Denis Johnston (1901-1984) was a playwright born in Dublin, educated in Dublin, Edinburgh and Cambridge, where he studied law. He practised law for ten years. In his life time he was primarily a playwright but also a director, war correspondent, broadcaster and later Director of Programmes at the BBC. Johnston gave the University of Ulster a collection of his papers, manuscripts and typescripts, including a large number of broadcast scripts for the BBC. The Collection also includes autobiographical material and his war correspondent's field notebooks.
The Denis Johnston Collection at the Ulster University consists of Johnston's papers, recordings and radio and television scripts. The notebooks in this collection cover his period as war correspondent from 1942 to 1945.
There are about 100 typescripts of talks for radio and about 20 television scripts. The recordings are held on record and video-tape. There are a number of volumes of press cuttings and scripts of radio and television adaptions of plays. There are also microfilm diaries covering 1917-1939.
There is an itemised handlist for this collection which may be consulted in the Library..
![MS11/23 - Eire. Constitution. Draft. Dublin: Published by the Stationery Office: Printed by Cahill & Co., [1937] Annotated by T.F. O’Rahilly. MS. Inscription by Éamon de Valera Thanking O’Rahilly for his Assistance](/sites/default/files/styles/media_crop/public/2018-04/MS11-23.jpg?itok=P7V_xvTZ)
