by Amanda Vaill
17. “The invented part, for me, is what has meanin”
[>] “laughing our heads off”: JDP, The Best Times, p. 203.
Sara roasted . . . Christmas carols: HMD interview.
“big arty rout” . . . it was the Murphys: AMacL to EH, [10 Feb. 1930], Letters of Archibald MacLeish, p. 232.
“an impossible sort of cheque”: Bankers Trust Company check dated 18 Dec. 1929, and made out to SWM, BU.
“Don’t be mad . . . eternal snows”: SWM to RB, [1 Jan. 1929], BU.
[>] He would sit for hours . . . Miss Roussel or Gerald: Yvonne Roussel Luff interview.
February . . . visit to Antibes: HMD to Yvonne Roussel, [spring 1930], Yvonne R. Luff.
“DEUX CENTS FRANCS . . . MURPHYS” GCM cablegram to RB, 7 Feb. 1930; BU.
“Were you talking . . . right there with them!”: GCM to Nancy Milford, in Zelda, p. 157.
[>] Meanwhile the Murphys . . . Montana to Vermala: HMD to Yvonne Roussel, [spring 1930], Yvonne R. Luff.
“melancholly skenery”: HMD interview.
“there is no more”: HMD to Yvonne Roussel, [spring 1930], Yvonne R. Luff.
“Harry’s Bar” . . . piano and sing: DOS, By a Stroke of Luck! p. 187.
[>] “My father holds”: HMD to YR, [spring 1930], Yvonne R. Luff.
Sara had tried . . . he refused it: SWM telegram to RB, [spring 1931], BU. Because of the potency . . . hair of the dog: Meade, Dorothy Parker, pp. 211–12.
“I have a great surprise”: HMD to YR, [spring 1930], Yvonne R. Luff.
[>] “I don’t suppose”: SWM to FSF, 3 Apr. [1936], PUL; see also Meade, Dorothy Parker, p. 213.
“even though Patrick”: DOS, By a Stroke of Luck! p. 187.
Gerald rented current . . . Saturday nights: HMD to Yvonne Roussel, [spring 1930], Yvonne R. Luff.
In addition to the Murphys’ . . . rabbit: PFM II to GCM, [Sept. 1930], HMD.
parrot named Cocotte . . . shoulder everywhere: DP to RB, [7 Nov. 1929], BU.
“and two enormous turtles”: HMD to Yvonne Roussel, [spring 1930], Yvonne R. Luff.
[>] “that morbid, turned-in thing”: DP to RB, 7 Nov. 1929, BU.
One day he became enraged . . . slipper: Yvonne Roussel Luff interview.
There was another row . . . avoid everyone else: GCM to AMacL, 22 Jan. 1931, LOC.
“Gerald is here . . . breathe in it”: AMacL to FSF, 15 Sept. [1930], Letters of Archibald MacLeish, p. 236.
“After all these years”: GCM to AMacL, 22 Jan. 1929, LOC.
[>] “I hope . . . without offending you”: Ibid.
“a long hike”: S&G, p. 56.
[>] “he’d had a kind”: Hester Pickman/HMD interview, HMD.
“because I never believed”: Lillian Hellman/HMD interview, HMD.
“authenticity . . . prospects”: “Les Expositions/Exposition Murphy” (article signed “E.T.”), L’Intransigeant, 29 Jan. 1929, p. 5.
[>] “specialized in Anglo-Saxons”: GCM/CT interview, HMD.
“for me only the invented”: GCM/CT interview notes, HMD.
“He talked thoughtfully . . . undiscovered gold”: GCM to SWM, undated letter, quoted by GCM in a letter to CT, 12 Apr. 1962, HMD.
“very painful”: GCM to FSF, 9 Jun. 1937, PUL.
[>] “were the only other Americans . . . contralto”: Tender Is the Night pencil ms. 2, “The Melarkey Case,” PUL.
“Gerald’s Irishness”: FSF, The Notebooks ofF. Scott Fitzgerald, p. 149.
“Seth is quite amusing . . . who was with him”: Tender Is the Night pencil ms. 2, “The Melarkey Case,” PUL.
