1936
Spends spring vacation with Helen in Bermuda, where they spend an evening with Sinclair Lewis, who recites passages by Thurber from memory. (Thurber later describes Lewis as “the only drunken writer I ever met who said nothing about his own work and praised that of another writer present.”) Rents house in Litchfield, Connecticut, for summer. On a trip to Columbus in November, enjoys evening exchanging stories and singing songs with Carl Sandburg.
1937
Cataract begins to cloud vision in his remaining eye, but he postpones necessary surgery. Sails with Helen to France in May; in Paris they encounter Ernest Hemingway, Dorothy Parker, and others; in London visits an exhibition of his drawings. Let Your Mind Alone! and Other More or Less Inspirational Pieces published in September by Harper.
1938
Returns to France; during four-month stay at villa at Cap d’Antibes, meets Winston Churchill (delighted by Churchill’s description of him as “that insane American and depraved artist”). Travels in England, Scotland, and France; returns to U.S. in September, settling in rented house in Woodbury, Connecticut. Writes to Elliott Nugent about idea for play set at Ohio State.
1939
Works with Elliott Nugent on play The Male Animal. “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” published in The New Yorker in March. Father dies in Columbus in April. Travels to Los Angeles in June to continue collaboration with Elliott Nugent; meets Charlie Chaplin and others in film community during three-month stay. The Male Animal staged in San Diego, Santa Barbara, and Los Angeles in October. Antiwar parable The Last Flower, created in one evening at the Algonquin, published by Harper at Christmas.
1940
After considerable rewriting, The Male Animal opens on Broadway in January to good reviews. Thurber visits Bermuda in the spring; begins contributing pieces to The Bermudian, edited by friend Ronnie Williams. Undergoes cataract surgery in June, but vision continues to deteriorate. Begins contributing humor column “If You Ask Me” to PM, left-wing tabloid edited by his friend Ralph Ingersoll (column runs from September 1940 until July 1941). Fables for Our Time and Famous Poems Illustrated published in September by Harper. Thurber undergoes major operation for glaucoma and iritis in October, but it fails to halt deterioration of his vision; undergoes another operation in December.
1941
Virtually blind, is released from hospital under care of nurses and goes to live at Grosvenor Hotel with Helen. Undergoes two more eye operations in March and April. Suffers a breakdown followed by a long period of deep depression (refers later to “a five-year nervous crack-up”). Rents house for summer on Martha’s Vineyard; meets poet Mark Van Doren, who becomes a close friend. “The Whip-Poor-Will” appears in August, first story published in New Yorker in fourteen months. Rents apartment in Manhattan in the fall.
1942
Attends premiere of film version of The Male Animal in Columbus in March. Alternates between apartment in Manhattan and house in Cornwall, Connecticut. Leaves Harper & Bros, for Harcourt Brace, which publishes My World—And Welcome To It in October.
1943
Moves into East 57th Street apartment with Helen in January. Despite failing vision, continues drawing with the aid of the Zeiss loop, a magnifying device used in defense plants. Publishes children’s book Many Moons (September) and cartoon collection Men, Women and Dogs (November), both with Harcourt Brace; Many Moons wins American Library Association award for best children’s book. Pleased by serious critical appreciation of his work in December number of Poetry, written by Peter De Vries, who becomes a close friend.
1944
Suffers in the fall from pneumonia, followed by a ruptured appendix and peritonitis, for which he undergoes emergency surgery. Spends time at the Homestead resort in Hot Springs, Virginia, where he returns frequently in subsequent years. The Great Quillow published in October by Harcourt Brace.
1945
The Thurber Carnival, a retrospective anthology covering Thurber’s entire career, is published in February by Harper, and becomes a bestseller. Buys 14-room colonial house on 60-acre property in West Cornwall. The White Deer published in September by Harcourt Brace. Works on film adaptation of “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” (none of his work is used). Turns down membership in National Institute of Arts and Letters because E. B. White has not been asked to join.
1946
Visits Columbus in January for mother’s 80th birthday celebration. Works at a slower pace as he continues to suffer from depression.
1947
Vacations in Bermuda, February–April. Movie version of The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, starring Danny Kaye, is released in August. Publishes final original drawing in The New Yorker on November 1. Writes letter to the New York Herald Tribune in November protesting an editorial calling for American government workers to take loyalty oaths.
1948
Visits Columbus in May. “Soapland,” a five-part series on radio soap operas, is published in The New Yorker, May to July. The Beast in Me and Other Animals published in September by Harcourt Brace.
1949
Visits Nassau (March) and Bermuda (April). Begins contributing feature “Letter from the States” to The Bermudian.
