Steinbeck (60 page)

I think I'll go on inventing on the side. Some years ago I invented silk slip covers for the lapels of a dark suit to make it a dinner jacket. The stripe went on with straps—whole kit 10 bucks. It was for salesmen and for people who fly a lot and can't take much luggage. A lovely idea. A friend of mine in the clothing business told me it would not be popular with the clothing industry.

Then I invented stirrups for long nightgowns to keep them from climbing (unless you want them to). This just got me in trouble with the pyjama industry. My final defeat came when I invented people.

Well, Somer ben a goin oot. When we all get home—let's have a hell of a winter.

Love to Dick
John

Paris
September 2, 1954

Dear Pat:

Everything seems to be ending at one time which is as it should be. The printed stationery is gone. The boys left for Rome yesterday and Waverly goes tonight; that leaves Elaine and me until the 9th. Then we go to London.

The boys went very gaily. We will not do what Gwyn does —that is let any sadness creep in. The night before we had a party for them and drank champagne and toasted them and they toasted us and we sang songs. In the morning we all went out to the airport with them, and made a fiesta of it. I feel sad without them but I don't want them to know it. I think it's much the better way, don't you? With Way it doesn't make so much difference. She has so many interests outside of us. And later the boys will have that too. I am not worried about them any more. They are so alive and good. They will get through just fine in spite of Gwyn and me—not because of us. I feel really good about them. I do have the habit of listening for them on the stairs but that will go away in a few days.

I have three more pieces of writing to do before I go to London. Maybe I can get started on them tomorrow. The Figaro pieces are completed in a blaze of glory. It has been a good series I think and I have liked doing it. I don't want to do anything but short things until I get home. Then I hope I will have a sharp clarity and a whole new approach toward the new book. And do you know—if I start work on it soon after the first of the year I will probably have it done by fall. I think about it a lot but I try not to think too closely about it because that would be like writing it.

Well, we put Waverly on the plane last night. Everyone a little tearful and so the summer of the children ended.

Now it's later in the day and I have managed to do a little work. But it isn't good work and must be thrown out. Too bad.

love to all
John

Paris
September 6 [1954]

Dear Toby:

Your good letter came this morning, full of news and cracks. I am answering it right away because Elaine and I are leaving Paris the day after tomorrow.

It's amazing how I have lost touch with the West Coast but inevitable. I haven't heard from anyone out there in such a long time. And why would I? There's no point of contact. New York is my home and I think Paris will be increasingly. I love it here. Maybe some time I will have a permanent apartment here. Of course I hear from my sisters regularly but all of the other contacts shrink down. I haven't heard from Dook for a very long time. I think he resents me. And perhaps I deserve it. But shoot—I only have one little life and there isn't a hell of a lot left of it and I want to have as much fun with it as I can. And associations are only kept alive if there is proximity. People change and each resents the change in the other, not thinking he has changed. And it isn't actually change either but only a non parallel existence. I have always been a mobile unit in wish if not in actuality. I thought that in middle age I would get over the restlessness—but I don't. It's just the same. I even go through the form of establishing a home. But it's only a place to go away from and to come back to. I am fortunate in that Elaine has my same restlessness. She will move at the stir of a suitcase.

I guess I don't know anyone very well any more. Right now I know Paris better than any place—and pretty soon it will be Rome or as Thom spells it Roam. Maybe he has the blood too.

love to you and Lois and the new generation

John

Hotel Ritz
London
September 14,1954

Dear Gadg and Molly:

Drawing a white night. Have been seeing a lot of theatre. Some good but I even like the bad. I have no taste. Wish I could talk to you. A whole revolution is going on in me. I talk and talk and I don't know whether or not it means anything. I suspect it does. I do nothing except short pieces. Good thing. I'm not ready to start yet. When I do it's going to bust a gut. It's hard to throw over 30 years work but necessary if the work has pooped out. It isn't that it was bad but that I've used it up.

Do you think I could write a play with no tricks, just he said and she said?

love to all there
John

London
September 17, 1954

 

When a writer starts in very young, his problems apart from his story are those of technique, of words, of rhythms, of story methods, of transition, of characterization, of ways of creating effects. But after years of trial and error most of these things are solved and one gets what is called a style. It is then that a story conceived falls into place neatly and is written down having the indelible personal hallmark of the writer. This is thought to be an ideal situation. And the writer who is able to achieve this is thought to be very fortunate.

I have only just arrived at a sense of horror about this technique. If I think of a story, it is bound automatically to fall into my own personal long struggle for technique. But the penalty is terrible. The tail of the kite is designed to hold it steady in the air but it also prevents versatility in the kite and in many cases drags it to the earth. Having a technique, is it not possible that the technique not only dictates how a story is to be written but also what story is to be written? In other words, style or technique may be a straitjacket which is the destroyer of a writer. It does seem to be true that when it becomes easy to write the writing is not likely to be any good. Facility can be the greatest danger in the world. But is there any alternative? Suppose I want to change my themes and my approach. Will not my technique, which has become almost unconscious, warp and drag me around to the old attitudes and subtly force the new work to be the old?

I want to dump my technique, to tear it right down to the ground and to start all over. I have been thinking of this a lot. I think I have one answer but I have not developed it enough to put it down yet.

