The Crack-Up
Page 22
Here are her books too: Pope and the earlier Burton,
A worn Verlaine; Bonheur and the Fêtes Galantes.
Come—let us go—I am done. Here one recovers
Too much of the past but fails at the last to find
Aught that made it the season of loves and lovers;
Give me your hand—she was lovely—mine eyes blind.
Isn’t that good? He hasn’t published it yet. I sent twelve poems to magazines yesterday. If I get them all back I’m going to give up poetry and turn to prose. John may publish a book of verse in the Spring. I’d like to but of course there’s no chance. Here’s one of mine.
TO CECILIA*
When Vanity kissed Vanity
A hundred happy Junes ago,
He pondered o’er her breathlessly,
And that all time might ever know
He rhymed her over life and death,
“For once, for all, for love,” he said. . .
Her beauty’s scattered with his breath
And with her lovers she was dead.
Ever his wit and not her eyes,
Ever his art and not her hair.
“Who’d learn a trick in rhyme be wise
And pause before his sonnet there.”
So all my words however true
Might sing you to a thousandth June
And no one ever know that you
Were beauty for an afternoon.
It’s pretty good but of course fades right out before John’s. By the way I struck a novel that you’d like Out of Due Time by Mrs. Wilfred Ward. I don’t suppose this is the due time to tell you that, though. I think that The New Machiavelli is the greatest English novel of the century. I’ve given up the summer to drinking (gin) and philosophy (James and Shoepenhaur and Bergson).
Most of the time I’ve been bored to death—Wasn’t it tragic about Jack Newlin*—I hardly knew poor Gaily.* Do write me the details.
I almost went to Russia on a commission in August but didn’t so I’m sending you one of my passport pictures—if the censor doesn’t remove it for some reason—It looks rather Teutonic but I can prove myself a Celt by signing myself
Very sincerely
F. Scott Fitzgerald
TO EDMUND WILSON
[Autumn of 1917]
Cottage Club,
Princeton, N. J.
Dear Bunny:
I’ve been intending to write you before but as you see I’ve had a change of scene and the necessary travail there-off has stolen time.
Your poem came to John Biggs, my room-mate, and we’ll put it in the next number—however it was practically illegible so I’m sending you my copy (hazarded) which you’ll kindly correct and send back—
I’m here starting my senior year and still waiting for my commission. I’ll send you the Litt.* or no—you’ve subscribed haven’t you. . . .
Do write John Bishop and tell him not to call his book Green Fruit.
Alec is an ensign. I’m enclosing you a clever letter from Townsend Martin which I wish you’d send back.
Princeton is stupid but Gauss and Gerrould are here. I’m taking naught but Philosophy & English—I told Gauss you’d sailed (I’d heard as much) but I’ll contradict the rumor.
Have you read Well’s Boon, the Mind of the Race, (Doran—1916) It’s marvellous! (Debutante expression.)
The Litt is prosperous—Biggs & I do the prose—Creese and Keller (a junior who’ll be chairman) and I the poetry. However any contributions would be ect. ect.
Young Benêt (at New Haven) is getting out a book of verse before Xmas that I fear will obscure John Peale’s. His subjects are less precieuse & decadent. John is really an anachronism in this country at this time—people want ideas and not fabrics.
I’m rather bored here but I see Shane Leslie occasionally and read Wells and Rousseau. I read Mrs. Geroulds British Novelists Limited & think she underestimates Wells but is right in putting McKenzie at the head of his school. She seems to disregard Barry and Chesterton whom I should put above Bennet or in fact anyone except Wells.
Do you realize that Shaw is 61, Wells 51, Chesterton 41, Leslie 31 and I 21. (Too bad I haven’t a better man for 31. I can hear your addition to this remark). . . .
Yes—Jack Newlin is dead—killed in ambulance service. He was, potentially, a great artist.
Here is a poem I just had accepted by Poet Lore
THE WAY OF PURGATION*
A fathom deep in sleep I lie
With old desires, restrained before;
To clamor life-ward with a cry
As dark flies out the greying door.
And so in quest of creeds to share
I seek assertive day again;
But old monotony is there—
Long, long avenues of rain.
