Katherine Anne Porter (156 page)

757.32
Fulwar Skipwith] American diplomat (1765–1839) who in 1803 played a major role in the Louisiana Purchase.

757.37
Graustarkian] In the vainglorious manner of Graustark, a fictional Central European principality continually threatened with extinction by its neighbors, the setting of six historical romances by American novelist George Barr McCutcheon (1866–1928).

759.29–31
that a man. . . confidence.”] From
A Vision
(1925, 1937) by W. B. Yeats.

760.13–14
Patrizieren. . . Amalienburg] Houses of city council members in Basel that approximate the Amalienburg, a hunting lodge built for Charles VII in the German Rococo style.

763.34
Sully] Thomas Sully (1783–1872), American portrait painter who, after studies with Gilbert Stuart and Benjamin West, flourished in Philadelphia.

765.2–4
Rose. . .
Epitaph
] Rilke (1875–1926) composed this, his epitaph, during his last months: “Rose, oh reiner Widerspruch, Lust,/ Niemandes Schlaf zu sein unter soviel Lidern.”

767.6
Raoul, Sire de Coucy] The Chatelaine de Coucy (1157–1192), whose “Chanson du Chatelain de Coucy” Porter translated for inclusion in her
French Song-Book
(1933).

769.12
Laïs the Corinthian] Courtesan at the time of the Peloponnesian War (431–404
B.C
.); her beauty is mentioned by Plutarch and other contemporary writers.

769.12–13
Saint Thérèse. . . roses] St. Thérèse de Lisieux (1873–1897), a Carmelite nun known as “The Little Flower of Jesus,” is typically depicted with a bouquet of roses.

769.22–26
A rose. . . version.)] Quatrain 116 of the
Rubáiyát
of Omar Khayyám (1048–1123), from the French version (1924) by Franz Toussaint (1879–1924).

771.35–36
rose liqueur. . . brain.”] Rosa solis, praised by Dame Suddlechop in Walter Scott’s
The Fortunes of Nigel
(1822): “Right Rosa Solis, as ever washed mulligrubs out of a moody brain!”

773.38–39
metamorphosed Ass] See
The Golden Ass (Asinus aureus)
by Apuleius (c.
A.D.
123–180).

774.5–6
rose of fire. . . Vision] See Canto 32 of the
Paradiso.

775.3–15
For the reproductions. . .
Bagatelle
.] See
La Rose dans art: Château de Bagatelle
(1938) by Jean-Louis Vaudoyer (1883–1963).

775.17–24
A short thick body. . . Paris.”] See
Fleurs de Pois
(1845), by François-Joseph Grillé (1782–1855).

775.26–27
portraits. . . Gérard] Redouté’s portrait was painted between 1817 and 1823 by Baron François Gérard (1770–1837).

775.27–30
In spite. . . apple.”] See
The Art of Botanical Illustration
(1950) by Wilfred Blunt (1901–1987).

777.35
Mercier] Louis-Sébastien Mercier (1740–1814), French dramatist and writer who, in his
Tableau de Paris
(1781–88), gave a contemporary account of the French Revolution.

778.13
David] Jacques-Louis David (1748–1825), neoclassical painter sympathetic to the Revolution, sketched
Marie Antoinette on the Way to the Guillotine
, October 16, 1793.

779.25
Isabey] Jean-Baptiste Isabey (1767–1855).

781.37
Yaddo] Artists’ colony, founded in 1900 by financier Spencer Trask and his wife, Katrina, in Saratoga Springs, New York.

784.12
remark of Mr. E. M. Forster] See “My Wood” (1926), in
Abinger Harvest
(1936).

785.25
Tobacco Road
] Novel (1932) about Georgia sharecroppers by Erskine Caldwell (1903–1987).

797.26–29
He preferred. . . world.”] Elizabeth Barrett Browning to Mrs. James Martin, a lifelong friend, October 20 (?), 1846, from
The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning
(1897), edited by Frederic G. Kenyon.

797.32–36
Then came. . . cheek.”] Robert Browning to Miss E. F. Haworth, a close friend, July 20, 1861, from
The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning
(
see above
).

799.35
Butcher-Arnold translation] Porter conflates the 1879 translation of the
Odyssey
by Samuel Henry Butcher (1850–1910) and Andrew Lang (1844–1912) with the 1861 partial translation of the
Iliad
by Matthew Arnold (1822–1881).

