John Lucas's engagement with writers has been wide-ranging in both professional and personal capacities and his papers do not fall into discrete categories. In the absence of a discernible order, the archive has been arranged according to its subject and origin. There are papers relating to literary figures with whom Lucas has had a personal connection and papers explicitly generated by his publishing house, Shoestring Press. In 2002/2003 some of the collection was indexed and the resulting references are noted in the catalogue. The collection is organised as follows:
- JLC/1 G. S. Fraser
- JLC/2 Douglas Garman
- JLC/3 John Lucas
- JLC/4 Stanley Middleton
- JLC/5 Hilda Morley
- JLC/6 Arnold Rattenbury
- JLC/7 Peter Russell
- JLC/8 Shoestring Press