lawrence's own notebooks refute his claim to have crossed the [[Sinai Peninsula]] from Aqaba to the Suez Canal in just 49 hours without any sleep. In reality, this famous camel ride lasted for more than 70 hours and was interrupted by two long breaks for sleeping, which Lawrence omitted when he wrote his book.{{sfn|Asher|1998|p=259}}

In the preface, Lawrence acknowledged George Bernard Shaw's help in editing the book. The first edition was published in 1926 as a high-priced private subscription edition, printed in London by [[Herbert John Hodgson]] and Roy Manning Pike, with illustrations by [[Eric Kennington]], Augustus John, [[Paul Nash (artist)|Paul Nash]], [[Blair Hughes-Stanton]],{{sfn|Wilson|1989|pp=759, 770}} and Hughes-Stanton's wife [[Gertrude Hermes]]. Lawrence was afraid that the public would think that he would make a substantial income from the book, and he stated that it was written as a result of his war service. He vowed not to take any money from it, and indeed he did not, as the sale price was one third of the production costs,{{sfn|Graves|1928|loc=chpt. 30}} leaving him in substantial debt.{{sfn|Mack|1976|p=323}} He always took care not to give the impression that he had profited economically from the Arab revolt. In a 'deleted chapter' of the ''Seven Pillars'' which reappeared in 2022, Lawrence wrote:

{{blockquote|For my work on the Arab front I had determined to accept nothing. The cabinet raised the Arabs to fight for us by definite promises of self-government afterwards. Arabs believe in persons, not in institutions. They saw in me a free agent of the British government, and demanded from me an endorsement of its written promises. So I had to join the conspiracy, and, for what my word was worth, assured the men of their reward. In our two years' partnership under fire they grew accustomed to believing me and to think my government, like myself, sincere. In this hope they performed some fine things but, of course, instead of being proud of what we did together, I was continually and bitterly ashamed.<ref>{{Cite news |title=Revealed: T.E. Lawrence felt 'bitter shame' over UK's false promises of Arab self-rule |last=Barnett |first=David |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/oct/30/revealed-te-lawrence-felt-bitter-shame-over-uks-false-promises-of-arab-self-rule |work=The Guardian |date=30 October 2022 |access-date=2 November 2022}}</ref>}}

As a specialist in the Middle East, [[Fred Halliday]] praised Lawrence's ''Seven Pillars of Wisdom'' as a "fine work of prose" but described its relevance to the study of Arab history and society as "almost worthless."<ref>Halliday, ''100 Myths About the Middle East'', 2005, p. 147, {{ISBN|0-86356-529-8}}.</ref>

[[Stanford University|Stanford]] historian [[Priya Satia]] observes that ''Seven Pillars'' presents the Middle East with a broadly positive, yet 'Orientalist' perspective. Lawrence's romanticised and vivid depictions transformed him into a sought-after symbol of Britain's leadership and goodwill in the Middle East. This occurred during a time when Britain's global influence was waning, and the nation was grappling with the aftermath of the First World War. Therefore, his "...books evoked a vision of redemption from the troubled spirit of the age" and offered a "reassurance of continuity" with Britain's triumphant history.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Satia |first=Priya |title=Spies in Arabia: The Great War and the Cultural Foundations of Britain's Covert Empire in the Middle East |date=Apr 2008 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |location=Oxford |pages=190–203}}</ref>

===''Revolt in the Desert''===
''[[Revolt in the Desert]]'' was an abridged version of ''Seven Pillars'' that he began in 1926 and that was published in March 1927 in both limited and trade editions.<ref>''Grand Strategies; Literature, Statecraft, and World Order'', Yale University Press, 2010, p. 8.</ref> He undertook a needed but reluctant publicity exercise, which resulted in a best-seller. Again he vowed not to take any fees from the publication, partly to appease the subscribers to ''Seven Pillars'' who had paid dearly for their editions. By the fourth reprint in 1927, the debt from ''Seven Pillars'' was paid off.{{sfn|Wilson|1989|p=786}} As Lawrence left for military service in India at the end of 1926, he set up the "Seven Pillars Trust" with his friend D. G. Hogarth as a trustee, in which he made over the copyright and any surplus income of ''Revolt in the Desert''. He later told Hogarth that he had "made the Trust final, to save myself the temptation of reviewing it, if ''Revolt'' turned out a best seller."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.telstudies.org/writings/letters/1927/270407_hogarth.shtml|title=T.E. Lawrence to D. G. Hogarth|date=7 April 1927|publisher=T. E. Lawrence Society|access-date=19 January 2020|archive-date=3 August 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190803170754/http://www.telstudies.org/writings/letters/1927/270407_hogarth.shtml|url-status=dead}}</ref>

