Selected Letters of William Styron (90 page)

†G
Haydn edited Redding’s book
On Being Negro in America
(New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1950) and introduced the Hampton Institute professor to Styron. Redding sent Styron a packet of materials, including William Sidney Drewry’s
The Southampton Insurrection
(Washington, D.C.: Neal Co., 1900) and Frederick Law Olmsted’s
A Journey in the Seaboard Slave States
(1856). For a careful discussion of Styron’s use of these two

†H
John Knox (1514–72) was a Scottish clergyman and leader of the Protestant Reformation.

†I
The Little Acorn was a restaurant in Durham’s warehouse district, started in 1940 by Robert Roycroft. In the words of a 1951 write-up, the Little Acorn was “one of the most modernly equipped establishments of its kind in Durham.… Private dining rooms [were] maintained for parties and banquets. They specialize[d] in pit-cooked barbecue, brunswick stew, Southern-style fried chicken, and sea foods.” See
http://​end​anger​eddurham.​blogspot.​com/​2008/​07/​little-​acorn-​restaurant.​html
.

†J
Samuel Goldwyn, Jr. (b. 1926), is the son of the pioneering film mogul Samuel Goldwyn and the producer of
Mystic Pizza, Master and Commander
, and other films.

†K
Irwin Shaw (1913–84), playwright, screenwriter, and novelist best known for his novel
The Young Lions
(1948). He and Styron became close friends.

†L
Along with Gertrude Stein, Alice B. Toklas (1877–1967) hosted a salon in Paris which included some of the most important American writers and French painters.

†M
Truman Capote (1924–84) was a writer best known for his novella
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
(1958) and his nonfiction novel
In Cold Blood
(1965). Capote was already an established writer for periodicals and the screen when Styron met him.

†N
Herbert Aptheker,
American Negro Slave Revolts
(New York: Columbia, 1942). Aptheker (1915–2003) was a Marxist historian who pioneered the study of slave revolts and was one of the first professional historians to pay careful attention to Nat Turner. His outspoken communism led to many struggles in the academy. Styron later critiqued the Aptheker volume as a white man’s “fantasy” in “Overcome,”
The New York Review of Books
(September 26, 1963). Styron’s review focused instead on Stanley M. Elkins’s
Slavery: A Problem in American Institutional and Intellectual Life
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1959). Styron also refers to Ulrich Bonnell Phillips and his seminal work,
American Negro Slavery
(New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1918). Phillips was a historian at Columbia University who professionalized the study of the South in the 1920s by defending slavery, calling it a system of “gentleness, kind-hearted friendship and mutual loyalty,” concepts that guided several generations of historians.

†O
Haydn wrote Styron on May 15, 1952, warning the author off Turner: “I would hate to see you get involved in subject matter as purple as your own imagination is.”

†P
John Phillip Marquand (1893–1980) was a novelist initially famous for his Mr. Moto spy stories, but Styron cites him here for his nostalgic treatment of the crumbling New England aristocracy. He was also the father of one of Styron’s friends, John P. Marquand, Jr.

†Q
The review appeared in the April 30, 1952, edition of
Punch
and was a rare positive response from the British critics. “The writing,” the review noted, “a rare and satisfying mixture of graphic realism and subtle impressionism, reaches a very high standard, and the story loses none of its effectiveness by starting with the dénouement and backpedalling through numerous day-dreams and recollections. Warmly recommended.”

†R
The list does not survive.

†S
Styron’s father had sent him a copy of a talk by Norman Cousins, “In Defense of a Writing Career,”
Michigan Alumnus Quarterly Review
(Autumn 1950).

†T
James T. Farrell (1904–79) was a novelist best known for his Studs Lonigan trilogy.

†U
Stephen Spender (1909–95) was an English poet and novelist.

†V
With John Aldridge, Vance Bourjaily (whom Styron called Raoul Beaujolais, following the example of John Appleton) was an editor of
Discovery
. Bourjaily was also a novelist whose first novel,
The End of My Life
(New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1947), was critically acclaimed. According to
Esquire
magazine, “Everyone came to Bourjaily’s parties in the early 1950s,” and Styron attended enthusiastically alongside Mailer, Jones, actors, literary personalities, and many others. See Bruce Weber, “Vance Bourjaily, Novelist Exploring Postwar America, Dies at 87,”
The New York Times
, September 3, 2010.