[>] “I don’t kiss people . . . hard woman”: Ibid. The line “I’m a hard woman” appears in Nicole’s dialogue in the published version of Tender Is the Night:
“‘I’m a mean, hard woman,’ she explained to Rosemary” (p. 21).
“You thought I was”: Callaghan, That Summer in Paris, p. 207. Callaghan and the bisexual Robert McAlmon had each recently been challenged to write stories about two homosexuals for This Quarter—Callaghan’s entry, entitled “Now That Apr.’s Here,” dealt with a gay man leaving his lover for a woman—and this commission may have made Fitzgerald oversensitive.
[>] “The novel should”: Fitzgerald papers, PUL.
18. “The geodetic points of our lost topography”
[>] “The orderliness”: GCM to AMacL, 22 Jan. 1931, LOC.
Gerald and Sara decided . . . sell Villa America: Ibid.
[>] They had given Léger . . . another collector: The panels, entitled Queues de comets sur fond noir, were painted “pour la Villa de Gérald Murphy à Antibes” in 1930, and are listed as number 750 in Georges Bauquier’s catalogue raisonné of Léger’s work.
“In spite of thunder” . . . Mediterranean coast: GCM to AMacL, 22 Jan. 1931, LOC.
He soon seemed improved . . . Baoth to Venice: HMD diary 1931, HMD.
[>] The cook, Frau July . . . rolling countryside: Ibid.
struck by the regulated . . . “dominates everything”: Léger, Lettres à Simone, p. 18.
“Absolutely terrified . . . at the idea”: Milford, Zelda, pp. 188–89 and 190.
“great . . . that you all”: GCM to FSF, [summer 1931], PUL.
“Scotty + the little Murphys”: FSF to ALM, [ca. summer 1931], Myers papers.
[>] Shortly after the Fitzgeralds’ . . . Miss Stewart: HMD diary 1931, HMD.
“She was terribly . . . just typical”: S&G, p. 60.
“My God”: GCM to AMacL, 22 Jan. 1931, LOC.
they took Honoria . . . for the first time: HMD diary 1931, HMD.
They also brought Fernand Léger . . . “delighted him”: GCM, MacAgy/Murphy papers; Léger, Lettres à Simone, p. 29.
[>] Countess Lieven . . . daughter Fanny: HMD diary 1931, HMD.
“gorgeous . . . Madame Bovary dress”: ESB interview.
“She used Helena Rubinstein” . . . fur piece: HMD interview.
In the end . . . ruinously expensive: GCM to AMacL, 4 Feb. 1932, LOC.
[>] Neither of his surviving . . . Senator Robert F. Wagner: “Many Pay Tribute to P. F. Murphy,” unattributed, undated newspaper clipping, GCM papers, HMD.
“my father left a company”: GCM, quoted in S&G, p. 45.
“take care of Esther”: HMD interview.
“He cannot be . . . kill us for their sport”: GCM, undated notes on Europa stationery; HMD. GCM also quotes many of the same lines in his 8 Jan. 1932 letter to AMacL.
[>] “a paradise”: GCM to AMacL, 4 Feb. 1932, LOC.
Sara made a ceremony . . . for a month: HMD diary 1932–35: Mar. and Apr. 1932, HMD.
“A thing of great”: GCM to AMacL, 4 Feb. 1932, LOC.
The galley had . . . water to fill it: AMacL to EH, 31 May 1933, JFK.
[>] “poor little Pook . . . sickness!”: GCM to AMacL, 8 Jan. 1932, LOC.
[>] visits from the Barrys . . . Concurrence: REM diary: 29 Mar. 1932; ALM to REM, [May 1932]; Myers papers.
“he kisses me”: Jeanne Leger’s postscript to FL’s letter to SWM, 18 Jun. 1932, HMD.
“Put away my house”: HMD diary 1932–35: 5 Jul. 1932, HMD.
“the era”: S&G, p. 51.
“Some day we’ll all”: GCM to AMacL, 4 Feb 1932, LOC.
