The Writings series (34 linear feet) is the largest series in the collection. It consists mainly of manuscripts and production materials for Piercy's poetry and novels, but it also contains other material related to her writing, notably files of background research and correspondence with publishers. The series is divided into five subseries: Poetry, Novels, Short Stories, Plays, and Essays and Non-fiction. In addition to works solely by Piercy are collaborations, most of them with her husband, Ira Wood. Piercy has always preferred typing over longhand, so almost no handwritten material exists, save for corrections to manuscripts and proofs.
The Poetry subseries consists of two subsubseries: Books and Single Poems. The Books subsubseries includes materials from Piercy's published books of poetry and is organized alphabetically by title. (The Novels subseries is arranged in much the same way, so the two categories will be discussed together further below.) Single Poems consists of various drafts of Piercy's individual poems. They are arranged alphabetically by poem title. An attempt has been made to place poems that have undergone title changes under the most recent title, but some exceptions may occur. Untitled poems and poems that may be fragments are grouped at the end of the section. Some overlap may occur between Single Poems and early drafts within the Books section.
Within the Novels subseries and the Books portion of the Poetry subseries, the general arrangement is as follows. Each title is divided into groupings of Notes or Research Files; Drafts, which include rough outlines and individual sections through to final, complete manuscripts; and Production Materials. Production Materials generally are comprised of a setting copy of the manuscript (also known as a printer's copy, but here referred to throughout as a setting copy) and various page proofs and galleys. Sometimes small amounts of related material are present as well, such as correspondence with editors and publishers or book reviews.
Notes or Research Files include background research for Piercy's novels, clippings, and occasionally brief outlines of her work (more so for her novels than for her books of poetry). A striking feature of the collection is the extent and detail of Piercy's research into physical settings and character's backgrounds. This facet is evidenced throughout the Writings series, most notably in the Writings and the Plays subseries.
Piercy has long relied on databases to store and organize her notes. Many of the research files appear to be printouts from either her own databases or a larger external database. Some of Piercy's earlier notes are typed onto notched cards from a database system, the General Practitioner, which Piercy herself modified and promoted. Additionally, it appears that Piercy has in some cases contracted outside researchers to aid in her research--as, for example, in the Third Child files. Frequently, the intended order of the research files is unclear, and they have thus been minimally processed.
Within the Drafts section, in many cases the arrangement and order of drafts was originally unclear. Early, partial drafts have frequently been grouped by the processor under the heading "Section Drafts," since they appear to be a result of Piercy's practice of writing first by sections (the sections being divided according to the separate characters in her novels), before arranging these sections together into a complete draft. Working titles, when known, for drafts at various stages are included in the arrangement scheme.
In the novel Small Changes, the character "Miriam" is based on a character from Maud Awake, an early, unpublished novel. Piercy had difficulty getting this novel published and eventually used portions of it in two later novels, most of it in Small Changes (1973) and some of it in Braided Lives (1982). Small amounts of information about this novel, and other works, are interspersed throughout the collection. Most such information was gleaned through correspondence or conversations between Piercy and collection curators.
The Short Stories subseries features the few short stories Piercy has written, arranged alphabetically by title.
The Plays subseries currently contains only one play, the collaboration with Ira Wood entitled The Last White Class: A Play about Neighborhood Terror (1979). This work has an unusual arrangement, and little has been done to change its original order. The "Initial Processor's Notes," written by a previous archival processor, offer an extensive description of the contents of these files. Folders have been assigned a number, with each number keyed to an entry in the Initial Processor's Notes. In general, the files are similar to those found in the "Novels" section, with an assortment of background materials (handwritten and typed notes, database entries, clippings, and pamphlets) and drafts in various stages, but also with elements unique to drama such as staging notes and group planning sessions.
Essays and Non-fiction consists of book-length works and shorter pieces by Piercy, including some collaborations. They are arranged alphabetically by title. Some highlights of this subseries are files for her database manual, The General Practitioner (co-written with her second husband, Robert Shapiro) and her memoir, Sleeping with Cats.
The General Practitioner is a guide to the eponymous database, a mechanical "edgenotched," numerically coded card system (as distinct from machine-readable IBM punch cards). It was designed by computing expert Anatol Holt and modified by Robert Shapiro and Marge Piercy. Both of them used the database extensively in their private and professional lives. Piercy was active in encouraging and training her friends and colleagues to use the system. Piercy and Shapiro had hoped through their manual to further explain and popularize the system, but the work never found a publisher. At the end of these files is related material which appears to be connected with the General Practitioner database system.
In Piercy's autobiography Sleeping with Cats (2002), she revisits significant events of her emotional life and her literary career. Researchers searching for a more intimate view of Piercy than this archive affords would do well to read this memoir. Included here are drafts and production materials. Drafts come in early partial versions (given the label "Various Drafts") and complete versions. Within the Various Drafts section, draft stage is unclear: some chapters appear to be early drafts, which can often be found later in expanded form within the same folder or in other folders; others are incomplete, with pages missing. In each folder, chapters have been left in their original order.
Also of interest is the writer's guide So You Want to Write: How to Master the Craft of Writing Fiction and the Personal Narrative, co-written with Ira Wood; unfortunately, very little manuscript material for this work is present. As concerns Piercy's shorter pieces, the researcher may find some overlap between this subseries and the "Speeches and Public Engagements" files in the Personal series. The few untitled or fragmented works are grouped at the end of this subseries.