‘LITERARY ASSETS OF THE LATE BARONESS ORCZY’: Manuscript Probate Valuation of the Popular Novelist’s Published Writings including Details of Royalties, Broadcasts & Translation Rights

Formal manuscript valuation of the literary properties of the late Hungarian-British novelist known as Baroness Orczy, creator of the Scarlet Pimpernel. This reveals a thriving set of sales in the British market, the interest in Orczy seemingly waning in the USA but vigourous activity in the European market, especially Germany. The manuscript comes from the archive of the literary agents A P Watt.

DESCRIPTION: The manuscript is housed in a buff folder titled by hand: ‘Baroness Orczy’. Written on lined paper with red printed columns for figures. The first page which comes at the beginning of a loose 5 page bifolium lists Orczy’s British publishers from ‘Hodder Stoughton’ to ‘University of L[ondon] Press’ as well as details of broadcasting and translations which reach a preliminary total of £1270.4.10, followed by a list of royalties paid from her publishers over the previous two years. This is succeeded by 20 pages detailing the situation across Orczy’s international publishers, listing holders of publishing rights and, where appropriate, figures owned: Bertelsmann in Germany owed her estate the enormous sum of £1128 in 1947!

Accompanied by a typed letter from 6 July 1948 by K Ewart of 52 Bedford Square, London, stating that he has valued ‘the literary assets of the late Baroness Orczy’ with further handwritten calculations. A second set of letters from 1969 relate the valuation of the estate of Orczy’s only child, John Montague Orczy-Barstow, overseen by Gerald le-Blount Kidd.