“lost [her] shirt”: Mary Hoyt Wiborg to SWM, 6 Dec. 1929, HMD.
had invested heavily . . . deed to it: S&G, p. 69.
[>] Now, however, she owed . . . an additional $1,: All details and quotations from SWM handwritten affidavit, 10 Aug. 1942, prepared for presentation in Wiborg v. Murphy, HMD.
[>] John and Katy . . . frequent guest on weekends: HMD diary 1932–35, HMD. “adore[d] it . . . arranging their lives”: GCM to AMacL, 8 Sept. 1932, LOC.
[>] “performed well for Ernest”: S&G, pp. 67–68.
“lovely trails . . . moon cocktails”: SWM to EH and PH, 29 Jul. [1936], JFK.
It was the custom . . . three hours: Carlos Baker, notes from interview with Olive Nordquist, Carlos Baker/Hemingway papers
, PUL.
“good for her”: HMD interview.
“tasteless, without variety . . . no longer respects”: GCM to AMacL, 8 Sept. 1932, LOC.
[>] Sara and Gerald dropped him . . . train from New York: SWM travel and residence affidavit; notes for Wiborg v. Murphy, HMD.
Baoth and Patrick and Honoria . . . horse-drawn sleigh: Murphy home movies, HMD.
Ada and Sara cooked . . . liqueurs: GCM to AMacL, 8 Sept. 1932, LOC.
“restor[ed] a few”: AMacL to John Peale Bishop, [ca. Apr. 1933], Letters of Archibald MacLeish, p. 256.
“nasty mean operation . . . agonies”: REM to ALM, 9 Feb. and 20 Feb. 1933, FMB.
[>] “rather rickety”: GCM to JDP, 9 Mar. 1933, UVA.
He and Sara wrote . . . more if need be: REM to ALM, [Feb. 1933], FMB.
“a chip of a little legacy”: GCM to JDP, 9 Mar. 1933, UVA.
he and Gerald were thinking . . . one of them: Ibid. There is no further record of any attempts to produce these works, so it must be assumed their discussions came to nothing.
Archie MacLeish had been approached . . . basis of his score: AMacL, Reflections, p. 93.
[>] “white Russian crook”: Donaldson, Archibald MacLeish, p. 236.
Sara Murphy, Hoytie Wiborg . . . Esther Murphy Strachey: AMacL correspondence with Alice de la Mar, Mrs. Harrison Williams, and Sol Hurok, Union Pacific file, Ballets Russes archives, DC/NYPL.
In March . . . Virgil Thomson: REM diary: 12 Mar. 1934, FMB.
distinguished himself . . . immediately afterward: GCM to CT, 4 Sept. 1960, HMD.
“What carried that ballet . . . Gerald’s music”: AMacL, Reflections, p. 94.
Nor were Sara . . . first night’s proceeds: Correspondence in Union Pacific file, Ballets Russes archives, DC/NYPL.
“Archie has hurt . . . can change that”: ALM to RLM, Jun. 1934, FMB.
“He’s a pretty lonely . . . knows it now”: AMacL to H. Phelps Putnam, [Jun. 1934], Letters of Archibald MacLeish, pp. 266–68.
[>] The weather in Key West was bad: EH to GCM, 27 Apr. 1934, HMD.
fishing with the Dosses . . . stared down at them: PH to SWM, 17 May 1934, HMD.
“It was lovely . . . I think”: EH to GCM, 27 Apr. 1934, HMD.
“Dearest Sara . . . sea-sick”: EH to SWM, 27 Apr. 1934, HMD.
more than twenty-five . . . without indignation: See “Prologue,” pp. 1–2.
[>] “Scotts book, I’m sorry”: EH to GCM, 27 Apr. 1934, HMD.
“I liked it . . . if it were true”: EH to FSF, 28 May 1934, Emest Hemingway: Selected Letters, p. 407.
dark, swashbuckling man . . . “adventurers in the movies”: Many years later Gerald told Calvin Tomkins that Tommy Barban was based on Mario (Tunti) Braggiotti, a pianist who, with his partner Jacques Frey, had a popular concert career in the 1930s and 1940s. Fitzgerald himself said that Barban had elements of Tommy Hitchcock, the society polo player—but, as Ernest pointed out, the characters in Tender Is the Night are composites.
