Trimalchio1 in West Egg
The only other titles that seem to fit it are Trimalchio and On the Road to West Egg. I had two others Gold-hatted Gatsby and The High-bouncing Lover but they seemed too light.
We leave for Rome as soon as I finish the short story I’m working on.
As Ever
Scott
I was interested that you’ve moved to New Canaan. It sounds wonderful. Sometimes I’m awfully anxious to be home.
But I am confused at what you say about Gertrude Stien. I thought it was one purpose of critics + publishers to educate the public up to original work. The first people who risked Conrad certainly didn’t do it as a commercial venture. Did the evolution of startling work into accepted work cease twenty years ago?
Do send me Boyds (Ernest’s) book1 when it comes out. I think the Lardner ads are wonderful. Did the Dark Cloud flop?
Would you ask the people down stairs to keep sending me my monthly bill for the encyclopedia?
FROM: Maxwell Perkins2
CC, 2 pp. Princeton University
New York City
Nov. 18, 1924
Dear Scott:
I think the novel is a wonder. I’m taking it home to read again and shall then write my impressions in full;—but it has vitality to an extraordinary degree, and glamour, and a great deal of underlying thought of unusual quality. It has a kind of mystic atmosphere at times that you infused into parts of “Paradise” and have not since used. It is a marvelous fusion, into a unity of presentation, of the extraordinary incongruities of life today. And as for sheer writing, it’s astonishing.
Now deal with this question: various gentlemen here don’t like the title,—in fact none like it but me. To me, the strange incongruity of the words in it sound the note of the book. But the objectors are more practical men than I. Consider as quickly as you can the question of a change.
But if you do not change, you will have to leave that note off the wrap. Its presence would injure it too much;—and good as the wrap always seemed, it now seems a masterpiece for this book. So judge of the value of the title when it stands alone and write or cable your decision the instant you can.
With congratulations, I am,
Yours,
FROM: Maxwell Perkins
CC, 4 pp. Princeton University
New York City
November 20, 1924
Dear Scott:
I think you have every kind of right to be proud of this book. It is an extraordinary book, suggestive of all sorts of thoughts and moods. You adopted exactly the right method of telling it, that of employing a narrator who is more of a spectator than an actor: this puts the reader upon a point of observation on a higher level than that on which the characters stand and at a distance that gives perspective. In no other way could your irony have been so immensely effective, nor the reader have been enabled so strongly to feel at times the strangeness of human circumstance in a vast heedless universe. In the eyes of Dr. Eckleberg various readers will see different significances; but their presence gives a superb touch to the whole thing: great unblinking eyes, expressionless, looking down upon the human scene. It’s magnificent!
I could go on praising the book and speculating on its various elements, and meanings, but points of criticism are more important now. I think you are right in feeling a certain slight sagging in chapters six and seven, and I don’t know how to suggest a remedy. I hardly doubt that you will find one and I am only writing to say that I think it does need something to hold up here to the pace set, and ensuing. I have only two actual criticisms:—
One is that among a set of characters marvelously palpable and vital—I would know Tom Buchanan if I met him on the street and would avoid him—Gatsby is somewhat vague. The reader’s eyes can never quite focus upon him, his outlines are dim. Now everything about Gatsby is more or less a mystery i.e. more or less vague, and this may be somewhat of an artistic intention, but I think it is mistaken. Couldn’t he be physically described as distinctly as the others, and couldn’t you add one or two characteristics like the use of that phrase “old sport”,—not verbal, but physical ones, perhaps. I think that for some reason or other a reader—this was true of Mr. Scribner and of Louise1—gets an idea that Gatsby is a much older man than he is, although you have the writer say that he is little older than himself. But this would be avoided if on his first appearance he was seen as vividly as Daisy and Tom are, for instance;—and I do not think your scheme would be impaired if you made him so.
