Rediscovering British literature

The ongoing show at the Mu Xin Art Museum in Wuzhen, Zhejiang province, features manuscripts of such well-known British writers as George Byron, Oscar Wilde, Virginia Woolf and Charles Lamb. [Photo provided to China Daily]

The second draft of playwright Wilde's Lady Windermere's Fan is also on show. It's typewritten and Wilde made some amendments and changes with pencil on the actors' lines and the stage directions.

"The process of writing for Wilde is not a lonely one," Ault says. "From his scripts, we can see that he collaborated with theater managers and actors to make changes."

Wang Anyi, a well-known Chinese writer, says that although in the information age many young writers have no scripts since they uses computers, she still writes in hand on paper.

She says correcting each word and seeing the corrections is a process for her to improve on her stories.

She says after visiting the exhibition, she was impressed by Woolf's "clear and tidy" scripts.

"Mine are a little bit messy. I really admire the clean ones," says Wang.

The manuscripts show at the Mu Xin Art Museum will run until Jan 14. After that, the British Library will take its show to Hong Kong and then Shanghai.

Kristian Jensen, head of Collections and Curation at the British Library, says that in order to cater to different audiences, they choose public and private museums to work in partnership with.

And, he adds that besides introducing British literature to China, next year the British Museum will hold a "China Year" in London to introduce Chinese literature to the British public.