812.14
Shelley] John W. Shelley (d. 1939), executive of British El Aguila Oil.

814.1
Covadonga Day] In Spain, a holiday in the northeastern state of Asturias, where, in
A.D.
718, in the mountain town of Covadonga, outnumbered Iberians triumphed in a bloody battle against the Moors, a victory said to be achieved through the grace of Mary.

814.6–7
Sanchez. . . Gaona] Mexican bullfighters Ignacio Sanchez Mejías (1891–1934) and Rodolfo Gaona y Jiménez (1888–1975).

814.8
Hattie Welton] Adventurer, circus performer, and owner of a riding school in Mexico City.

816.9
fronton] Jai alai arena.

816.10
Alameda] See
note 100.22
.

826.1–2
The silence. . . Pascal,] Cf. “Le silence éternel de ces espaces infinis m’effraie” (“The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me”), from the
Pensées
of Blaise Pascal (1623–1666).

827.6
Mr. Toynbee] British historian Arnold Toynbee (1889–1975), author of the 12-volume work
A Study in History
(1934–61).

830.1
The Never-Ending Wrong
] When this essay, first published in
The Atlantic Monthly
in June 1977, was published as a small book later the same summer, Porter added the following foreword:

“This book is not for the popular or best-selling list for a few weeks or months. It is a plain, full record of a crime that belongs to history.

“When a reporter from a newspaper here in Maryland asked to talk to me, he said he had heard that I was writing another book. . . what about?. . . I gave him the title and the names of Sacco and Vanzetti. There was a wavering pause. . . then: ‘Well, I don’t really know anything about them. . . for me it’s just history.’

“It is my conviction that when events are forgotten, buried in the cellar of the page—they are no longer even history.”

830.4–5
Nicola. . . Vanzetti] Ferdinando Nicola Sacco (1891–1927) and Bartolomeo Vanzetti (1888–1927).

831.24
Webster Thayer] Judge Thayer (1857–1933), of the Superior Court of Massachusetts, was judge in both trials of Sacco and Vanzetti.

831.27
Rosa Baron] Rosa (or Rose) K. Baron (d. 1961) was National Prisoners’ Relief Director of the Communist Party’s International Labor Defense organization in 1925–46. She defended the legal rights of prosecuted Party members and others sympathetic to the Communist cause.

833.1
Leon Henderson] Henderson (1895–1986), in 1927 an economist with the Russell Sage Foundation, and his wife, Myrlie Hamm Henderson, raised money for the defense of Sacco and Vanzetti.

833.2
Governor Fuller] Alvan Tufts Fuller (1878–1958), Republican governor of Massachusetts in 1924–29.

834.5
Read those letters!
]
The Letters of Sacco and Vanzetti
(1928), the source of the direct quotations from Sacco and Vanzetti used in this essay; the book was edited by Marion Denman Frankfurter (1891–1975), wife of Felix Frankfurter and his partner in the early activities of the American Civil Liberties Union, and Gardner Jackson (1896–1965), who covered the Sacco-Vanzetti case for
The Boston Globe
in 1921–26 and was secretary of Sacco-Vanzetti Defense Committee in 1926–27.

834.19
Mrs. Evans] Elizabeth G. Evans (1856–1937), of Brookline, Massachusetts, a wealthy donor to socially progressive causes who raised money for the defense of Sacco and Vanzetti.

835.5
Gardner Jackson] See
note 834.5
.

837.11–12
Lincoln Brigade] Abraham Lincoln Brigade, anti-Franco volunteers from the United States who fought alongside the Spanish Republican forces in the Spanish Civil War.

837.17
Bessie Beatty] Beatty (1886–1947), editor of
McCall’s
magazine, wrote
The Red Heart of Russia
(1919), an eyewitness account of the Russian Revolution.

837.19
Albert Rhys Williams] Williams (1883–1962), journalist whose sympathetic reports from Soviet Russia were collected in books including
Through the Russian Revolution
(1921).

837.29–30
Frank Tannenbaum] Tannenbaum (1893–1969), political journalist in Mexican, Russian, and African American affairs; later taught criminology at Cornell (1932–35) and Latin American history at Columbia (1935–65).

837.34–35
Third International] The Communist International (Com-intern), founded in Moscow in 1919, promoted the Communist cause in the West and worked toward the formation of an international Soviet republic.

840.4
From each. . . need.”] Communist slogan coined by Karl Marx in his “Critique of the Gotha Program” (1875).

841.33
AMTORG] Trading corporation serving Soviet import and export firms doing business with the United States, founded in 1924 by American entrepreneur Armand Hammer (1898–1990), the son of Russian immigrants.