The other point is also about Gatsby: his career must remain mysterious, of course. But in the end you make it pretty clear that his wealth came through his connection with Wolfsheim. You also suggest this much earlier. Now almost all readers numerically are going to be puzzled by his having all this wealth and are going to feel entitled to an explanation. To give a distinct and definite one would be, of course, utterly absurd. It did occur to me though, that you might here and there interpolate some phrases, and possibly incidents, little touches of various kinds, that would suggest that he was in some active way mysteriously engaged. You do have him called on the telephone, but couldn’t he be seen once or twice consulting at his parties with people of some sort of mysterious significance, from the political, the gambling, the sporting world, or whatever it may be. I know I am floundering, but that fact may help you to see what I mean. The total lack of an explanation through so large a part of the story does seem to me a defect;—or not of an explanation, but of the suggestion of an explanation. I wish you were here so I could talk about it to you for then I know I could at least make you understand what I mean. What Gatsby did ought never to be definitely imparted, even if it could be. Whether he was an innocent tool in the hands of somebody else, or to what degree he was this, ought not to be explained. But if some sort of business activity of his were simply adumbrated, it would lend further probability to that part of the story.
There is one other point: in giving deliberately Gatsby’s biography when he gives it to the narrator you do depart from the method of the narrative in some degree, for otherwise almost everything is told, and beautifully told, in the regular flow of it,—in the succession of events or in accompaniment with them. But you can’t avoid the biography altogether. I thought you might find ways to let the truth of some of his claims like “Oxford” and his army career come out bit by bit in the course of actual narrative. I mention the point anyway for consideration in this interval before I send the proofs.
The general brilliant quality of the book makes me ashamed to make even these criticisms. The amount of meaning you get into a sentence, the dimensions and intensity of the impression you make a paragraph carry, are most extraordinary. The manuscript is full of phrases which make a scene blaze with life. If one enjoyed a rapid railroad journey I would compare the number and vividness of pictures your living words suggest, to the living scenes disclosed in that way. It seems in reading a much shorter book than it is, but it carries the mind through a series of experiences that one would think would require a book of three times its length.
The presentation of Tom, his place, Daisy and Jordan, and the unfolding of their characters is unequalled so far as I know. The description of the valley of ashes adjacent to the lovely country, the conversation and the action in Myrtle’s apartment, the marvelous catalogue of those who came to Gatsby’s house,—these are such things as make a man famous. And all these things, the whole pathetic episode, you have given a place in time and space, for with the help of T. J. Eckleberg and by an occasional glance at the sky, or the sea, or the city, you have imparted a sort of sense of eternity. You once told me you were not a natural writer—my God! You have plainly mastered the craft, of course; but you needed far more than craftsmanship for this.
As ever,
P.S. Why do you ask for a lower royalty on this than you had on the last book where it changed from 15% to 171/2% after 20,000 and to 20% after 40,000? Did you do it in order to give us a better margin for advertising?
We shall advertise very energetically anyhow and if you stick to the old terms you will sooner overcome the advance. Naturally we should like the ones you suggest better, but there is no reason you should get less on this than you did on the other.
TO: Maxwell Perkins
c. December 1, 1924
ALS, 3 pp. Princeton University
Hotel des Princes
Piazza di Spagna
Rome, Italy
Dear Max:
Your wire + your letters made me feel like a million dollars—I’m sorry I could make no better response than a telegram whining for money. But the long siege of the novel winded me a little + I’ve been slow on starting the stories on which I must live.
I think all your critisisms are true
(a) About the title. I’ll try my best but I don’t know what I can do. Maybe simply “Trimalchio” or “Gatsby.” In the former case I don’t see why the note shouldn’t go on the back.
Chapters VI + VII I know how to fix
Gatsby’s business affairs I can fix. I get your point about them.
His vagueness I can repair by making more pointed—this doesn’t sound good but wait and see. It’ll make him clear
But his long narrative in Chap VIII will be difficult to split up. Zelda also thought I was a little out of key but it is good writing and I don’t think I could bear to sacrifice any of it
I have 1000 minor corrections which I will make on the proof + several more large ones which you didn’t mention.
Your critisisms were excellent + most helpful + you picked out all my favorite spots in the book to praise as high spots. Except you didn’t mention my favorite of all—the chapter where Gatsby + Daisy meet.
