What a beautiful place! Camellias and roses in bloom all around. Room overlooks the Gulf of Salerno, as blue as the water in a [Pierre] Puvis de Chavannes painting. Yesterday a festival celebrating the arrival of the skull of St. Andrew in Amalfi seven hundred years ago, but enjoyment interrupted by the arrival of some people she used to know in Nebraska. [Alice] Meynell's essays about Italy in the book Jewett gave her are very fine, especially the essay "The Lesson of Landscape," but A. E. Housman writes with equal truthfulness, and she includes a transcription of his "The Olive," a poem he gave her that she has never seen in print. The "White Heron" and the Dunnet ladies [references to copies of books by Jewett] are always with her. Willa Cather [Stout #138]
Yes, will change the name of the bull [in My Ántonia] to Andrew Jackson for this one edition of a thousand copies. Father's bulls were actually named Gladstone, for a stubborn disposition, and Brigham Young, for breeding competence. P.S.: Yes, agrees to donate a set of the autograph edition to the fundraising for Finland. Willa Cather [Stout #1477]
. . . On another topic, has just started a novel and needs a book their father had. He tried to give it to her, but she did not want to take a book so personally valuable to him, especially while living at the Grosvenor. Doesn't want to have it forever, as it should be in father's home, but could really use it for a time. Please ask Carrie Sherwood to get it and send it. It's called The History of the Valley, and it was written by Andrew Kerchival or Andrew Kerchway [The book is A History of the Valley of Virginia by Samuel Kercheval, and this copy is also part of the Rosowski Cather Collection at UNL]. Father rebound the book and stored it in the back parlor secretary. If Carrie has trouble finding it, perhaps Elsie could retrieve it when she goes to Red Cloud for the dedication of their mother's window [a window in Grace Episcopal Church] on All Saints' Day. Will return it in the spring. Willie
Must refer to her as Miss Guiney due to long history of admiration, though such a habit does not mean she feels distant. Returned from travels in the West recently, and is glad to be back. Typically is longing for it, but got her fill during the recent trip. The people seem so fat and overconfident, as if they are trying to meet the expectations of Owen Wister and Remington. The land in Arizona and New Mexico is amazing, though. As Balzac commented, the desert has both all and nothing, God without humankind. That line has to be lived awhile before its profundity sinks in. The spirit gets lonesome in a place where the only history is geologic. Glad she liked "Alexander," but thinks "The Bohemian Girl" is even better. Mrs. Fields did not like it, however, but she just could not get past the crudeness of the characters' behavior. Will Guiney let her and her sister rent the cottage? Did she know Andrew Lang or the unfortunate Mr. Stead [possibly William Thomas Stead, British writer who died when the Titanic sunk in April 1912]? Mrs. Vermocken writes that she loves Guiney's house, and hopes she can see it (and Guiney) soon. Was planning to stay with Mrs. Fields in October, but work is keeping her in the city. Willa
