A Difficult Woman

by Alice Kessler-Harris

  9 LH to Rabbi Feibelman, November 13, 1941, and Julian Feibelman to LH, November 5, 1941, box 91, “Watch on the Rhine” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  10 LH to Jack Warner, March 9, 1943, box 91, “Watch on the Rhine” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  11 This and the following quotes are from Jack Warner to LH, March 12, 1943, and LH to Jack Warner, March 24, 1943, box 91, “Watch on the Rhine” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  12 LH to Audio Subscriptions, Inc., July 19, 1942, box 91, “Watch on the Rhine/Correspondence and Statements” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  13 LH to Bennett Cerf, July 5, 1944, box 91, “Watch on the Rhine/Correspondence and Statements” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  14 LH to Hal Keith, August 27, 1946, box 91, “Watch on the Rhine/Correspondence and Statements” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  15 LH to Bennett Cerf, November 8, 1943, “Watch on the Rhine/Correspondence and Statements” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  16 LH to Mr. Jelinek, July 12, 1947, “Watch on the Rhine/Correspondence and Statements” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  17 William Abrahams, notes, box 77, folder 1, William Miller Abrahams Papers, SUL.

  18 Lillian Hellman, schedule of securities, December 31, 1944, box 103, folder 9, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  19 Dashiell Hammett to LH, April 5, 1944, box 77, folder 8, William Miller Abrahams Papers, SUL. See also Dashiell Hammett to LH, January 8, 1944, box 77, folder 8 and Dashiell Hammett to Nancy Bragdon, June 4, 1944, box 77, folder 6, William Miller Abrahams Papers, SUL.

  20 Edith Kean to LH, March 24, 1951, box 91, “Watch on the Rhine (Tax matters, 1951)” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  21 Copy of the ad from the New York Times, August 1951, box 65, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  22 Katherine Brown to LH, August 23, 1951, box 53, folder 52, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC. Letters that follow are September 1, 1951, and October 12, 1951, box 53, folder 52, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  23 LH to Losey, February 5, 1953, box 5, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC. Losey apparently held no grudge. Twenty years later, he asked Hellman to write a script from Conrad’s The Secret Sharer. Hellman was intrigued but ultimately refused. Joe Losey to LH, June 30, 1972, and LH to Joseph Losey, July 18, 1972, box 3, “June–November, 1972” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. (New York, NY) Records, Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University, New York, NY.

  24 Morris and Lore Dickstein, interview by author, March 24, 2005.

  25 Letters between LH and Arthur Kober, box 71, folders 2–9, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  26 Letters from LH to Lois Fritsch, typed or handwritten on stationery from the Eden Hotel-Roma or the Hotel Dorchester in London, undated, box 122, folder 2, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  27 Ibid.

  28 LH to Lois Fritsch from Eden Hotel-Roma, undated, box 122, folder 2, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  29 LH to Lois Fritsch from the Dorchester, London, undated, box 122, folder 2, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  30 Hellman, Pentimento, 200.

  31 Jan Van Loewen to LH, March 1953, box 72, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  32 LH to Kermit Bloomgarden, February 26, 1954, box 72, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  33 LH to Jean Anouilh, April 13, 1954, April 23, 1954, and May 10, 1954, box 72, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  34 Kay Brown to Jean Anouilh, May 12, 1954, and Jean Anouilh to Kay Brown, May 19, 1954, box 72, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  35 Jan Van Loewen to Kay Brown, December 13, 1955, and Kay Brown to Jan Van Loewen, December 15, 1955, box 72, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  36 Stewart Benedict, “Anouilh in America,” Modern Language Journal 45 (December 1961): 342.

  37 Jan Van Loewen to LH, January 18, 1974, box 72, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  38 Maurice Peress interview with Gordon Davidson, August 17, 2010, unpublished, Los Angeles, CA. I am grateful to Maurice Peress for providing this material and the insights that follow from it.