Two more things. Zelda’s been reading me the cowboy book1 aloud to spare my mind + I love it—tho I think he learned the American language from Ring rather than from his own ear.
Another point—in Chap. II of my book when Tom + Myrte go into the bedroom while Carraway reads Simon called Peter2—is that raw? Let me know. I think its pretty nessessary.
I made the royalty smaller because I wanted to make up for all the money you’ve advanced these two years by letting it pay a sort of interest on it. But I see by calculating I made it too small—a difference of 2000 dollars. Let us call it 15% up to 40,000 and 20% after that. That’s a good fair contract all around.
By now you have heard from a smart young french woman who wants to translate the book. She’s equeal to it intellectually + linguisticly I think—had read all my others—If you’ll tell her how to go about it as to royalty demands ect.
Anyhow thanks + thanks + thanks for your letters. I’d rather have you + Bunny like it than anyone I know. And I’d rather have you like it than Bunny. If its as good as you say, when I finish with the proof it’ll be perfect.
Remember, by the way, to put by some cloth for the cover uniform with my other books.
As soon as I can think about the title I’ll write or wire a decision. Thank Louise for me, for liking it. Best Regards to Mr. Scribner. Tell him Galsworthy is here in Rome.
As Ever,
Scott
TO: Maxwell Perkins
c. December 20, 1924
ALS, 5pp. Princeton University
Hotel des Princes, Piazza de Spagna, Rome.
Dear Max:
I’m a bit (not very—not dangerously) stewed tonight + I’ll probably write you a long letter. We’re living in a small, unfashionable but most comfortable hotel at $525.00 a month including tips, meals ect. Rome does not particularly interest me but its a big year here, and early in the spring we’re going to Paris. There’s no use telling you my plans because they’re usually just about as unsuccessful as to work as a religious prognosticaters are as to the End of the World. I’ve got a new novel to write—title and all, that’ll take about a year. Meanwhile, I don’t want to start it until this is out + meanwhile I’ll do short stories for money (I now get $2000.00 a story but I hate worse than hell to do them) and there’s the never dying lure of another play.
Now! Thanks enormously for making up the $5000.00. I know I don’t technically deserve it considering I’ve had $3000.00 or $4000.00 for as long as I can remember. But since you force it on me (inexecrable [or is it execrable] joke) I will accept it. I hope to Christ you get 10 times it back on Gatsby——and I think perhaps you will.
For:
I can now make it perfect but the proof (I will soon get the immemorial letter with the statement “We now have the book in hand and will soon begin to send you proof” [what is ‘in hand’—I have a vague picture of everyone in the office holding the book in the right and and reading it]) will be one of the most expensive affairs since Madame Bovary. Please charge it to my account. If its possible to send a second proof over here I’d love to have it. Count on 12 days each way—four days here on first proof + two on the second. I hope there are other good books in the spring because I think now the public interest in books per se rises when there seems to be a group of them as in 1920 (spring + fall), 1921 (fall), 1922 (spring). Ring’s + Tom’s (first) books, Willa Cathers Lost Lady + in an inferior, cheap way Edna Ferber’s are the only American fiction in over two years that had a really excellent press (say, since Babbit).1
With the aid you’ve given me I can make “Gatsby” perfect. The chapter VII (the hotel scene) will never quite be up to mark—I’ve worried about it too long + I can’t quite place Daisy’s reaction. But I can improve it a lot. It isn’t imaginative energy thats lacking—its because I’m automaticly prevented from thinking it out over again because I must get all those characters to New York in order to have the catastrophe on the road going back + I must have it pretty much that way. So there’s no chance of bringing the freshness to it that a new free conception sometimes gives.
The rest is easy and I see my way so clear that I even see the mental quirks that queered it before. Strange to say my notion of Gatsby’s vagueness was O.K. What you and Louise + Mr. Charles Scribner found wanting was that:
I myself didn’t know what Gatsby looked like or was engaged in + you felt it. If I’d known + kept it from you you’d have been too impressed with my knowledge to protest. This is a complicated idea but I’m sure you’ll understand. But I know now—and as a penalty for not having known first, in other words to make sure I’m going to tell more.
