Catalog 116, Letters, F-K
457. GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ, Gabriel. Typed Letter. c. 1950. One full-page, single-spaced letter, signed in type, "gabito," with García Márquez's holograph annotation across the top. A closely written letter by the Nobel Prize winner, five years before his first published book, and in which he makes explicit reference to a number of characters and situations that later appear in his masterpiece, One Hundred Years of Solitude. His writing style shows evidence of the influence of Faulkner and Joyce, and he forgoes punctuation, writing the letter in stream-of-consciousness style as a single long sentence, an approach he later used in his 1975 novel Autumn of the Patriarch. García Márquez is one of the most private and reclusive of Nobel Prize winners. A celebrity in his native Colombia, he has taken pains to keep his private life and his manuscript writings out of the public arena. We have never seen as substantive a letter as this appear on the market, let alone one that qualifies as a literary manuscript, foreshadowing the author's later work, nor one as early as this: the author was 22 years old when he wrote it. An exceptional example of the unknown writer developing the themes that led to his greatness. Previously folded and possibly torn, now sealed.
458. GASS, William. Typed Note Signed. December 19, 1971. Three paragraphs, in which Gass declines to write a book review or article of criticism as his novel "has dragged on too long while I blabbed about other books in newspapers and magazines...I'm sorry to say no, even if saying no makes me feel a little like the old whore who has at last managed to repulse one advance - both foolish and virtuous." Signed by the author. Typed on blue ribbon; folded for mailing; else fine.
459. GASS, William. Typed Note Signed. April 23, 1972. Gass thanks his recipient for passing along a valentine from a reader and looks beyond the present time wherein "Teaching has really consumed me...quite unwillingly" to the summer when "some present scraps, plans, and puddles may complete themselves..." Signed by the author. Folded for mailing, else fine.
460. GORDON, Mary. Typed Note Signed. August 27, 1980. An interesting note to another writer, commenting on his recent novel, which she has just read, and mentioning her own situation -- finishing up The Company of Women, writing an article on J.F. Powers, starting a new novel "so that I can get back to it after the baby is born...I feel I'm about to disappear into a welter of fecundity and maternal stupidity..." Near fine.
461. HAYES, Helen. Typed Letters Signed. July 7, 1989 and September 16, 1989. Two letters written to the editor of Art & Antiques magazine, each expressing interest in being a contributor and offering her telephone number by way of contact. The need for the second letter is perhaps explained by a third party letter of August 8, also to the editor, and included here: "Have you touched base with Helen Hayes? She wrote to me that she was exhausted, so she was going off to Ireland..." In September, Hayes writes: "I think, after the middle of October, I have freedom ahead... I'd like very much to be in your magazine. I think it is beautiful." Hayes was one of the most honored actresses of her time, with her awards ranging from an Academy Award, an Emmy and a Grammy to being voted Woman of the Year on multiple occasions by various organizations. Both of her letters folded in half for mailing; else fine. Mailing envelopes included.
462. HERBST, Josephine. Typed Letter Signed. (date missing, probably the early 1940s). One dense page, mostly reactions and insights brought on from having gone through an attic and the letters and papers therein from twenty years before. Herbst had been an aspiring young expatriate writer in Paris and Berlin in the years following World War I, had had an affair with noted playwright Maxwell Anderson, whom she alludes to in the letter (finding "a whole stack of poems too, written on paper napkins where we used to go to breakfast from a man famous only for plays"). She later adopted the left wing causes of the 1930s, traveling to Spain in 1937 to report on the Civil War there, as had Ernest Hemingway. After her divorce in 1940, she became a recluse at her home in Erwinna, Pennsylvania, but later returned to New York, where this letter was written, and began writing again, gaining a new circle of admirers. She won a grant from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1966, culminating nearly a half century of writing. Acidic paper browned and edge-chipped, splitting at the folds; good only, and fragile. With a number of holograph pencil emendations and annotations.
463. HOFFMAN, Abbie. Autograph Letter Signed. Seven sheets, 4½" x 7". No date, circa 1970. Written to John Wilcock, editor of Other Scenes magazine, and columnist for Penthouse. Hoffman begins politely, assuring Wilcock that, with regard to Hoffman's recent book, Steal This Book, both Wilcock's magazine and "all underground papers... can reprint the whole thing if they want." He then goes on to mention that he was "peeved at 2 things" -- one having to do with not being credited in Wilcock's column and the second, clearly a sore point, about Hoffman "assembling" rather than "writing" the book, implying that he ripped off the contents from others and now he was standing to make the money and claim the glory for others' work. Hoffman is livid about this. He says, "First off I wrote the book. Make no mistake about it... I spent 50 times the amount of work, etc than I did on both my previous books." And he goes on to take even greater exception to the inference that he was making money off his celebrity: he defends his revolutionary credentials, talking about the "penthouse" he lives in as being "neat cause Anita & I fixed it up by ourselves [and] is nothing more than a 3 room railroad flat that rents for $135 on one of the toughest blocks of the Lower East Side." And with regard to his supposed wealth -- an accusation frequently leveled at him because of his celebrity and his penchant for the media spotlight -- Hoffman cites chapter and verse of where his money has gone: "I recently lost $25,000 (plus taxes) on Dharuba's (NY 21) bail when he fled to Algeria. In fact last year, I probably lost more on bail than any other individual in the country. Then there was the huge expense of our trial & appeal. Then $2000 to John Sinclair, $5,000 for Yippis [sic] Algerian trip, $1,000 to Mother-Fuckers, $3,500 to start Movement Speakers Bureau, $7,500 for Yippie stuff, about $10,000 to groups that I care not to mention, WPAX radio to South-East Asia has already cost $6,000 all but $50 has come out of my book royalties. & well you get the point..." He goes on to mention that "Anita & I really try to live by the BOOK - Steal this Book, that is..." and says that "last year including the Chicago Trial expenses" he gave away over $100,000 -- inadvertently confirming the point that was often made, that financially he was in another class than most of his fellow revolutionaries, even if that didn't make him a hypocrite and he gave most of the money away. The letter concludes on a bitter note: "I really resented your implications & just file it in the memory of back jabs that inevitable [sic] pile up in a bullshit movement." An outstanding, revealing letter by the most high-profile figure of the counterculture, a founder of the Yippies, and later an underground social activist and, eventually, a suicide -- one of the emblematic figures of an era. One edge of pages rough, where the sheets were torn from a notebook, otherwise fine. Together with mailing envelope and a letter from Wilcock, apparently responding to this.
