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SIAE HISTORICAL ARCHIVES

The Historical Archives of SIAE, held by the Burcardo Library, are made of about 2,600 documents, divided into five sections:

1. authors' and publishers' applications for membership
2. submission forms related to plays or musical and literary works
3. correspondence of Italian and foreign authors with SIAE
4. contracts for translation or performing rights of plays written by Italian and foreign authors
5. minutes of meetings of SIAE boards and of international conferences

The Archives were created to rescue documents presenting a high historical or cultural value from the common wear and tear which is the destiny of office papers. In gathering these documents, two criteria were followed: the age of the document and the importance of the authors, of the work or of the document's signee.  It is an open archive, containing recent documents together with papers of historical value, and open for future additions. The importance of the authors or signees depending on a subjective judgement, this criterium was applied as largely as possible to avoid the risk of arbitrarious choices. Therefore, documents signed by important artists like D'Annunzio, France, Brecht, Gor'kij and Hoffmansthal, are gathered together with documents related to authors and works of minor importance, sometimes forgotten by the contemporary audience.

In conclusion, the Historical Archives of SIAE are a first choice of documents coming from SIAE Headquarters and considered important for the history of literature, theatre and music since the end of the Nineteenth Century. New reserches could bring to light other documents of different kind; for instance, personal papers, curricula, photos and most of all, playtexts and promptbooks currently stored in the archives of the Theatre Section of SIAE; at present, these documents are under rearrangement.

 

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Latest update: 07-06-07