Oh might I rise again! Might I
Throw off the throbs of that old wine—
See the new morning mass the sky
With fairy towers, line on line—
Find each mirage in the high air
A symbol, not a dream again!
But old monotony is there—
Long, long avenues of rain.
No—I have no more stuff of Johns—I ask but never receive.
If Hillquit gets the mayoralty of New York it means a new era. Twenty million Russians from South Russia have come over to the Roman Church.
* * *
News jottings (unofficial)
* * *
I can go to Italy if I like as private secretary of a man (a priest) who is going as Cardinal Gibbons representative to discuss the war with the Pope (American Catholic point of view—which is most loyal—barring the Sien-Fien—40% of Pershing’s army are Irish Catholics). Do write.
Gaelicly yours
Scott Fitzgerald
I remind myself lately of Pendennis, Sentimental Tommy (who was not sentimental and whom Barrie never understood) Michael Fane, Maurice Avery & Guy Hazelwood,†
TO EDMUND WILSON
Jan. 10th, 1917 [1918]
Dear Bunny:
Your last refuge from the cool sophistries of the shattered world, is destroyed!* I have left Princeton. I am now Lieutenant F. Scott Fitzgerald of the 45th Infantry (regulars).
My present address is
co Q.P.O.B.
Ft. Leavenworth
Kan.
After Feb 26th
593 Summit Ave.
St. Paul
Minnesota
will always find me forwarded.
—So the short, swift chain of the Princeton intellectuals, Brooke’s clothes, clean ears and, withall, a lack of mental prigishness . . . Whipple, Wilson, Bishop, Fitzgerald . . . have passed along the path of the generation—leaving their shining crown upon the gloss and unworthiness of John Bigg’s head.
One of your poems I sent on to the Litt. and I’ll send the other when I’ve read it again. I wonder if you ever got the Litt. I sent you . . . So I enclosed you two pictures,† well give one to some poor motherless Poilu fairy who has no dream. This is smutty and forced but in an atmosphere of cabbage. . .
John’s book came out in December and though I’ve written him rheams (Rhiems) of praise, I think he’s made poor use of his material. It is a thin Green Book.
GREEN FRUIT
by JOHN PEALE BISHOP
1st Lt. Inf. R.C.
SHERMAN FRENCH CO.
BOSTON
In section one (Souls and Fabrics) are Boudoir, The Nassau Inn and of all things Fillipo’s Wife, a relic of his decadent sophomore days. Claudius and other documents in obscurity adorn this section.
Section two contains the Elspeth poems—which I think are rotten. Section three is Poems out of Jersey and Virginia and has Campbell Hall, Millville and much sacharine sentiment about how much white bodies pleased him and how, nevertheless, he was about to take his turn with crushed brains (this slender thought done over in poem after poem). This is my confidential opinion, however; if he knew what a nut I considered him for leaving out Ganymede
and Salem Water and Francis Thompson and Prayer and all the things that might have given body to his work, he’d drop me from his writing list. The book closed with the dedication to Town-send Martin which is on the circular I enclose. I have seen no reviews of it yet.
* * * * * * * *
THE ROMANTIC EGOTIST
by F. SCOTT FITZGERALD
“. . . the Best is over
You may complain and sigh
Oh Silly Lover. . .”
Rupert Brooke
“Experience is the name Tubby gives to his mistakes.”
Oscar Wilde
Chas. Scribners Sons (Maybe!)
MCMXVIII
* * * * * * * *
There are twenty-three chapters, all but five are written and it is poetry, prose, vers libre and every mood of a temperamental temperature. It purports to be the picaresque ramble of one Stephen Palms [Dalius?] from the San Francisco fire thru school, Princeton, to the end where at twentyone he writes his autobiography at the Princeton aviation school. It shows traces of Tarkington, Chesterton, Chambers, Wells, Benson (Robert Hugh), Rupert Brooke and includes Compton-McKenzielike love-affairs and three psychic adventures including an encounter with the devil in a harlot’s apartment.