1950
During March stay in Bermuda writes The 13 Clocks, which is published in November by Simon & Schuster with illustrations by West Cornwall friend Marc Simont. Visits Columbus in June on his way to receive honorary doctorate from Kenyon College. Meets T. S. Eliot in December. “Photograph Album,” series of articles about Thurber’s family and early life, begins appearing in The New Yorker.
1951
Thurber draws self-portrait (his last drawing for publication) for cover story in Time (July 9); T. S. Eliot, in an interview for Time, comments on Thurber’s work: “There is a criticism of life at the bottom of it. It is serious and even somber . . . His writings and also his illustrations are capable of surviving the immediate environment and time out of which they spring.” Offered honorary degree by Ohio State University, but refuses in protest of university policy of barring politically controversial guest speakers. Harold Ross dies of lung cancer on December 6. (Thurber writes in a letter: “He was the principal figure in my career and I don’t know what I would have amounted to without his magazine, in which 90 percent of my stuff has appeared . . . Ross was a part of my daily life for almost exactly a quarter of a century.”)
1952
The Thurber Album, book version of “Photograph Album” series, is published in April by Simon & Schuster. Suffers from worsening thyroid condition.
1953
Thurber Country published in October by Simon & Schuster. Television adaptation of The 13 Clocks is broadcast in December. Returns to Columbus to spend Christmas with his family.
1954
Behaves erratically, exhibiting outbursts of violent anger under influence of thyroid condition and heavy drinking. Vacations in Bermuda and on Martha’s Vineyard.
1955
Spends summer and fall in Europe. Thurber’s Dogs, consisting mostly of previously published pieces, appears in October from Simon & Schuster. Spends a month in Columbus after his mother suffers a stroke and sinks into a coma; mother dies in December.
1956
Relations with staff of The New Yorker, now under editorship of William Shawn, become increasingly difficult, and Thurber makes public statements about his problems with the magazine. Further Fables for Our Time published in October by Simon & Schuster; awarded $5,000 prize from American Library Association for promoting “the cause of liberty, justice and fair play.”
1957
Quarrels with New Yorker fiction editor William Maxwell over editing of children’s story The Wonderful O; withdraws manuscript and writes to Katharine White, “I need a long holiday from the magazine and its high pressures.” The Wonderful O published in May by Simon & Schuster. Alarms and Diversions published in November by Harpers. “The Years with Ross,” series of articles on Harold Ross and the early years of The New
Yorker, begins appearing in the Atlantic in November.
1958
Travels to Europe with Helen for five-month stay; honored by staff of Punch at luncheon in July; meets Adlai Stevenson in Paris. Disagreements over articles on Ross lead to final breach with E. B. and Katharine White.
1959
The Years with Ross is published in expanded form by Atlantic, Little, Brown, and becomes a bestseller; many veteran New Yorker contributors find fault with book’s accuracy.
1960
A Thurber Carnival, revue adapted from Thurber’s works by Haila Stoddard, opens in Columbus; show moves to Broadway in February, but closes due to actors’ strike despite excellent reviews. After a run in Central City, Colorado, it reopens on Broadway in September, with Thurber playing himself in one sketch; he appears on stage for 88 performances before the show closes in November. Behavior continues to be erratic and sometimes violent, possibly because of series of undiagnosed minor strokes. John “Jap” Gude (Thurber’s agent for many years) and writer Peter De Vries remain close friends, while others avoid him.
1961
Receives a Tony award for A Thurber Carnival. Travels with Helen to England in January, in unsuccessful effort to promote an English production of A Thurber Carnival; sleeps little and explodes often in fits of rage. Lanterns and Lances published in May by Harper. Returns to U.S. in May. Collapses after leaving party for Noel Coward on October 3; is rushed to Doctors Hospital in New York City where doctors remove a brain tumor. Lapses into semiconsciousness and dies November 2. Ashes buried at Green Lawn Cemetery in Columbus on November 8.
Note on the Texts
This volume contains the complete texts of four works by James Thurber, The Seal in the Bedroom (1932), My Life and Hard Times (1933), The Last Flower (1939), and The 13 Clocks (1950); two chapters by Thurber from Is Sex Necessary? (1929), his collaboration with E. B. White; six chapters from his memoir The Years with Ross (1959); a selection of short pieces and drawings taken from 13 collections published during Thurber’s lifetime; and seven pieces never collected in book form by Thurber. The contents are arranged in the chronological order of their initial book publication, with the exception of the seven uncollected pieces, which are placed in a separate section at the end of this volume.
