Selected Letters of William Styron (79 page)

Speaking of governors, Wm. Winter
^*ccc
got a fine laudatory article in the
Times
in regard to his educational program. The South is rising again!

When you coming up to Yankee land? It’s been too long. Stay in touch and best to all my Oxford buddies.

Yrs ever Stingo

T
O
M
ARY
B
UXTON
^*ddd

February 16, 1983 Roxbury, CT

Dear Mary: Your letter was written with great good spirit and warmth and I hope I can reply in kind, at least in part.

Let me begin, though, with a true reminiscence. When I was 22, the age of the narrator in
Sophie’s Choice
, and living in New York, I came down with a truly wretched case of hepatitis. In those days, right after World War II, it was a very serious and unfamiliar disease, and I’m sure I came as close to dying as I ever have. While recuperating, I received a letter from Elizabeth. The gist of her letter was this: while she was happy that I had recovered, she hoped from her heart that I realized that I had
brought the illness on myself
, that by the loose and debauched life I had been living—drinking, irregular habits, etc.—I had no one to blame but myself for my close call with oblivion. I was still very weak when I read her words, barely able to get out of bed, and they made—to say the least—a bleak impression on my spirit. In short, I can say—some 35 years later—that it was one of the most hateful and poisonous letters a boy of 22 ever received from a vindictive stepmother, and it made me feel like hell. Therefore, I really can’t accept your gentle suggestion that Elizabeth was representative of stepmothers in general, who are traditionally despised by their 13-year-old children. I was no longer 13, like Luke vis-à-vis Virginia, or your sister’s stepson. I was, rather, a young adult in full command of my sensibilities, and I still hate Elizabeth for that loathsome, disgusting letter with its terrible freight of puritanical malice. The only reason—as always—that I didn’t write back and tell her to go fuck herself was because of my father, and my desire not to make that good man unhappy. How he lived with her for so long in apparent bliss is a cosmic mystery.

Of course I “forgave” her—whatever that means. Until she died, she and my father visited our family and we had some fine times together. I think she had sincere affection for all my children. There were moments when in a sort of pitying way I had warm feelings for her. But she was a grim woman and I’m sure that had my father married her, say, five years earlier, when I was just a child, I would have been destroyed. I’m amazed to this day that I allowed myself to have anything to do with her. I rather regret that in the TV documentary you saw there was more time spent on her than should have been—a disproportionate bulge which I thought was a flaw in the film. And I’m very sorry indeed that Buck was hurt. But I would be insincere now if I didn’t register my true feelings.

You’re partially right, certainly, about my father’s true nature in matters of race. The book version of the old man was considerably idealized and you are correct in saying that he kept most of the prejudices of his post-bellum Southern generation. But there had been many moments in the past when I had glimpsed in him the sight of a genuine liberal struggling to escape from the flesh of a reactionary (he did in all actuality, as I said in the book, resign as president of the Va. chapter of the Sons of the Revolution when that group endorsed Senator Joe McCarthy) and so I think my portrait wasn’t too far off.

I’m glad all is going well with you and Chip. I think of the Tidewater often though it’s been many years now since I’ve visited the Peninsula. Your letter was, at heart, filled with good will and an undercurrent of happiness, and I hope that state is always yours.

Faithfully and with love always

Bill            

P.S. Rose sends her fondest.

T
O
W
ILLIE
M
ORRIS

May 8, 1983
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Cannes, France

Dear Willie: The Cannes Film Festival would be poontang heaven for a young stud but since I am President of the Jury I have to act real moral and drink mineral water. I’m having a good time but 22 movies in 10 days is a bit much even for a film buff like me. I’ll be back around the last of May and hope we can have a good ole boy reunion.