It seems of almost mystical significance to me that you thot he was older—the man I had in mind, half unconsciously, was older (a specific individual) and evidently, without so much as a definate word, I conveyed the fact.—or rather, I must qualify this Shaw-Desmond-trash by saying, that I conveyed it without a word that I can at present and for the life of me, trace. (I think Shaw Desmond2 was one of your bad bets—I was the other)
Anyhow after careful searching of the files (of a man’s mind here) for the Fuller Magee case3 + after having had Zelda draw pictures until her fingers ache I know Gatsby better than I know my own child. My first instinct after your letter was to let him go + have Tom Buchanan dominate the book (I suppose he’s the best character I’ve ever done—I think he and the brother in “Salt” + Hurstwood in “Sister Carrie” are the three best characters in American fiction in the last twenty years, perhaps and perhaps not) but Gatsby sticks in my heart. I had him for awhile then lost him + now I know I have him again. I’m sorry Myrtle is better than Daisy. Jordan of course was a great idea (perhaps you know its Edith Cummings)4 but she fades out. Its Chap VII thats the trouble with Daisy + it may hurt the book’s popularity that its a man’s book.
Anyhow I think (for the first time since The Vegetable failed) that I’m a wonderful writer + its your always wonderful letters that help me to go on believing in myself.
Now some practical, very important questions. Please answer every one.
Montenegro has an order called The Order of Danilo. Is there any possible way you could find out for me there what it would look like—whether a courtesy decoration given to an American would bear an English inscription—or
anything to give versimilitude to the medal which sounds horribly amateurish.
Please have no blurbs of any kind on the jacket!!! No Mencken or Lewis or Sid Howard or anything. I don’t believe in them one bit any more.
Don’t forget to change name of book in list of works
Please shift exclamation point from end of 3d line to end of 4th line in title page. Please! Important!
I thought that the whole episode (2 paragraphs) about their playing the Jazz History of the world at Gatsby’s first party was rotten. Did you? Tell me frank reaction—personal. Don’t think! We can all think!
Got a sweet letter from Sid Howard—rather touching, I wrote him first. I thought Transatlantic was great stuff—a really gorgeous surprise. Up to that I never believed in him ‘specially + I was sorry because he did in me. Now I’m tickled silly to find he has power, and his own power. It seemed tragic too to see Mrs. Viectch wasted in a novelette when, despite Anderson the short story is at its lowest ebb as an art form. (Despite Ruth Suckow, Gertrude Stien, Ring there is a horrible impermanence on it because the overwhelming number of short stories are impermanent.1
Poor Tom Boyd! His cycle sounded so sad to me—perhaps it’ll be wonderful but it sounds to me like ploughing in a field first freshness has gone.
See that word?2 The ambition of my life is to make that use of it correct. The temptation to use it as a neuter is one of the vile fevers in my still insecure prose.
Tell me about Ring! About Tom—is he poor? He seems to be counting on his short story book, frail cane! About Biggs—did he ever finish the novel? About Peggy Boyd,3 I think Louise might have sent us her book!
I thot the White Monkey was stinko. On second thoughts I didn’t like Cowboys, West + South either. What about Bal de Compte Orget? and Ring’s set? and his new book? + Gertrude Stien? and Hemmingway?1
I still owe the store almost $700 on my Encyclopedia but I’ll pay them on about Jan 10th—all in a lump as I expect my finances will then be on a firm footing. Will you ask them to send me Ernest Boyd’s book? Unless it has about my drinking in it that would reach my family. However, I guess it’d worry me more if I hadn’t seen it than if I had. If my book is a big success or a great failure (financial—no other sort can be imagined, I hope) I don’t want to publish stories in the fall. If it goes between 25,000 and 50,000 I have an excellent collection for you. This is the longest letter I’ve written in three or four years. Please thank Mr. Scribner for me for his exceeding kindness.
A Life in Letters Page 10