[>] “Dear Scott”: SWM to FSF, [spring 1934], PUL.
She had been getting . . . her own correspondence: Milford, Zelda, pp. 284–86.
“Jazz Age Priestess . . . audience for background”: Ibid., pp. 291–92.
[>] Sara paid $200 . . . Cary Ross took in: Cary Ross to FSF, 4 May 1934, Correspondence of F. Scott Fitzgerald, pp. 359–60.
“Those monstrous . . . morbid”: Milford, Zelda, p. 290.
[>] “I am going . . . their garden has conveyed”: Zelda Fitzgerald to FSF, Milford, Zelda, p. 290.
Mediterranean Midi . . . lifetime ago: Mediterranean Midi is pictured on p. 75 of Zelda, An Illustrated Life: The Private World of Zelda Fitzgerald, edited by Eleanor Lanahan; the caption says it “probably dates from the 1940s"; but the caption also says it is “suggestive of Capri where Zelda in 1925 is reported to have taken her earliest painting lesson.” Neither assignment is definitive; equally persuasive are the visual references in the painting to the Murphys’ garden and linden tree, and (of course) the title.
[>] “I had the pleasure . . . expensive rugs”: John O’Hara to EH, [spring 1934], Selected Letters of John O’Hara; see also Meade, Dorothy Parker, p. 234.
“THIS IS TO REPORT”: DP to GCM and SWM, 8 Jun. 1934, HMD.
[>] “YOU WILL NOT HAVE”: Mary Hoyt Wiborg to SWM, 8 Jun. 1934, HMD.
19. “We try to be like what you want us to be”
[>] flag Gerald designed . . . Picasso so admired: GCM, MacAgy/Murphy papers.
“260 kilometres . . . (or so blue)”: SWM and GCM to PH and EH; 21 Jun. 1934, JFK.
[>] bringing prints of Ballet mécanique . . . to screen: Léger, Lettres à Simone, p. 114.
“A Sara à Gerald”: FL, Weatherbird sketchbook, HMD.
“small checks”: FL to GCM, Mar. 1934, HMD.
Gerald . . . take home as presents: S&G, p. 83.
One evening . . . “if you stand tall”: FMB interview.
[>] “Children . . . rechute”: S&G, p. 83.
Honoria came to visit . . . practically transparent: HMD interview.
“Isn’t it horrid? . . . some more words”: SWM to EH and PH, 18 Sept. 1934, JFK.
“the doctors have told”: Esther Murphey Strachey to Muriel Draper, 17 Apr. 1935, Muriel Draper papers, Beinecke Library.
“either a Grants Gazelle . . . each others backs”: EH to GCM and SWM, 30 Sept. 1934, HMD.
[>] “I thought as I carried”: AMacL to PFM II, 26 Oct. 1934, HMD.
[>] “I didn’t know one thing”: GCM, quoted in S&G, p. 78.
He hired Tomi Parzinger . . . “Leather”: FMB interview.
“spend[ing] all his time”: JDP to EH, [23 Jul. 1935], The Fourteenth Chronicle, p. 479.
‘“Trade . . . harmful but efficient”: GCM to FSF, 31 Dec. 1935, PUL.
He told a friend . . . sleepwalking: LW, p. 125; CT interview.
[>] “to the value . . . God awful expenses”: EH to GCM and SWM, 16 Nov. [1934], HMD.
“YOUR RECORDS SHIPPED”: GCM and SWM to EH, 21 Nov. 1934, JFK.
“turned into various things”: JDP to GCM, 11 Jan. [1935], HMD; Miller, Letters from the Lost Generation, p. 106.
Murphys proposed to rent . . . Mark Cross permitted: KDP to SWM, 12 Jan. 1935, UVA.
“Welcome Home, Baoth”: S&G, p. 86.
[>] “Dos and Ernest”: KDP to SWM, [Feb. 1935], UVA; Miller, Letters from the Lost Generation, p. 112.