464. IGNATOW, David. Typed Note Signed. September 14, 1978. To the editors at FSG: "I'm taking the liberty of submitting to you a ms. of short stories, not mine, that I think is worthy of consideration for publication..." The author on whose behalf Ignatow is writing is unnamed, although he does add that Grace Paley is interested in writing an introduction. One corner staple; editorial "logged in" remarks; folded in thirds; and typed on a machine that made only partial "o's." Near fine.
465. JHABVALA, Ruth Prawer. Typed Note Signed. October, 1967. Written to her agent, and directing him to forward all future payment to her nephew's account. Signed three times as "Ruth," "Ruth Jhabvala" and "R. Prawer Jhabvala," either to cover all legal bases or to "initial" figures that appear to the left of her signatures. Also included is a typed note signed from Roger Angell, dated June 1967 and written on New Yorker stationery, forwarding payment to her agent. With three unendorsed checks from the agent to Jhabvala; a retained copy of the letter from the agent to the nephew forwarding the checks as instructed; and a letter from the nephew to the agent acknowledging receipt. There is accounting in the margins of both Jhabvala's and Angell's letters; the checks have the memo field torn off; the lot is about near fine. Together with a contract (unsigned) and three supporting letters (none from Jhabvala) from 1962, arranging for the reprinting of quotes from a 1957 New Yorker interview with Jhabvala in the book The Age of the Manager. Also together with Library of Congress Agreements, unsigned, from 1964, arranging for two of Jhabvala's works to be transcribed into Braille and tape-recorded; and also together with an undated, unsigned agreement from Harper's Bazaar to purchase "Light and Reason." Folded; else fine. For all:
466. KAZAN, Elia. Typed Letter Signed. June 9, 1989. Written to an editor at Art & Antiques magazine, declining to write an article on rugs. In part: "At the moment I'm just too busy writing a novel, right smack in the middle of it, and can't think of anything else since I'm also preparing a long film which necessitates my going on location to Greece, Turkey and France." Kazan received an honorary Oscar in 1999 for lifetime achievement in film directing, an honor met with protest over his having named eight friends as Communists in 1952 when testifying before the House Un-American Activities Committee. On personal stationery, 7 1/4" x 10 1/2". Folded in thirds for mailing; two small smudges where corrections have been made to the text; else fine. Envelope included.
467. KAZIN, Alfred. Correspondence. 1984-1985, 1991. Seven typed notes signed, six from the period 1984-1985, one from 1991, all to an editor at Art & Antiques magazine. For the most part, these are brief, one-sided parleys in a charmingly cantankerous tone, e.g.: "I have to say I like you better than I like yr mag. I have carefully measured the bed in that page photograph of the Roosevelt house and what with the various Victorian bric a brac it comes to 276 inches longer than my poor piece, which has so much interior decorating added to it that it should have been signed by Emily Post..." One note is signed "Isaac," a joke on an earlier barb on Isaac Bashevis Singer having been misidentified in the magazine. Envelopes are included; other than mailing folds, the lot is fine.
468. KENNEDY, William. Typed Note Signed. January 18, 1984. A brief note declining to write a piece on Walter Launt Palmer, as Kennedy is "physically unable to take on one more assignment." Folded in thirds for mailing; else fine.
469. KENNEDY, William. Typed Note Signed. November 1, 1984. Addressed to a fellow writer, Kennedy declines an invitation to read, citing overwork. Folded in thirds for mailing; else fine. With envelope.
470. KEROUAC, Jack. Typed Letter Signed. [December, 1956]. A full page love letter to Helen Weaver ("Sweetheart"), mailed on New Year's Eve. A passionate letter, written just before On the Road was published and while Kerouac still had the innocence and charm of a struggling writer, unencumbered by the celebrity that dogged him in later years. Much of the letter is personal, professing his love and desire to reunite with his girlfriend -- in writing that has the rhythm and lyricism of his novels, as well as the free flowing associations and lofty allusions: "I will lead schools, be exiled, scoffed at, I prophesy it, and I will lead schools.. But it's only the golden eternity. ... eternal peace... and we're just passing through..." A portion of the letter refers to the business of writing in which he is engaged: "I have another week here, of mad typing and working on FOUR different manuscripts, that'll make us rich... .. Then I take the West Coast champion train, if my agent comes through with the return fare, and be right back, to your door, on Tuesday the 8th... If I dont get drunk and flub up..." Signed, "Jean (qui t'aime XXXXX)." Previously folded in sixths for mailing and splitting at the corner folds; paper acidifying; else near fine. With typed mailing envelope, postmarked Orlando, Florida. A remarkable letter, with Kerouac's characteristic, and unmistakable, prose.
471. KINGSOLVER, Barbara. Form Letter Signed. (1995). A computer printout of a letter in which she agrees to, and gives mailing instructions for, signing one book and declines to sign many as "my writing-time and family-time are of most importance to me..." Signed by the author. Folded for mailing; fine, with envelope.