Thurber arrived at the final versions of even the shortest of his pieces through a process of extensive revision. In an interview published in 1940 in The New York Times Book Review, he said of his writing: “I rarely have a very clear idea of where I’m going when I start. Just people and a situation. Then I fool around—writing and rewriting until the stuff jells.” Speaking to The Paris Review in 1955, he remarked: “Well, my wife took a look at the first version of something I was doing not long ago and said: ‘Goddam it, Thurber, that’s high-school stuff.’ I have to tell her to wait until the seventh draft, it’ll work out all right.” His cartoons, by contrast, were dashed off as spontaneously as possible; Thurber told The Los Angeles Sunday Times Magazine in 1939: “I’m not an artist. I’m a painstaking writer who doodles for relaxation.” Thurber occasionally made small revisions, and sometimes altered the captions of cartoons, when preparing work that had appeared in The New Yorker and other periodicals for book publication. (When compiling material already published in book form for subsequent collections, Thurber sometimes made further revisions, updating or retitling previously collected pieces. After he lost his eyesight, The New Yorker experimented briefly with using new captions with previously published cartoons.)
The texts printed in this volume are taken from their first book publication, except for the texts of five of the uncollected pieces, which are taken from their original periodical publication. Pieces taken from collections by Thurber are presented in this volume in the same order as they appeared in the volumes in which they were first collected.
The following annotated list gives the source of the texts and drawings printed in this volume and the dates of their original periodical publication (all page numbers refer to this volume):
“The Nature of the American Male: A Study of Pedestalism” and “The Lilies-and-Bluebird Delusion” appeared as the first and fifth chapters in Is Sex Necessary?: Or, Why You Feel the Way You Do by James Thurber and E. B. White, published in New York by Harper & Brothers on November 7, 1929. The texts printed here are from the Harper edition.
“Mr. Monroe Holds the Fort” and “The Pet Department” are taken from The Owl in the Attic and Other Perplexities, published in New York by Harper & Brothers on February 5, 1931. “Mr. Monroe Holds the Fort” appeared in The New Yorker on November 30, 1929. Fourteen of the pieces in “The Pet Department” appeared in The New Yorker, under the heading “Our Pet Department,” as follows: p. 38, February 22, 1930; p. 39, April 5, 1930; p. 40, June 7, 1930; p. 41, May 3, 1930; p. 42, March 1, 1930; p. 43, March 15, 1930; p. 44, February 22, 1930; p. 45, March 15, 1930; p. 46, May 17, 1930; p. 47, May 17, 1930; p. 49, March 1, 1930; p. 51, April 5, 1930; p. 53, June 7, 1930; p. 54, May 3, 1930. The remaining drawings in “The Pet Department” appeared for the first time in The Owl in the Attic. The texts printed here are from the Harper edition.
The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments was published in New York by Harper & Brothers on November 23, 1932. The following drawings appeared in The New Yorker: p. 59, January 30, 1932; p. 60 (top), December 5, 1931; p. 61 (bottom), June 20, 1931; p. 62, February 14, 1931, February 28, 1931; p. 63, August 29, 1931, October 3, 1931; p. 64, November 7, 1931, August 13, 1932; p. 65, October 10, 1931, August 22, 1931; p. 66 (top), May 7, 1932; p. 67, July 11, 1931, June 11, 1932; p. 68, May 16, 1931, February 27, 1932; p. 70 (top), July 25, 1931; p. 72, September 12, 1931, May 28, 1932; p. 73 (top), September 26, 1931; p. 74, July 2, 1932, July 4, 1931 p. 75, April 16, 1932, March 19, 1932; p. 76, March 12, 1932, April 2, 1932; p. 77, January 23, 1932, August 20, 1932; p. 78, January 2, 1932, May 14, 1932; p. 79 (bottom), November 21, 1931; p. 80, April 9, 1932, July 30, 1932; p. 81 (top), November 14, 1931; p. 82, April 30, 1932; pp. 83–84, February 6, 1932; p. 104 (top), October 15, 1932; p. 107 (top), June 25, 1932; p. 113 (bottom), May 28, 1932; p. 114 (bottom), July 23, 1932; p. 115 (bottom), April 9, 1932; p. 118, April 23, 1932; p. 119, July 16, 1932, June 4, 1932; p. 120, June 4, 1932, July 16, 1932; p. 121, July 16, 1932, June 4, 1932; p. 126 (top), December 19, 1931 (the remaining drawings appeared for the first time in The Seal in the Bedroom). The text printed here is taken from the Harper edition.
My Life and Hard Times was published in New York by Harper & Brothers on November 10, 1933. Eight of the chapters had previously appeared in The New Yorker: “The Night the Bed Fell,” July 8, 1933; “The Car We Had to Push,” July 15, 1933; “The Day the Dam Broke,” July 29, 1933; “The Night the Ghost Got In,” August 12, 1933; “More Alarms at Night,” August 26, 1933; “A Sequence of Servants,” September 9, 1933; “University Days” (as “College Days”), September 23, 1933; “Draft Board Nights,” September 30, 1933. The text printed here is that of the Harper edition.
