George Orwell’s archives offer an invaluable insight into one of the most influential British writers of the 20th century, shedding light on how he produced his most memorable books, his sensitivity to criticism and his fear that legal threats could ruin his work. Now the treasure trove that is the extensive archive of correspondence and contracts amassed by Orwell’s original publisher, Victor Gollancz, could be thrown to the wind in what has been described as an act of “cultural vandalism”.

Crucial correspondence regarding the Nineteen hundred and eighty-four author and Observer The correspondent is being offered for sale on the open market after the publisher’s parent company decided to sell the archive in 2018 because the warehouse was closing.

Richard Blair, 80 – whose father Eric Blair wrote under the pseudonym George Orwell – is devastated by the loss: “It is terribly sad … Once the Gollancz material is acquired by private collectors it may disappear into the ether forever.”

For £75,000, Peter Harrington, a leading antiquarian, is currently offering Gollancz articles relating to Orwell’s second novel, The daughter of a clergymanThey include his original contract, a letter of corrections, and a 1934 report by Gerald Gould – then fiction editor of the Observer and a reader of the Gollancz manuscript – who indicated that it should be published.

Harrington also sells letters for £50,000 relating to Orwell’s third novel, Keep the Aspidistra flyingwhich shows that concerns about libel led to significant changes in the final text. In 1936, upset by Gollancz’s desired changes, Orwell wrote that he would nevertheless do what he could to satisfy his publisher’s demands – “short of ruining the book altogether”.

For £35,000 Jonkers Rare Books, another leading bookseller, is selling articles on The Road to Wigan PierOrwell’s classic study of industrial poverty in the north of England. It includes a long letter to Gollancz in which he denies that he is a middle-class snob, asks him to intervene, and threatens legal action against his opponents.

Documents related to The daughter of a clergyman include Orwell’s letter making it clear that none of the characters could be linked to living persons. Correspondence about Animal farm records Gollancz’s famous rejection of the classic anti-totalitarian fable first published in 1945, because of the pro-Soviet political climate created by World War II. Orwell wrote: “I must tell you that I think it is quite politically unacceptable from your point of view (it is anti-Stalin).” Gollancz initially disagreed with the idea that he was bound to the Stalinist line, but after reading the manuscript, he wrote on April 4, 1944: “You were right and I was wrong. I am so sorry. I have returned the manuscript.”

Victor Gollancz founded one of the most influential publishing houses of the 20th century. The company was acquired by the Orion Group, which became part of Hachette, owned by the French multinational Lagardère.

Rick Gekoski, a leading antiquarian bookseller, was asked to destroy the archive, which included correspondence with Kingsley Amis and Daphne du Maurier and other Gollancz authors. Last week he dismissed criticism of the destruction as “misguided”, saying: “The whole thing was approved by Malcolm Edwards, the publishing director of Orion, and it was sold at the request of the board of directors.” In Gekoski’s 2021 book Guarded by dragonshe wrote: “No one on Orion’s board cared where they went, or to whom.”

He remembered a warehouse filled with tens of thousands of books and dozens of filing cabinets – “rusty and dusty, crammed with all the production, editorial and rights files of Gollancz Publishing, the vast majority of which had remained unopened for perhaps 50 years.”

After trying unsuccessfully to sell the entire archive to various institutions for around £1 million, it was distributed among dozens of dealers, private collectors and libraries: “All the board asked us to do was throw away as much material as possible… and the rest… had to be thrown away.”

Jean Seaton, director of the Orwell Foundation, said: “The reason no one opened those filing cabinets for 50 years was because they were idiots and didn’t understand the value of the archive. Why didn’t their board consult experts and historians who would have understood that they might have to make some money from it, but who would have understood its real public value? Instead they dispersed a national archive.”

Orwell biographer DJ Taylor recalled that when he and the Orwell Foundation discovered that the Gollancz archive was being sold, they tried to raise money: “We couldn’t do that, because these were very valuable documents. Of course, we were afraid that the archive would just be sold off piecemeal.”

He added that the publisher had always been “amateurish” with its “incredibly valuable” archive. He recalled the lax security when he was working on his first Orwell book 23 years ago. “I remember going into the office once and they said, ‘Oh, where’s it gone?’ A box of Orwell’s letters to Victor Gollancz had just disappeared somewhere in the building,” he said.

Bill Hamilton, literary agent at AM Heath and executor of Orwell’s estate, said: “Archiving literary material is just not something that commercial publishers specifically think about, which is rather ironic.”

He noted that most authors today are “very aware of the role their archive plays in their literary heritage.” Wolf’s Hall For example, author Hilary Mantel sent her documents to the Huntington Library in America.

Liz Thomson, who covered the book trade for 35 years, described the sale as “cultural vandalism”: “Britain’s cultural heritage has been sold cheaply through second-hand booksellers… What hope is there for future biographers and historians?”

She pointed out Gollancz’s Animal farm correspondence – sold by Jonkers for an asking price of £100,000 – including Orwell’s 1944 letter describing it as “a little fairy tale… with a political meaning” and the publisher’s rejection. “Gollancz refused to publish the novel because he was afraid it would upset Anglo-Soviet relations… The archive is priceless,” Thomson said.

The publisher’s disposition stands in contrast to Richard Blair’s efforts to maintain an archive of the writer’s correspondence. In 2021, he purchased 50 letters so he could donate them to the Orwell Archive at University College London, fearing they would otherwise have ended up on the market and “never be seen again.”

Pom Harrington, son of Harrington’s founder, said: “Of course it would be great if institutions could acquire these unique materials. It’s not reasonable for them to expect to get it.” Christiaan Jonkers, founder of Jonkers Rare Books, said: “There wouldn’t be nearly as much of this kind of material available if people like us didn’t facilitate the process. Even something as monumental as this Orwell archive could simply be thrown away if it didn’t come onto the market.”

Hachette declined to comment.