  39 Maurice Peress, interview by author, August 19, 2010.

  40 LH to Robby Lantz, February 8, 1966, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  41 LH to Leonard Bernstein, November 22, 1971, box 122, folder 16, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  42 Selma Wolfman to Arthur Richenthal, December 13, 1962, box 70, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  43 These claims are in box 68, folder 3, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  44 Hellman’s secretary detailed the history of these insurance company cancellations and refusals over a five-year period to her lawyer, Oscar Bernstein, concluding, “Since December 15, 1962, Kermit Bloomgarden’s agent, an agent from Arthur Richenthal and a third agent have all tried to get a policy but without success.” Selma Wolfman to Oscar Bernstein, May 17, 1963, box 70, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  45 Philip Stern to LH, May 31, 1963, box 70, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  46 LH to Calvin Siegel, February 27, 1964, box 70, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  47 LH to Kurtis Sameth Hill, Inc., July 29, 1968, box 70, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  48 Draft typescript, “Deposition by Lillian Hellman, June 1962”; O’Dwyer and Bernstein to Mrs. Josephine Marshall, March 19, 1963; box 56, unfiled materials, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  49 LH to Ronald Bernstien, August 29, 1969, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  50 Donald Condon to Norman Swallow, May 10, 1978, Hellman/Hammett Estate Files, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  51 LH to Oscar Bernstein, January 14, 1965, box 54, “Hammett Estate” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  52 LH to Oscar Bernstein, May 24, 1965, box 54, “Hammett Estate” folder, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  53 Hellman, Pentimento, 258.

  54 Lillian Hellman, “Comments,” spring 1963, box 40, folder 5, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC. These were frivolous short pieces that smacked of selling one’s soul for money.

  55 Selma Wolfman to “Dear Mr. Lantz,” October 28, 1963, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  56 LH to Robby Lantz, January 20, 1964, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  57 LH to Robby Lantz, February 12, 1964, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  58 LH to Robby Lantz, November 6, 1963, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  59 Robby Lantz to Caskie Stinnett, August 7, 1963, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  60 Don Congdon to LH, June 13, 1977, and LH to Don Congdon, June 15, 1977, box 3, “Feb-June, 1977” folder; Heather Hirson to Don Congdon, November 16, 1977, box 3, “July-Dec, 1977” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  61 LH to Don Congdon, June 16, 1971, box 51, folder 12, Lillian Hellman Collection. She used the phrase again in LH to Don Congdon, August 17, 1971, box 3, “June-Nov, 1971” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  62 Don Congdon to Viera Dinkova, October 29, 1971, box 48, “Lillian Hellman, ’71” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  63 Patricia Naggiar to LH, July 19, 1977, box 3, “July-December” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  64 Rita Wade to Ephraim London, February 9, 1976, and Ephraim London to Rita Wade, February 10, 1976, box 77, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  65 Nancy Troland to LH, January 17, 1977, and Don Congdon to LH, November 23, 1976, box 52, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  66 Don Congdon to Nancy Troland, January 21, 1977, box 52, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  67 Don Congdon to Antonia Handler Chayes, March 4, 1977, uncatalogued papers, “Hellman: Hammett Esta
te, 1977” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  68 Don Congdon to Flora Roberts, December 4, 1973, box 48, “Hellman/Hammett Jan-June” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  69 Don Congdon to LH, with handwritten LH note, May 13, 1977, box 3, “Feb-June, 1977” folder, and Don Congdon to Ruzica Vlaskalin, June 14, 1977, uncatalogued papers, “Hellman: Hammett Estate, 1977” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  70 Don Congdon to Helen Harvey, September 15, 1976, box 49, unfiled papers, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  71 This went on until her death. See Robby Lantz to LH, March 6, 1984, box 72, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  72 Don Congdon to LH, December 17, 1974, box 3, “Feb-Nov, 1974” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  73 Don Congdon to LH, October 26, 1977, box 3, “July-Dec, 1977” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  74 Exchange of letters with Vicky Wilson of Alfred Knopf, December 1980, box 72, folder 3, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  75 LH to Don Congdon, April 5, 1977, and Don Congdon to LH, April 11, 1977, box 3, “Feb-June, 1977” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  76 LH to Don Congdon, January 19, 1976, Don Congdon to LH, January 26, 1976, box 3, “Jan-Dec, 1976” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  77 Robby Lantz to Lillian Hellman, June 29, 1971, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  78 LH to Robby Lantz, July 15, 1971, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  79 LH to Donald Oresman, July 16, 1974, box 3, “July to December, 1974” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records.