“a tendency to be”: Ibid., [2 Dec. 1934].
he still looked . . . records Gerald had sent: EH to GCM and SWM, 14 Dec. [1934], HMD; and home movie shot by Hemingway during that winter and sent to Patrick Murphy, HMD.
And the Hemingways’ new house . . . palm trees all around: John Hemingway interview; EH home movie, HMD.
“John was very dishonest . . . dirty sheets and everything”: Noel Murphy/HMD interview, HMD.
About the closest . . . Muriel Draper: There are four folders of correspondence between Esther and Muriel Draper in Draper’s papers at Yale’s Beinecke Library, some of it salaciously jokey, some of it warm and passionate.
[>] “[A]pparently . . . know what they’re doing”: GCM to SWM, 15 Feb. 193[5], HMD. Gerald’s letter is actually dated 1934—an indication of how preoccupied he was.
“an actual relief . . . any such programmes”: Ibid.
“The leaning tower of Baoth”: S&G, p. 88.
“We are still behind”: GCM to SWM, 18 Feb. 1935, HMD.
[>] “ten days of hideous”: Esther Murphy to Muriel Draper, 17 Apr. 1935, Muriel Draper papers, Beinecke Library.
Significantly Hoytie . . . believe was a curse: HMD, Noel Murphy/HMD, and William MacLeish interviews.
[>] Archie could not stay . . . “she cried and cried”: This account is drawn from interviews with HMD, William MacLeish, and Hester Pickman (the last by HMD); HMD’s book, S&G and letters from Esther Murphy Strachey to Muriel Draper (17 Apr. 1935), AMacL to JDP and KDP ([20 Mar. 1935] in Letters of Archibald MacLeish, p. 275); and the d
iaries of REM (entries for 14 and 17 Mar. 1935).
[>] “Darlings . . . dear to us all”: KDP to SWM and GCM, 18 Mar. 1935, UVA.
“You’ve been so brave . . . be brave”: JDP to SWM and GCM, 18 Mar. 1935, HMD.
“It is not so bad . . . be brave about”: EH to SWM and GCM, [19 Mar. 1935], HMD.
“courage &grace . . . mystery of pain”: AMacL to GCM and SWM, [29 Mar. 1935], HMD.
“fancy . . . one like that”: AMacL to JDP and KDP, [20 Mar. 1935], Letters of Archibald MacLeish, p. 275.
“BAOTHS ASHES STAND”: GCM and SWM to KDP, JDP, EH, and PH, 21 Mar., 1935, UVA.
In the taxicab . . . cursing God: S&G, p. 91; HMD interviews.
“The news . . . Baoth and Patrick”: William MacLeish interview.
Alexander Woollcott . . . “feeling better”: S&G, p. 94.
[>] “The difficulty will be . . . visor on backwards”: EH to PFM II, 5 Apr. 1935, HMD.
Unlike many tuberculosis . . . disease and its treatment: Gallos, Cure Cottages of Saranac Lake, pp. 24–25.
[>] local radio station . . . “rest hour”: Ibid., p. 168.
classic Adirondack . . . enough to stand in: The description of the house, which burned down in 1967, came from interviews with Judge Jan Plumadore of Saranac Lake, whose family owned it in the 1960s. Other details are from personal observation.
“the Merchant Prince” . . . Saranac every other weekend: SWM to EH and PH, 11 Sept. 1935, JFK.
The Big Money . . . collapsed from the inside: JDP, The Big Money, p. 550.
“Sara very thin”: JDP to EH, [23 Jul. 1935], The Fourteenth Chronicle, p. 479.
[>] All his big canvases . . . “for all eternity”: FL to GCM and SWM, 27 Jul. 1935, HMD (my translation). To Simone Herman, Léger confided that the only way he could afford this career move was to live with the Murphys “for six months to a year.” (Léger, Lettres à Simone, p. 132, my translation.)
ten thousand viewers . . . twenty days: FL to GCM, undated, HMD.
Sara was able to get . . . “Pour Sara et Gérald”: S&G, p. 98; LW, p. 127.
Gerald was putting Léger up: Léger, Lettres à Simone, pp. 166–67.