Nineteen pieces in this volume are taken from The Middle-Aged Man on the Flying Trapeze, published in New York by Harper & Brothers on November 15, 1935. All appeared in The New Yorker. “The Departure of Emma Inch,” August 10, 1935; “There’s an Owl in My Room,” November 17, 1934; “The Topaz Cufflinks Mystery,” July 23, 1932; “A Preface to Dogs,” January 2, 1932; “The Private Life of Mr. Bidwell,” January 28, 1933; “Mr. Preble Gets Rid of His Wife,” March 4, 1933; “A Portrait of Aunt Ida,” November 10, 1934; “The Luck of Jad Peters,” December 8, 1934; “I Went to Sullivant,” June 22, 1935; “If Grant Had Been Drinking at Appomattox,” December 6, 1930; “How to See a Bad Play,” September 14, 1935; “The Funniest Man You Ever Saw,” August 15, 1931; “The Black Magic of Barney Haller,” August 27, 1932; “Something to Say,” July 30, 1932; “Snapshot of a Dog,” March 9, 1935; “The Evening’s at Seven,” October 22, 1932; “The Greatest Man in the World,” February 21, 1931; “One Is a Wanderer,” March 2, 1935; “A Box to Hide In,” January 24, 1931. Th
e texts printed in this volume are taken from the Harper edition.
Eighteen pieces in this volume are taken from Let Your Mind Alone! And Other More or Less Inspirational Pieces, published in New York by Harper & Brothers on September 8, 1937. Seventeen of them appeared in The New Yorker. “Pythagoras and the Ladder,” November 28, 1936; “Destructive Forces in Life,” December 5, 1936; “The Case for the Daydreamer,” December 19, 1936; “How to Adjust Yourself to Your Work,” January 9, 1937; “Anodynes for Anxieties,” January 30, 1937; “The Conscious vs. The Unconscious,” February 20, 1937; “Sex ex Machina,” March 13, 1937; “Sample Intelligence Test,” April 3, 1937; “Miscellaneous Mentation,” May 1, 1937; “The Breaking Up of the Winships,” January 11, 1936; “Nine Needles,” January 25, 1936; “A Couple of Hamburgers,” November 16, 1935; “Aisle Seats in the Mind,” December 21, 1935; “Mrs. Phelps,” December 12, 1936; “Wild Bird Hickock and His Friends,” May 29, 1937; “Doc Marlowe,” November 2, 1935; “The Admiral on the Wheel,” February 1, 1936. “A Dozen Disciplines” appeared for the first time in Let Your Mind Alone!. The texts printed in this volume are taken from the Harper edition.
The Last Flower: A Parable in Pictures was published in New York by Harper & Brothers on November 17, 1939. None of the text and drawings in the book had previously appeared in periodical form. The text printed here is taken from the Harper edition.
Thirty-two pieces in this volume are taken from Fables for Our Time and Famous Poems Illustrated, published in New York by Harper & Brothers on September 18, 1940. All of them appeared in The New Yorker. “The Mouse Who Went to the Country,” “The Little Girl and the Wolf,” “The Two Turkeys,” “The Tiger Who Understood People,” January 21, 1939; “The Fairly Intelligent Fly,” “The Lion Who Wanted to Zoom,” “The Very Proper Gander,” “The Hen and the Heavens,” February 4, 1939; “The Moth and the Star,” “The Shrike and the Chipmunks,” “The Hunter and the Elephant,” “The Scotty Who Knew Too Much,” February 18, 1939; “The Bear Who Let It Alone,” “The Owl Who Was God,” “The Sheep in Wolf’s Clothing,” April 29, 1939; “The Stork Who Married a Dumb Wife,” “The Crow and the Oriole,” “The Elephant Who Challenged the World,” July 29, 1939; “The Courtship of Arthur and Al,” “The Hen Who Wouldn’t Fly,” “The Glass in the Field,” “The Rabbits Who Caused All the Trouble,” August 26, 1939; “The Bird and the Foxes,” “The Tortoise and the Hare,” “The Unicorn in the Garden,” October 21, 1939; “The Seal Who Became Famous,” “The Green Isle in the Sea,” “The Patient Bloodhound,” February 17, 1940; “Excelsior,” March 11, 1939; “Lochinvar,” April 8, 1939; “Curfew Must Not Ring To-night,” June 17, 1939; “Barbara Frietchie,” September 16, 1939. The texts printed in this volume are taken from the Harper edition.
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