  80 LH to Don Congdon, August 16, 1977. See also exchange of letters with Congdon over a contract with ICM, August 2, 1977, August 5, 1977, and August 12, 1977, box 3, “July-December, 1977” folder, Harold Matson Company, Inc. Records, RBML.

  81 Don Congdon to LH, September 23, 1983, box 52, folder 2, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  82 Robby Lantz to LH, January 9, 1984, and February 6, 1984, box 72, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  83 LH to Robby Lantz, July 7, 1969, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  84 For example, see LH to Lantz, July 15, 1971, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  85 LH to Robby Lantz, June 11, 1964, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  86 LH to Robby Lantz, February 8, 1966, box 72, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  87 LH to Herman Shumlin, August 13 and 15, 1969, box 73, folder 2, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  88 Donald Oresman to Jack Klein, November 11, 1977, box 52, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  89 LH to Donald Oresman, December 28, 1978, box 52, folder 3, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  90 Donald Oresman to Lillian Hellman, January 17, 1979, box 52, folder 4, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  91 In New York lingo, that meant a twenty-four-hour doorman, an on-site superintendent, a handyman, elevator operators, and janitorial service.

  92 The offer she turned down was from Douglas Elliman. She bought the house in 1944 for $48,000.

  93 Theodore Zimmerman to LH, May 23, 1969, box 66, folder 8. See also letters and memos from LH to Zimmerman, May 29, 1969, September 17, 1969, November 6, 1969, box 66, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  94 LH to Joyce Hartman, August 20, 1969, box 66, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  95 LH to Joan Zimmerman, October 13, 1970, box 66, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  96 LH to Theodore Zimmerman, October 6, 1972, box 66, folder 5, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  97 LH to Paul O’Dwyer, May 8, 1973; see also letters of October 3, 1973, October 12, 1973, October 17, 1973, January 14, 1974, box 66, folder 5, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  98 Hellman closed on apartment 10A on June 23, 1970, and the move, supervised by Mrs. Loftus, took place on July 25–27. Hellman returned from the Vineyard to the completed apartment in September.

  99 LH to William Michael, December 14, 1970, box 66, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  100 LH to Mildred Loftus, August 10, 1970, box 66, folder 8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  101 Ibid.

  102 LH to Selma Wolfman, handwritten note, 1958, box 68, folder 4, and LH to Mr. Barton, November 8, 1961, box 68, folder 3, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  103 Lillian Hellman, typescript, “Things to Do,” April 10, 1973, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  104 LH to Miss Jovic, April 6, 1979, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  105 Rosemary Mahoney, A Likely Story: One Summer with Lillian Hellman (New York: Doubleday, 1998).

  106 Per author conversation with Rose Styron, who tells of walking toward Hellman’s Martha’s Vineyard home one afternoon and turning back in embarrassment after she heard Hellman loudly berating her helper.

  107 LH to “Dear Amy,” June 8, 1980, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  108 Ming Hu to LH, September 29, 1980, November 25, 1980, December 25, 1980, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  109 LH to Mercedes Tello, December 31, 1980, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  110 LH to Nell Mohn, May 16, 1980, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  111 LH to “Whom it may concern,” October 6, 1980, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  112 Typescript, untitled statements, April 8, 1981, and April 10, 1981, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  113 Letter (name changed to protect the writer) to Rita Wade, May 21, 1981, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  114 LH to “Linda,” September 21, 1981, box 67, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  115 LH to Paul O’Dwyer, July 5, 1972, box 89, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  116 Nancy Bragdon to Stanley Isaacs, June 25, 1946, box 87, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  117 Arthur Cowan to LH, December 23, 1957, box 89, folder 6, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  118 Florence Newhouse to LH, May 27, 1960, box 89, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  119 LH to Florence Newhouse, June 13, 1960, box 89, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  120 LH to Paul O’Dwyer, July 5, 1972, box 89, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  121 Morris and Lore Dickstein, interview by author, March 24, 2005.