The resultant trust paid off the debt, and Lawrence then invoked a clause in his publishing contract to halt publication of the abridgement in the United Kingdom. However, he allowed both American editions and translations, which resulted in a substantial flow of income.{{sfn|Wilson|1989|p=786}} The trust paid income either into an educational fund for children of RAF officers who lost their lives or were invalided as a result of service, or more substantially into the [[RAF Benevolent Fund]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ICT5DQAAQBAJ&pg=PT96|title=T.E. Lawrence: Tormented Hero|first= Andrew|last= Norman|publisher=Fonthill Media |year=2014|isbn=978-1781550199}}</ref>

===Posthumous===
Lawrence left ''[[The Mint (book)|The Mint]]'' unpublished,<ref>Doubleday, Doran & Co, New York, 1936; rprnt Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1984 {{ISBN|0-14-004505-8}}</ref> a memoir of his experiences as an enlisted man in the Royal Air Force (RAF). For this, he worked from a notebook that he kept while enlisted, writing of the daily lives of enlisted men and his desire to be a part of something larger than himself.{{sfn|Wilson|1989|p=810}} The book is stylistically different from ''Seven Pillars of Wisdom'', using sparse prose as opposed to the complicated syntax found in ''Seven Pillars''. It was published posthumously, edited by his brother [[A. W. Lawrence|Arnold]].<ref>{{cite book|title=The Mint, by 352087 A/c Ross A Day-book of the R.A.F. Depot between August and December 1922|first=T. E.|last=Lawrence|publisher=Jonathan Cape|year=1955}}</ref>

After Lawrence's death, Arnold Lawrence inherited Lawrence's estate and his copyrights as the sole beneficiary. To pay the inheritance tax, he sold the US copyright of ''Seven Pillars of Wisdom'' (subscribers' text) outright to [[Doubleday (publisher)|Doubleday Doran]] in 1935.{{sfn|Orlans|2002|p=134}} Doubleday controlled publication rights of this version of the text of ''Seven Pillars of Wisdom'' in the US until the copyright expired at the end of 2022 (publication plus 95 years). In 1936, A. W. Lawrence split the remaining assets of the estate, giving Clouds Hill and many copies of less substantial or historical letters to the [[National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty|National Trust]], and then set up two trusts to control interests in his brother's residual copyrights.<ref name=SPOWF>{{cite web |title=Seven Pillars of Wisdom Fund |url=https://research.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database/term_details.aspx?bioId=92933 |website=Research.britishmuseum.org |publisher=British Museum |access-date=19 January 2020}}</ref> He assigned the copyright in ''Seven Pillars of Wisdom'' to the Seven Pillars of Wisdom Trust,<ref>{{EW charity |208669|Seven Pillars Of Wisdom Trust}}</ref> and it was given its first general publication as a result.{{sfn|Orlans|2002|p=133}} He assigned the copyright in ''The Mint'' and all Lawrence's letters to the Letters and Symposium Trust,{{sfn|Orlans|2002|p=134}} which he edited and published in the book ''T. E. Lawrence by his Friends'' in 1937. The work contained recollections and reminiscences by a large number of Lawrence's friends and colleagues.{{sfn|Orlans|2002|p=134}}

A substantial amount of income went directly to the RAF Benevolent Fund and to archaeological, environmental, and academic projects.{{sfn|Wilson|1989|p=774}} The two trusts were amalgamated in 1986, and the unified trust acquired all the remaining rights to Lawrence's works that it had not owned on the death of A. W. Lawrence in 1991, plus rights to all of A. W. Lawrence's works.<ref name=SPOWF/> The UK copyrights on Lawrence's works published in his lifetime and within 20 years of his death expired on 1 January 2006. Works published more than 20 years after his death were protected for 50 years from publication or to 1 January 2040, whichever is earlier.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.telstudies.org/writings/tel_uk_copyright.shtml |title=British copyright law and T.E. Lawrence's writings |publisher=T.E. Lawrence Society |access-date=19 January 2020 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191205094137/http://www.telstudies.org/writings/tel_uk_copyright.shtml |archive-date=5 December 2019}}</ref>