Stingo

T
O
W
ILLIE
M
ORRIS

July 6, 1983 Vineyard Haven, MA

Dear Willie:

I’m so glad you felt the same way I did about the Hamptons. That damn place has always filled me with anxiety but the week-end in question I thought really exemplified the place at its worst. Needless to say I adore Gloria, as you do, but Matthews and I both agreed passionately that it is a terrible mistake to invite such a mob for any kind of festivity. There was absolutely no communication with anyone, so that you end up more in a state of constant irritation and even hostility than in the conviviality that such an event is supposed to produce. Except for seeing you, and one or two other people I care for, the whole week-end was for me a terrible and depressing washout, and I made a solemn vow never to go back to that area unless I can be assured that the social life will be under control. You’re absolutely right: the people there do move in packs, and it is very close to disgusting. I’ve always cherished my few friends there, but at the same time I’ve always detested the place for its umbilical cord relationship to the worst aspects of N.Y. City: chic food shops and dreadful cocktail parties and shrinks and gynecologists driving BMWs and, mainly, seeing the same damn people over and over and over again. Believe me, and I mean it: Martha’s Vineyard has its drawbacks but it is a slander to say that in any way it resembles the Hamptons. I can live my own life here, and work, and I know it would be impossible to do that there. I think the greatest indictment came from Peter and Maria Matthiessen, who told me that they’ve gotten so fed up with this madhouse aspect of the place that they’ve seriously considered moving away.

Anyway, it was great to see you and I’m very much looking forward to that book of yours. Will you get me an early version to read? Tell Matee Daniels that all the intellectual Jews up here are rooting for him to win; they know he will push their cause down there and it will mean a lot more copies of highbrow quarterlies being sold in the great state of Mississippi. Vann Woodward is coming up for a visit in a week or two. We’ll hoist a glass in memory of all the good old times.

Yrs in Jesus

& Jerry Falwell,

As ever,           

Bill    

T
O
C
ARLOS
F
UENTES

July 17, 1983 Vineyard Haven, MA

Dear Carlos: I’m sorry you couldn’t have made it up here for a brief vacance. The weather has been splendid and I miss our Immanuel Kantian promenades.

Your Harvard speech was absolutely excellent and I’ve heard very fine reverberations.
^*fff
I’m sure its effects will be strong and persuasive—despite the official resistance—and you certainly had an enormously influential podium. It was a triumph of reasoned exhortation.

Keep me posted on developments in regard to the Canadian powwow. I think it could be very fruitful indeed.

Abrazos Stay in touch

Bill      

T
O
E
DWARD
B
UNKER

November 28, 1983 Roxbury, CT

Dear Édouard Bon Coeur:

I have tried to contact you many times recently by telephone but got either no answer or a mysterious busy signal. The latter baffled me, and I wondered why there should be a busy signal when otherwise no answer. This conjured up visions of someone lurking around, not answering the phone but making calls, etc. However, it seems plain that you have not been home for some time and I hope this reaches you.

For one thing I wanted to let you know how certain efforts I have made to procure you some loot have been making out. By the time I was able, at the beginning of the fall, to make inquiries about funds and fellowships at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, to which I belong, it turned out that all of the candidates and applications had been processed for this year—the deadline was early last summer. So while this put you out for
the current year, you are still eminently qualified for the next go-round in the coming year. I should point out that these fellowships are not terribly munificent—I mean, you can’t live off them—but they amount usually to several thousand bucks nonetheless, and are pretty good in terms of recognition. So please keep this in mind for 1984, as I’d be glad to push the matter and I think you’d have an excellent chance to get a fellowship. Many writers who are not nearly as classy as you have gotten these grants.

This idea may simply appall you, and if it does read no further—but did you ever consider teaching? I don’t have to tell you how many good writers have taken this route, and should it not make you unhappy to think about it I believe I might be able to pull some kind of influence in this direction. If you are interested that is another thing you can let me know about, and I shall make the appropriate moves.