  122 Florence Newhouse to LH, c. 1968, box 89, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  123 LH to Paul O’Dwyer, December 6, 1973, box 90, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  124 LH to Paul O’Dwyer, July 5, 1972; see also O’Dwyer to LH, June 27, 1972, box 89, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  125 LH to Donald Oresman, May 1, 1979, box 52, folder 4, Lillian Hellman Collection.

  126 Jack Klein, Lillian Hellman estate statements, box 29, folder 1, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  8. A Known Communist

  1 Winston Churchill, “The Sinews of Peace,” March 5, 1946, Fulton, Missouri.

  2 Harry Truman, “‘Word Has Just Been Received’: Truman Speaks on the Railroad Strike,” May 24, 1946, http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5137/.

  3 LH to John Melby, c. May 28, 1946, box 81, folder 7/8, Lillian Hellman Collection, Harry Ranson Center, University of Texas at Austin.

  4 Studs Terkel, “The Wiretap This Time,” New York Times (October 29, 2007): A19.

  5 Lillian Hellman, “From America,” in Daniel S. Gillmor, ed., Speaking of Peace (New York: National Council of the Arts, Sciences and Professions, 1949), 122; see also FBI case file, New York Section, April 9, 1951, file no: 100-2858 EXM, box 74, folder 5, 10, William Miller Abrahams Papers, M1125, Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, CA. The FBI, keeping track of
Harry Hopkins, thought Hellman, “an alleged communist,” might have had an affair with Hopkins, whom it described as “very pro Russian and pro Communist.”

  6 The clearest exposition of this phenomenon is in Richard Pells, The Liberal Mind in a Conservative Age: American Intellectuals in the 1940s and 1950s (New York: Harper and Row, 1985), 284–85.

  7 Ibid., 285.

  8 Clifton Brock, Americans for Democratic Action (New York: Public Affairs Press, 1962), 52.

  9 Pells, Liberal Mind, 285: the fundamental argument was between the belief of many liberals (including liberal intellectuals like Schlesinger, Hook, and Philip Rahv) in what Richard Pells calls “the continuing danger of traitors and spies in high places, the necessity of security checks and legislative restraints to safeguard democracy, the tendency of Communists on trial to dissemble and deceive, the definition of Communism itself as a foreign conspiracy, and the need for intellectuals to acknowledge their moral guilt and cast off their political innocence.”

  10 Marilyn Berger, “Profile, Lillian Hellman,” in Jackson Bryer, ed., Conversations with Lillian Hellman (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1986), 251–252.

  11 Richard Parker, John Kenneth Galbraith: His Life, His Politics, His Economics (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux), 261.

  12 Pells, Liberal, 265. Here Hellman is placed among a handful of intellectuals who refused to “serve the State.” He includes among these Dwight MacDonald, Henry Steele Commager, I. F. Stone, Mary McCarthy, Arthur Miller, and Michael Harrington.

  13 LH to Muriel Rukeyser, February 8, 1945, box 41, folder 7, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  14 LH to John Melby, c. May 28, 1946, box 81, folder 7/8, Lillian Hellman Collection, HRC.

  15 Daily Worker, “Women Ask for Peace” (March 8, 1946): 9. Other equally respectable signatories included Mrs. Henry Wallace, Mrs. J. Borden Harriman, Rep. Helen Gahagan Douglas (Richard Nixon’s first political victim), Helen Hayes, Katherine Lenroot, chief of the U.S. Children’s Bureau, Mrs. David de Sola Pool, and Mrs. La Fell Dickinson, president of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs.