Guide to Reading Letter Transcriptions
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| Textual Feature | Appearance |
|---|---|
| passage deleted with a strikethrough mark | |
| passage deleted by overwritten added letters | |
| passage added above the line | passage with added text above |
| passage added on the line | passage with added text inline |
| passage added in the margin | passage with text added in margin |
| handwritten addition to a typewritten letter | typed passage with added handwritten text |
| missing or unreadable text | missing text noted with "[illegible]" |
| uncertain transcriptions | word[?] |
| notes written by someone other than Willa Cather | Note in another's hand |
| printed letterhead text | printed text |
| text printed on postcards, envelopes, etc. | printed text |
| text of date and place stamps | stamped text |
| passage written by Cather on separate enclosure. | written text |
When I sent you a package of books through the consulate in the Autumn, I sent no letter with them because I thought the omission of a letter would release you from any but a formal acknowledgement through your secretary.
Your gracious letter reached me on my birthday3, and gave me great pleasure. Since you found the "Archbishop"4 interesting, it may further interest you
to know that in writing the narrative I followed very closely the actual life-story
of the two first missionary Bishops5
who came after the old Spanish territory became a paart of the
United States6. Even the picture on the
paper cover7 of the book,
representing the Archbishop on horseback, was drawn from an old ambrotype of
Archbishop Lamy as a young man.
Nothing had ever been written about either of these two missionaries, except one book8, printed on a country press in a remote Colorado town9; and it was never read outside of Colorado10. After my book was published I received so many letters of inquiry form Catholics, military men, and traders who had known the Old West, that I sat down and wrote a truthful account of how I came to write the story, and where I got my information. I am sending you a copy of that statement11, which I published in the most ⬩W⬩S⬩C⬩conservative Catholic periodical12 here.
I recently had the pleasure of meeting Mr.
Novak13, the consul General here, and Professor Vocčadlo14, to whom I hope I was able to give
some slight assistance.
Your friendly interest in my books is a source of great pride and satisfaction to me, and I beg you to accept my gratitude and sincere admiration.
Very cordially yours Willa CatherInformation about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let0961.xml
- Letter identifier
- 0961
- Contents
- Document is two leaves, typewritten on recto only of each leaf.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk1
- Date letter was written
- February 12 [1928]
- Explanation of conjectured date
-
The year of this letter is establised by the publication of Death Comes for the Archbishop in September 1927.
- Place letter was written
- New York, New York, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Masaryk Garrigue Tomáš, Masaryk Institute and Archive of the ASCR, Prauge, Czech Republic
Individual Annotations
Willa Cather's birthday was December 7.
The dust jacket of the first edition of Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927).
Person Annotations
Masaryk, Tomáš (1850-1937). Founder and first president of Czechoslovakia. Born in Moravia, which was then part of the Austrian Empire, Tomáš Masaryk received a doctorate from the University of Vienna in 1876. Studying in Leipzig, he met and then married American music student Charlotte Garrigue in 1878. Appointed professor of philosophy at the Czech University of Prague in 1882, he used his academic writings to promote the value of Czech culture. When he entered politics in the 1890s, he took up the cause of the Slovaks in northern Hungary. A key figure in the Czech-Slovak Union, he was elected Czechoslovakia’s first president in 1918. He resigned the presidency in 1935. Cather began corresponding with Masaryk in 1925 after he sent her a letter. She professed she was “glad” that her novel My Ántonia (1918) had “carried a message from [her] Bohemian neighbors” that she “loved as a child, to their home country” (#0768).
Lamy, Jean-Baptiste (1814-1888). French Roman Catholic Archbishop and missionary. Born in Lempdes in Auvergne, France, Jean-Baptiste Lamy attended the seminary of Clermont and then the seminary of Mont Ferrand, where he met fellow student Joseph Machebeuf. Lamy was ordained in 1838 and assigned to a parish in the town of Chapdes, France. In 1839, he and Machebeuf traveled to the U.S., where Lamy served at a parish in Danville, OH, for 8 years. In 1849, he was appointed the head of the newly formed Vicariate of New Mexico and appointed Machebeuf as his Vicar-General. Lamy finally arrived in New Mexico in 1851, where he conflicted with priests who had served under a Mexican bishop. The Vatican elevated Lamy to Archbishop of Sante Fe in 1875; he retired in 1884. During their 1925 trip to New Mexico, Willa Cather and Edith Lewis became interested in the lives of Lamy and Machebeuf, and Cather based Jean Marie Latour in Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927) on Lamy.
1069Machebeuf, Joseph P. (1812-1889). French Roman Catholic Bishop and missionary. Born in Riom, France, Joseph Machebeuf entered the seminary of Mont Ferrand, where he met fellow student Jean-Baptiste Lamy. Machebeuf was ordained in 1836 and served as a curate in Le Cendre. In 1839, Machebeuf and Lamy traveled to the U.S., where Machebeuf served as a curate in Tiffin, OH and then in 1841 as a priest in Sandusky, OH. When Lamy was appointed the head of the newly formed Vicariate of New Mexico in 1849, he appointed Machebeuf as his Vicar-General. He served as priest at Albuquerque (1853–1858) and at Santa Fe (1858–1860) before being transferred to Colorado, where he was elevated Vicar Apostolic of Colorado and Utah in 1868 and then Bishop of Denver in 1887. During their 1925 trip to New Mexico, Willa Cather and Edith Lewis became interested in the lives of Lamy and Machebeuf, and Cather based Joseph Vaillant in Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927) on Machebeuf.
Novák, Jaroslav (1884-1942). Czechoslovakian diplomat. Born in Kozušany, Moravia, Dr. Jaroslav Novák attended the Charles-Ferdinand University of Prague, teaching at the Žižkov and Ceska Trebova labs. In 1919 he represented Czechoslovakia at the Paris Peace Conference. From 1925-1933 Novák served in New York as Consul General of Czechoslovakia. He then worked for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, serving as the first envoy of Czechoslovakia to Venezuela. Novák died in exile during the German occupation of Czechoslovakia. On 19 December 1930 he wrote Cather to thank her for “all the creative work which you have done” and offered to send her the book Romantic Czechoslovakia (1930).
Vočadlo, Otakar (1895–1974). Professor, linguist, English scholar, and Americanist. Otakar Vočadlo, born in Klatovy, Czech Republic, was a student of philology, literature, and philosophy and worked as a professor at universities in England, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. Vočadlo married Ludmila Kruisova in 1921 and toured and lectured worldwide sporadically throughout his life. In 1928, he embarked on a U.S. lecture tour speaking about literary and other topics, and while on this tour Cather met him in New York City and offered "slight assistance." During World War II, Vočadlo was imprisoned in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. Other than his lectures, Vočadlo is best known for his annotated six-volume edition of William Shakespeare’s works in Czech translations (1959-64) and the posthumously published correspondence with Karel Čapek, Anglické listy Karla Čapka (1975).
Place Annotations
Work Annotations
Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927), by Willa Cather
The Life of the Right Reverend Joseph P. Machebeuf (1908), by William Joseph Howlett
"Letter from Willa Cather to the Editor of the Commonweal, A," Commonweal (November 27, 1927), by Willa Cather
Commonweal