It rather damns much of Princeton but its nothing to what it thinks of men and human nature in general. I can most nearly describe it by calling it a prose, modernistic Childe Harolde and really if Scribner takes it I know I’ll wake some morning and find that the debutantes have made me famous over night. I really believe that no one else could have written so searchingly the story of the youth of our generation.
In my right hand bunk sleeps the editor of Contemporary Verse (ex) Devereux Joseph, Harvard ’15 and a peach—on my left side is G. C. King a Harvard crazy man who is dramatizing War and Peace; but you see I’m lucky in being well protected from the Philistines.
The Litt continues slowly but I haven’t received the December issue yet so I cant pronounce on the quality.
This insolent war has carried off Stuart Wolcott in France, as you may know and really is beginning to irritate me—but the maudlin sentiment of most people is still the spear in my side. In everything except my romantic Chestertonian orthodoxy I still agree with the early Wells on human nature and the “no hope for Tono Bungay” theory.
God! How I miss my youth—that’s only relative of course but already lines are beginning to coarsen in other people and that’s the sure sign. I don’t think you ever realized at Princeton the childlike simplicity that lay behind all my petty sophistication and my lack of a real sense of honor. I’d be a wicked man if it wasn’t for that and now that’s disappearing.
Well I’m overstepping and boring you and using up my novel’s material. So Goodbye. Do write and lets keep in touch if you like.
God bless you.
Celticly
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Bishop’s adress
Lieut. John Peale Bishop (He’s a 1st Lt.)
334th Infantry
Camp Taylor
Kentucky
TO EDMUND WILSON
[1920]
599 Summit Ave.
St. Paul, Minn
August 15th
Dear Bunny:
Delighted to get your letter. I am deep in the throes of a new novel.
Which is the best title
(1) The Education of a Personage
(2) The Romantic Egotist
(3) This Side of Paradise
I am sending it to Scribner. They liked my first one. Am enclosing two letters from them that might amuse you. Please return them.
I have just finished the story for your book.* It’s not written yet. An American girl falls in love with an officer Francais at a southern camp.
Since I last saw you I’ve tried to get married & then tried to drink myself to death but foiled, as have been so many good men, by the sex and the state I have returned to literature.
Have sold three or four cheap stories to American magazines.
Will start on story for you about 25th d’Auout (as the French say or do not say) (which is about 10 days off)
I am ashamed to say that my Catholicism is scarcely more than a memory—no that’s wrong it’s more than that; at any rate I go not to the church nor mumble stray nothings over chrystaline beads.
Maybe in N’York in Sept or early Oct.
Is John Bishop in hoc terrain? . . .
For God’s sake Bunny write a novel & don’t waste your time editing collections. It’ll get to be a habit.
That sounds crass & discordant but you know what I mean.
Yours in the Holder* group
Scott Fitzgerald
TO EDMUND WILSON
[1920]
599 Summit Ave.
St. Paul, Minn.
Dear Bunny:
Scribner has accepted my book for publication late in the winter. You’ll call it sensational but it really is neither sentimental nor trashy.
I’ll probably be East in November & I’ll call you up or come to see you or something. Haven’t had time to hit a story for you yet. Better not count on me as the w. of i. or the E.S. are rather dry.
Yrs. faithfully
Francis S. Fitzgerald
TO JOHN V. A. WEAVER
[1921]
626 Goodrich Ave.
St. Paul, Minn
Dear John:
I was tickled to write the review.* I saw Broun’s & F.P.A.’s reviews but you know how they love me & how much attention I pay to their dictums.
This is my new style of letter writing.† It is to make it easy for comments & notes to be put in when my biographer begins to assemble my collected letters.
The Metropolitan isn’t here yet. I shall certainly read Enamel. I wish to Christ I could go to Europe.
Thine
F. Scott Fitzgerald
TO EDMUND WILSON
[Postmarked November 25, 1921 ]
626 Goodrich Avenue
St. Paul, Minn.
Dear Bunny:
Thank you for your congratulations.‡ I’m glad the damn thing’s over. Zelda came through without a scratch & I have awarded her the croix-de-guerre with palm. Speaking of France, the great general with the suggestive name is in town today.