[unsigned]

Saint Paul de Vence, France
September 29 [1954]

Dear Graham:

We have been driving very slowly, savoring the country the way you'd run wine around the back of your tongue. It is lovely. The first relaxed thing I've had in many years.

I am wearing the hat with great success. Men, prone to take it lightly as a piece of solid British frippery, are thrown into a paroxysm of admiration at the beautiful salmon flies.

I have cut off my moustache for the first time in 30 years —Elaine is not sure she likes me with a nude face. After all she does not like to move furniture. It occurred to me after all of these years that retaining a little scrap of hair as a memorial of an hairy time was silly. I think I grew it in the first place because my upper lip is so long I was afraid people would try to put a bit in my mouth. But it is more probable that I aspired to an erudition and a Latin sophistication and maturity I felt was withheld. Now that I am sure these latter are not possible I have got rid of the poor gesture. I once had a beard—but shaved it off when I found I was trying to live up to it. It's bad enough to have confused impulses but worse if you can't remember what they were.

We wish you were with us. The weather is warm and autumnal.

love to both
John

Saint Paul de Vence
September 29, 1954

Dear Elizabeth:

We have been driving very slowly. We have stayed in beautiful places. Last night at Les Baux and wandered in the ghost city. You undoubtedly know Saint Paul de Vence. It is above the Mediterranean in back of Nice but is a little walled medieval town. Just got in a little while ago so have only seen a little part of it. I have thought so much about the screed I sent you from London re technique [see page 497] and it seems truer to me all of the time. And the necessity for a new start is also valid. I have thought and am still thinking of the transition. Perhaps the hard discipline of play which does not have the advantage of the novelist's apology and explanation but only the iron discipline of form and the requirement that dialogue carry the whole burden not only of movement but of character. This is something I do not know and so would have to struggle with. But I have no idea in this of abandoning the novel but only of starting fresh with it. Perhaps some transition work in this form would do it. I am purposely not writing anything now. But it will not be too long before I will have to. And I would like to have some clean approach. I thought of a little playlet last night when I could not sleep. A strange little story I haven't thought of for years and which I now might be able to write. I will probably bore you with these searchings for quite a long time. Excuse it please. It is more than important to me.

Love to all,
John

Rome
October 29, 1954

Dear Elizabeth:

I think I will start a letter to you tonight. The reception for me [at the Embassy] was quite pleasant and no strain at all. The guest list was pretty fabulous. One amusing thing happened. They wanted to make a display of some of my books. They have about 70 volumes of various titles in the library. Not one was in and they couldn't get them in, so they had to go out and buy a dozen copies.

Last night Mrs. Luce [American Ambassador to Italy] asked us to a cocktail party and then to a very small dinner party. It was pleasant and we both think she is a pretty remarkable woman.

News last night of Hemingway's Nobel Prize which pleases me greatly. He should have had it before this.

Italy is full of flying saucers. In the street the other day everyone was looking up. Thousands of people said they saw something. Clare Luce says she saw something. A football game stopped the other day and 60 thousand people saw three of them go over. I myself have not seen anything but all Italy is greatly excited. I am asked what I think about it in every interview. I have a stock answer which I may even believe. People see things. In the Middle Ages they saw angels. Later witches. Now saucers. I don't know what is there but I do know that people see things. Always have.

Strange. I have a feeling that everything has stopped and is waiting—rather like some Sunday afternoons or the hour before a party. A change is coming. I can feel it very plain. And it is a good change. This is real dope talk as far as reason is concerned but it is a skin feeling. And maybe that is as good a way as any to evaluate.

Elaine is out doing last-minute shopping (Christmas). We have a must list as long as your arm. Seems to jump every year.

I guess that's all. I have to write to the boys.

Love,
John

Positano, Italy
December i, 1954

Dear Pat:

Now we're on the last lap. Tomorrow we go to Naples and Sunday get on the boat. We've had it. Both kind of worn out. It's been a long haul and perhaps we have seen too much. That is very possible. We will stop at Pompei and Herculaneum on our way to Naples though. We went to Salerno and to Red Beach where I landed ten years ago. It looks different. They have planted little pines where it was all shell holes and blood. But the place still had a kind of horrid charge for me like a remembered nightmare. I never did write what I really thought of the war. It wouldn't have been encouraging to those who had to fight it. But some of the disgust and sorrow came back on that beach two days ago. And people blithely talk about another one. You can never talk people out of fighting. Every new generation has to know by trying. Thucydides says it was true in his day.

Anyway, we'll be seeing you soon now. It is going to be very comfortable to slide under my writing board even if I just sit there and do nothing.

Elaine sends love to all.

John

Stembuck
“I must say I do have fun with my profession.
...”

1955
Pipe Dream
(musical adaptation of
Sweet Thursday)
produced. Bought summer cottage in Sag Harbor, Long Island.

 

 

1956
Covered both national conventions for Louisville
Courier-Journal
and syndicate.

 

 

1957
The Short Reign of Pippin IV
published. Correspondent in Europe, again for Louisville
Courier-Journal
and syndicate. Began research on Malory and
Morte d'Arthur.