You may not believe it, but I am far, far into a new novel which pleases me enormously. My liver has acted up to the extent that I barely drink anything anymore—so it is just me and Aquinnah, taking our walks in the woods together. I hope we can get together before too long, perhaps in the holiday season, but at the moment, I am totally mystified as to your whereabouts. As I say, I hope this reaches you in good shape, and that you are likewise in good shape. Why don’t you give me a call if the carrier pigeon delivers this to you safely.

Yours,

Bill

T
O
F
REDERICK
E
XLEY

December 24, 1983 Roxbury, CT

Dear Fred: If you don’t get a Guggenheim, it will be through no fault of mine.
^*ggg
I laid it on so thick (saying such things as: In 25 years of making recommendations there is no candidate so highly regarded in my eyes, etc.) that they will either buy it or reject it out of hand as preposterous, perhaps even indecent. I am used to such humiliations as the Signed First
Edition Society. The other day I got a fan letter saying, in all seriousness, that my work combined the best of James Joyce and James Michener.

Merry Xmas,

Bill      

T
O
C
HARLES
S
ULLIVAN

February 1, 1984 Roxbury, CT

Dear Charlie:

Many thanks for the splendid cigars, which were here waiting for me after a trip to Mexico. I’m about ready to head south again, since despite the fact that moments of New England winters are exhilarating, enough is really enough and some of these days around 10° with the wind blowing are really monstrous. Who knows, I may end up on your doorstep. Anyway, the cigars are excellent. They are proof of something I’ve long maintained (in spite of wisdom to the contrary): that the best Tampa cigars are really of very highly maintained excellence, close enough to Havanas to make a more than passable substitute (Imagine, it’s been 20 years since the Cuban Embargo!). Anyway, I am grateful to you for the thoughtfulness.

My Marine Corps novel is coming along well, and sometime before long I’d like to talk to you about it seriously and at length, and maybe solicit your advice and observations.

As you will recollect very well, WWII ended before a lot of us got to the Pacific, thus shattering dreams and creating ambiguities. My own dream was shattered because a large part of me wanted to fight the Japs and prove my courage and all that sort of thing. After all, this is what the USMC had been training me to do for a long time, and I felt quite let down when in August 1945 we all heard the news at Quantico. On the other hand, another part of me was quite relieved that Hiroshima prevented me from having my ass shot off. I would be dishonest if I didn’t say that. At any rate I ended the war with profoundly mixed feelings, and a large part of this new novel is concerned with these complicated attitudes toward courage, idealism, patriotism and, most importantly, The Bomb.

The story is told as if I (called Stingo—remember him?—who is the
first person narrator) had been perhaps nine months or a year older, and then—instead of having his career terminate at Quantico—had been of the right age to be involved in the fighting as a platoon leader on Okinawa. Due to a freak accident, which is no fault of his own, he escapes combat, which causes him enormous and real frustration, since he not only honestly wants to prove himself in action but also feels that he has let his platoon down badly because of his absence. Shortly after this—recovered from the accident—he rejoins his unit on Okinawa, finding that most of his platoon has been shot up in one of the final battles, and the island is now secured. Thus he has truly escaped hearing a shot fired in anger. During the mopping-up operations, however, which are virtually danger-free for our hero, a fellow officer is horribly and mortally hurt in a booby trap and dies in the narrator’s arms. Back on Saipan (this incidentally is based on theoretical action with the 2d Division, which as you may remember was involved in the later stages of the campaign—8
^th
Marines), Stingo’s previous macho courage does a flipflop and he finds himself no longer this gutsy young officer but utterly terrified. Though he has not experienced battle, he has seen its horrible effects and thus he loses his bravery. His terror, of course, is compounded by the fact that he knows he will be participating in the invasion of Japan (Operation Coronet, November on Kyushu) and that his chances are slim indeed for survival. The previous study in machismo turns into a study of fear. However, when the bomb drops on Hiroshima he is saved. It would be easy to say that his joy knows no bounds—he feels joy but it is hardly boundless, being shadowed by too many other factors: Hiroshima itself and his own continuing agonized conscience.