I agree with you about Mencken—Weaver & Dell are both something awful. . . .
I have almost completely rewritten my book.* Do you remember you told me that in my midnight symposium scene I had sort of set the stage for a play that never came off—in other words when they all began to talk none of them had anything important to say. I’ve interpolated some recent ideas of my own and (possibly) of others. See inclosure at end of letter.† . . . Having disposed of myself I turn to you. I am glad you and Ted Paramore are together. . . I like Ted immensely. He is a little too much the successful Eli to live comfortably in his mind’s bed-chamber but I like him immensely.
What in hell does this mean? My control must have dictated it. His name is Mr. Ikki and he is an Alaskan orange-grower
If the baby is ugly she can retire into the shelter of her full name Frances Scott.
St. Paul is dull as hell. Have written two good short stories and three cheap ones.
I like Three Soldiers immensely & reviewed it for the St. Paul Daily News. I am tired of modern novels & have just finished Paine’s biography of Clemens. It’s excellent. Do let me see if you do me for the Bookman. Isn’t The Triumph of the Egg a wonderful title. I liked both John’s‡ and Don’s § articles in Smart Set. I am lonesome for N. Y. May get there next fall & may go to England to live. Yours in this hell-hole of life & time, the world.
F. Scott Fitz
TO EDMUND WILSON
[Postmarked January 24, 1922]
626 Goodrich Ave.
St. Paul, Minn.
Dear Bunny:
Farrar tells a man here that I’m to be in the March Literary Spotlight.* I deduce that this is your doing. My curiosity is at fever heat—for God’s sake send me a copy immed
iately.
Have you read Upton Sinclair’s The Brass Check?
Have you seen Hergeshiemer’s movie Tol’able David?
Both are excellent. I have written two wonderful stories & get letters of praise from six editors with the addenda that “our readers, however, would be offended.” Very discouraging. Also discouraging that Knopf has put off the Garland† till fall. I enjoyed your da-daist article in Vanity Fair—also the free advertising Bishop gave us. Zelda says the picture of you is “beautiful and bloodless.”
I am bored as hell out here. The baby is well—we dazzle her exquisite eyes with gold pieces in the hopes that she’ll marry a millionaire. We’ll be east for ten days early in March…
What are you doing? I was tremendously interested by all the data in your last letter. I am dying of a sort of emotional aenemia like the lady in Pound’s poem. The Briary Bush is stinko.
Cytherea is Hergeshiemer’s best but its not quite.
Yours
John Grier Hibben‡
TO JOHN PEALE BISHOP
[Probably written in the spring of 1922]
626 Goodrich Avenue
[St. Paul, Minn.]
Dear John:
I’ll tell you frankly what I’d rather you’d do. Tell specifically what you like about the book* and don’t— —. The characters—Anthony, Gloria, Adam Patch, Maury, Bleekman, Muriel Dick, Rachael, Tana ect ect ect. Exactly whether they are good or bad, convincing or not. What you think of the style, too ornate (if so quote) good (also quote) rotten (also quote). What emotion (if any) the book gave you. What you think of its humor. What you think of its ideas. If ideas are bogus hold them up specifically and laugh at them. Is it boring or interesting. How interesting. What recent American books are more so. If you think my “Flash Back in Paradise” in Chap I is like the elevated moments of D. W. Griffith say so. Also do you think it is imitative and of whom.
What I’m angling for is a specific definite review. I’m tickled both that they have asked for such a lengthy thing and that you are going to do it. You cannot hurt my feelings about the book—tho I did resent in your Baltimore article being definitely limited at 25 years old to a place between McKenzie who wrote 2½ good (but not wonderful) novels and then died—and Tarkington who if he has any talent has the mind of a schoolboy. I mean, at my age, they’d done nothing.
As I say I’m delighted that you’re going to do it and as you wrote asking me to suggest a general mode of attack I am telling you frankly what I would like. I’m so afraid of all the reviews being general and I devoted so much more care myself to the detail of the book than I did to thinking out the general scheme that I would appreciate a detailed review. If it is to be that length article it could scarcely be all general anyway.