†W
Leslie Blatt Felker was a Duke classmate, but she did not earn her degree because of her marriage to Clay Felker (1925–2008), a Duke classmate and later founder of
New York
magazine. After their divorce, she married literary critic and Styron admirer John W. Aldridge, and her third husband was Princeton University population researcher Charles F. Westoff, whom she also divorced. She recalled an unsatisfying sexual encounter with William Faulkner in Leslie Aldridge Westoff’s “A Faulkner Flirtation,”
The New York Times Magazine
, May 10, 1987.

†X
George Mandel and Mickey Knox. Knox (b. 1922) was at the time a blacklisted actor living in Rome, and a close friend of (and fervent correspondent with) Norman Mailer and James Jones. See Mickey Knox,
The Good, the Bad, and the Dolce Vita: The Adventures of an Actor in Hollywood, Paris, and Rome
(New York: Nation Books, 2004).

†Y
Glenway Wescott (1901–87) was a major novelist in the expatriate community in Paris in the 1920s.

†Z
Prétexte was a perfume, now discontinued, by the French house Lanvin.

‡a
James Ramon Jones (1921–77), a novelist best known for his novel
From Here to Eternity
(1951), which established him as a major voice in postwar American literature. He and his wife, Gloria, became very close friends of the Styrons. This is the first correspondence between Styron and Jones; the two met through John P. Marquand, Jr., at a party in Manhattan in the fall of 1951. For more see Willie Morris,
James Jones: A Friendship
(New York: Doubleday, 1978).

‡b
Postcard, “Van Gogh’s bedroom in Arles.” Styron addressed the postcard to “James Jones ‘Author of Catcher in the Rye.’ ”

‡c
Ormonde de Kay (1924–98), writer and editor, who wrote the 1949 film
Lost Boundaries
, as well as several children’s books.

‡d
A pun on Hippocrates’ aphorism “Art is long, life is short.”

‡e
Styron refers to his draft of
The Long March
.

‡f
Hortense Calisher (1911–2009) was a prolific author nominated for the National Book Award three times. “Little Truman” refers to Truman Capote.

‡g
The Franz J. Horch literary firm was a major manager of foreign rights at the time. The firm became known as the Roslyn Targ Literary Agency in the 1970s.

‡h
Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan (1933–2003) had been a classmate of George Plimpton at Harvard and socialized with the
Paris Review
crowd in the 1950s, becoming a close friend of the Styron family. He served as United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees between 1966 and 1978.

‡i
Letter from Geneva Marsh of Ventura, California, who called
Lie Down in Darkness
“the biggest hunk of nothing I’ve ever had the displeasure to stumble through … the most unsatisfactory waste of time I’ve ever spent.”

‡j
Postcard of la Côte d’Azur.

‡k
George Plimpton (1927–2003): journalist, writer, and longtime editor in chief of
The Paris Review
, which he helped found.

‡l
H. L. “Doc” Humes (1926–92): a founder of
The Paris Review
and the author of two novels. His girlfriend at the time was nicknamed “Moose.”

‡m
Robert Hazel (1921–93), poet and novelist, author of
The Lost Year
(1953) and
A Field Full of People
(1954).

‡n
Shelby Foote (1916–2005), historian and novelist, authored the multivolume
The Civil War: A Narrative
. He became especially well known for his starring role in Ken Burns’s 1990 PBS documentary
The Civil War
.

‡o
J. Donald Adams, literary critic and editor of
The New York Times Book Review
.

‡p
Art Buchwald (1925–2007), American humorist and longtime summer resident of Martha’s Vineyard, where he was a close friend of the Styrons.

‡q
Elsa Maxwell (1893–1963) was a gossip columnist and author best known for hosting high society parties.

‡r
Mrs. William Paley (1915–78) was born Barbara Cushing. She was the CBS television founder’s second wife.

‡s
Darryl F. Zanuck (1902–79) was a producer, writer, and studio executive and winner of three Academy Awards. Styron refers to Whittaker Chambers (1901–61), the Communist turncoat, Soviet spy, and winner of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Chambers testified against Alger Hiss and wrote a scathing anti-Communist account of the trial and his life in the bestselling and influential 1952 autobiography
Witness
.

