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 |
GRAND MANAN2
NEW BRUNSWICK
CANADA My Dear Mariel1;
I thought you'd like to know about Prof.
Bates3. Of late years I had opportunities to do him several
small favors that he pleased him so much. He
was the most shy and modest man—never asked
anything, but the chance came along, and thank God I took it. I saw him for
only one evening, however; and after it we had a really exciting taxi ride
from Columbia down to Washington Square. He did not look a year older than
when we knew him, but was just the same and
yet so ripened, smoothed down, finished, but still very slim and somehow
boyish. Awfully gentle - - not standardized, never a bit on the make. I did
like him.
Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let0977.xml
- Letter identifier
- 0977
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, handwritten on recto only.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Mariel C. Gere1
- Date letter was written
- August 21 [1929]
- Explanation of conjectured date
-
Herbert Bates, one of Willa Cather's teachers at the University of Nebraska, died in New York in the spring of 1929.
- Place letter was written
- Grand Manan, New Brunswick, Canada2
- Location of original letter
- Willa Cather Collection (RG2639.AM), Nebraska State Historical Society, Lincoln, NE
Person Annotations
Gere, Mariel Clapham (1874-1960). Cather’s university
friend; a teacher. Mariel Gere, eldest daughter of Charles H.
and Mariel C. Gere, born in Lincoln, NE, entered the University of
Nebraska's prep school in the same year Cather did. She and her sisters
visited Cather several times in Red Cloud, NE. Both were members of the
Union Literary Society until Gere joined the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority in
1892. Gere graduated in the science course and taught chemistry at Lincoln
High until 1941. She also served on the Lincoln City Library board for many
years. Cather and Gere remained friends and correspondents; Gere defended
Cather from accusations that she had been arrogant and friendless during her
university years.
Bates, Herbert (1868-1929). American educator and writer. Born in Massachusetts, Bates received his BA from Harvard (1890), where he contributed to campus publications. In 1891 he came to the University of Nebraska as an instructor in rhetoric; Cather was one of his students, and he inspired the character of Gaston Cleric in My Ántonia (1918). When he left Nebraska in 1896 she applied unsuccessfully for his position. He published a volume of poetry, Songs of Exile (1896), before joining the faculty of the Manual Training High School in Brooklyn, NY, in 1897. He became active in the National Council of Teachers of English, wrote A History of English Literature (1918), and edited Modern Lyric Poetry (1929), and various classics. Cather owned a copy of his edition of Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1895) and kept in occasional touch with him until his death.
Place Annotations
Grand Manan, New Brunswick, CanadaCather and Edith
Lewis frequently vacationed on Grand Manan Island during the summer and
early fall for about twenty years, beginning in 1922. For the first few
years, they stayed at the Inn at Whale Cove, a collection of cottages with a
main house operated by Sarah Jacobus. Cather and Lewis rented Orchardside
Cottage from Jacobus until they had their own cottage built. In 1926, Lewis
acquired land on Grand Manan, and construction was completed in 1928. Cather
and Lewis returned to this cottage almost every summer until
1940.