841.37
ROSTA] Soviet news agency, 1918–35; superseded by TASS.

841.39
Kenneth Durant] Durant (1889–1972) became ROSTA’s American bureau chief in 1919. He worked from the offices of the United Press Association, on Park Row.

842.6–8
A perennial candidate. . . honest man.] William Z. Foster (1881–1961), General Secretary of the Communist Party USA from 1921 to 1957, was the Party’s candidate for United States president in the elections of 1924, 1928, and 1932.

842.15–17
Lola Ridge. . . Lumpkin] In August 1927, the political poet Lola Ridge (1873–1941) had published
The Ghetto
(1918),
Sun-Up
(1920), and
Red Flag
(1927); John Dos Passos (1896–1970) had published six books, including
Manhattan Transfer
(1925); the journalist Paxton Hibben (1880– 1928) had published an eyewitness account of the famine in Russia (1922); Michael Gold (1894–1967) had founded the Communist arts magazine
New Masses
; Helen O’Lochlainn Crowe had gained notoriety as a writer on labor and social causes; James Rorty (1891–1973) was a poet and the literary editor of
New Masses;
Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950) had won the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry for
The Harp-Weaver
(1923); William Gropper (1897–1977) was a cartoonist for
The Daily Worker
and
New Masses
; and Grace Lumpkin (1892–1980) had published the first of the proletarian short stories that foreshadowed her novel
To Make My Bread
(1932).

843.18
Pink Tea] Nineteen-twenties’ slang term for a peaceful left-wing political demonstration.

845.33–34
Mr. Edward James] James (1873–1954), son of Robertson James, was the younger brother of William and Henry.

845.36
Jim Larkin] James (Big Jim) Larkin (1876–1947), Irish labor leader and social activist, was one of the guiding spirits of the Communist Party USA. In 1923, after serving three years of a ten-year sentence for committing acts of “criminal anarchy,” he was deported to Ireland, where he became head of the Irish Communist Party and the Workers’ Union of Ireland.

846.39
skew-gee] Off-course.

847.38
Herbert B. Ehrmann] Ehrmann (1891–1970), associate counsel for Sacco and Vanzetti, was the author of
The Untried Case
(1933, revised 1960) and
The Case That Will Not Die
(1969).

848.14
Felix Frankfurter] Frankfurter (1882–1965) wrote a journalistic account of the trial for
The Atlantic Monthly
(March 1927) and, years later,
The Case of Sacco and Vanzetti: A Critical Analysis for Lawyers and Laymen
(1961).

848.16
Mrs. J. Borden. . . Harriman] In 1927, Florence Jaffray Hurst Harriman (1870–1967) was known as a Washington hostess and the founder of the National Women’s Club of the Democratic Party.

849.19
Mrs. Leon Henderson] See
note 833.1
.

852.39
Giovinezza.”] “Youth,” the official hymn of the Italian National Fascist Party.

856.33
song about an Irish wake] “The Night That Paddy Murphy Died.”

856.37
the first line of the Internationale] “Stand up, wretched of the earth!”

856.38–39
Giovinezza. . . bellezza!
”] “Youth, youth! Spring beauty!”

859.28
Mrs. Stuart Chase] Marian Tyler Chase (1897–1989), journalist and co-author of several books with her husband, the economist and social critic Stuart Chase (1888–1985).

859.36
Arthur Garfield Hays] Hays (1881–1954), general counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union and participant in several prominent civil rights trials of the 1920s and 1930s.

860.8
Baumes’ Law] New York State law (1926), drafted by Senator Caleb H. Baumes (1863–1937), calling for automatic life imprisonment of any criminal convicted of three or more felonies.

861.4
the judge] James A. P. Parmenter (1860–1937), Boston municipal judge.

863.29
article by. . . Russell] “The End of the Myth: Sacco and Vanzetti 50 Years Later” by Francis Russell (1910–1989), author of
Tragedy in Dedham: The Sacco and Vanzetti Case
(1962) and
Sacco and Vanzetti: The Case Resolved
(1986).

864.21
Felipe Carillo] Felipe Carrillo Puerto (1874–1924), Porter’s lover in 1920–21, was governor of Yucatán from 1922 to 1924.

865.23
The State. . . monsters,”] Friedrich Nietzsche, in
Also Sprach Zarathustra
(1883–85).

865.26–27
Emma. . . life]
Living My Life
(1931) by anarchist Emma Goldman (1869–1940).

865.30
Prince. . . memoirs]
Memoirs of a Revolutionist
(1899) by Prince Peter Alexeyevich Kropotkin (1842–1921).