is submitted to the Archive of The University of Victoria can never be un-submitted. Perhaps Mary Butts had known, in some part of her brain, that her “Dear Douglas” would one day outlive her. Perhaps she had finely crafted one, some, all of her letters in such a way to finely reflect the human condition - “as found in the turn of the century!” - and then sent them off hoping on hope that they would not only be preserved but donated to a museum as proof of a life lived. Every instance of asking for money, every snide remark, every reference to opium carefully masked by sickness, and even the godawful handwriting could very well be Mary reaching through time and inviting us back home with her. It could - and it couldn’t. Because Mary Butts is very much dead and her letters are very much intact they exist in a state of equal consent and non-consent. Perhaps she would have welcomed her letters being entered into an archive but turned her nose up at their transcription to online spaces. Would she have been fine with some letters but rather we burn others? Would she have preened or howled at the thought of a gaggle of students creating art around her, digging into her, making assumptions about her?