‡t
Fulton John Sheen (1895–1979) was a conservative archbishop in the American Catholic Church known for his radio program
The Catholic Hour
.

‡u
As noted earlier, John’s father was the novelist John P. Marquand. When John, Jr., wrote
The Second Happiest Day
(1953), he published under the nom de plume John Philips. He was part of the
Paris Review
circle, serving as an advisory editor and contributor.

‡v
Marquand Jr. won the
New York Post
’s emerging writer prize, worth $25,000. Cass Canfield (1897–1986) was a publishing executive, and the longtime president of Harper & Brothers.

‡w
Pidey Bailey married Peter Gimbel (1927–87), heir to the Gimbels department store chain, before marrying Sidney Lumet (1924–2011), the director of such films as
12 Angry Men, Dog Day Afternoon
, and
Network
, and also a producer and screenwriter.

‡x
After finishing her master’s degree, Rose took a year off to travel and study in Europe. Louis Rubin wrote to tell her that Styron had won the Prix de Rome and was at the American Academy. Rose left a note in Styron’s mailbox there and they made a date to meet in the bar of the Hotel Excelsior.

‡y
John P. C. Train (b. 1928) is an investment adviser and author. A college friend of George Plimpton, Train was the first managing editor of
The Paris Review
.

‡z
Styron’s first attempt at an introduction for
The Paris Review
’s debut issue was harshly criticized by Marquand, Plimpton, and Matthiessen.

‡A
Bassett House was one of the women’s dormitories at Duke.

‡B
Rose Burgunder.

‡C
The Second Happiest Day
.

‡D
Truman Capote.

‡E
Styron refers to humorous rumors that he and Truman Capote were romantically involved.

‡F
Thomas Henry Guinzburg (1926–2010), editor and publisher as well as cofounder of
The Paris Review
. He succeeded his father as president of Viking Press.

‡G
Robert and Claire White were two of Styron’s closest friends in Italy. The couple partly inspired Cass and Poppy Kinsolving in
Set This House on Fire
.

‡H
Styron refers to Don M. Wolfe, editor of
Discovery
.

‡I
The first correspondence exchanged between Mailer and Styron was Mailer’s very generous and engaged letter of February 26, 1953, reprinted in
The New York Review of Books
(February 26, 2009). Mailer called Styron’s
Long March
“just terrific, how good I’m almost embarrassed to say, but as a modest estimate it’s certainly as good an eighty pages as any American has written since the war.” Mailer continued with “one humble criticism”: “I wonder if you realize how good you are.” Mailer identified a “manner” in Styron’s prose which reveals “a certain covert doubt of your strengths as a writer … which I suppose is like saying, ‘You, neurotic—stop being neurotic!’ ”

‡J
Hamlet
, 1.2.133: “How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world!”

‡K
Beat the Devil
(1953) starred Humphrey Bogart, Jennifer Jones, and Peter Lorre. John Huston directed Truman Capote’s script.

‡L
Cicero’s oration against Verres: “Oh the times! Oh the customs!”

‡M
Styron’s first letter to Norman Mailer.

‡N
James Jones, “None Sing So Wildly,”
New World Writing: Second Mentor Selection
(New York: New American Library, 1952).

‡O
Mailer’s first two novels,
The Naked and the Dead
(New York: Rinehart, 1948) and
Barbary Shore
(New York: Rinehart, 1951).

‡P
Paul Bowles (1910–99), composer and novelist. His novel
The Sheltering Sky
(1949) was a major success. In 1947, Bowles settled in Tangier, where he lived for the rest of his life.

‡Q
The White Horse Tavern is a Greenwich Village bar that was frequented by Dylan Thomas, Bob Dylan, Norman Mailer, James Baldwin, Hunter Thompson, and Jack Kerouac.

‡R
Maxwell Geismar, “The End of Something,”
The Nation
, March 14, 1953.

‡S
On postcard of gargoyles at Notre Dame Cathedral.

‡T
Styron was in Paris with Bobbie Taeusch during the brief period when he and Rose had broken up after an intense courtship from October through December 1952.