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 |
The Grosvenor3
35 FIFTH AVENUE
New York2 February 6, 1930. Dear Mr. Greenslet1:
You have emptied a pretty kettle of fish upon my head! Wasn't it faithless of you
(and,
incidently, most illegal) to use my name4, without my permission, in
your ad. for LAUGHING BOY5? Two old and
intimate friends of mine published new books this fall, and their respective
publishers asked me to let them use my name in exactly the way you used it. I
refused in both cases, because if one begins that sort of thing there is simply no
end to it. Sometimes the best possible friends write the worst possible books, and
if they come to you and say, "you allowed
your name to be used for this book or that book," what is one going to say in reply?
The only way to keep out of embarrassing situations is to consistently, and in every case, to keep one's name out of blurbs and advertisements. It's
quite right that reviewers and people who write professionally about books should
be
quoted, that is their job and their judgment ought to count for something, but a
friendly expression of interest in a book surely ought not to be used in print without one's consent6.
Now that I have got this off my chest, please have someone send me a copy of the new edition7 of ANTONIA8. Living thus in a hotel, I have none of my own books, and I want to make some corrections in ANTONIA for the English edition9. (and for you, if you will make the corrections.)
$1976.25Also, since I am leaving for California10 about the 20th, would it be convenient for you to send me my royalty check sometime next week instead of March 1st? I want to get my business affairs all straightened up before I go, if possible.
Very sincerely yours, Willa CatherInformation about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let1003.xml
- Letter identifier
- 1003
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, typewritten on recto only.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Ferris Greenslet1
- Date letter was written
- February 6, 1930
- Place letter was written
- New York, New York, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Houghton Mifflin Company correspondence and records, 1832-1944 (MSAm1925), Harvard University, Houghton Library, Cambridge, MA
Individual Annotations
Grosvenor Hotel (New York City): When Cather and Edith Lewis lost their 5 Bank Street apartment in 1927, they moved into the Grosvenor Hotel, where they continued to live until 1932. The hotel was located at 35 Fifth Avenue in the Manhattan borough of New York City.
Cather earlier wrote Greenslet that she liked Laughing Boy, which was published by Houghton Mifflin, "very much" (#1002). The advertisement using her endorsement has not been located.
On 10 February 1930, Greenslet apologized profusely. He explained that although he knew Cather's rule about endorsing other authors' books, he couldn't resist the appeal of "one of our publicity young men," who had seen her letter (#1002) and wanted to list her name "among those who had liked the book."
Published by Houghton Mifflin Co. in 1926, with a revised introduction.
William Heinemann published the English editions of My Ántonia, which appeared in 1919, 1927, and 1943.
Person Annotations
Greenslet, Ferris (1875-1959). American editor and writer.
Born in Glens Falls, NY, Ferris Greenslet earned a BA (1897) from
Wesleyan University and a PhD (1900) from Columbia University. He served as
associate editor at the Atlantic Monthly from 1902 to
1907, and married Ella Stoothoff Hulst in 1903; they had two children,
Marguerite (born 1904) and George (born 1906). As an author he specialized
in biography. He became literary editor at Houghton Mifflin, the Boston
publisher of the Atlantic, c. 1908 and was socially
and professionally acquainted with Annie Adams Fields and Sarah Orne Jewett,
who may have introduced him to Cather. He evidently solicited Cather to
submit Alexander’s Bridge (1912), her first published
novel, to Houghton Mifflin. In 1910, when Greenslet became editor in chief
of the trade department, Roger Scaife divided his shares as a director of
the company with him, and the two presented themselves to authors as
partners, with Scaife handling book advertising and format and Greenslet
negotiating contracts and supervising editing; when Greenslet was absent
from the office, Scaife handled correspondence with Cather. Greenslet became
a director of Houghton Mifflin in 1919 and manager of the trade department
in 1933. Cather left Houghton Mifflin as a publisher for Alfred A. Knopf,
Inc., because she became dissatisfied with the production and advertising of
her books. However, she remained on cordial terms with Greenslet and
undertook several projects for him after her departure. Her extant letters
to him constitute one of the largest groups to a single correspondent.
Place Annotations
Work Annotations
Laughing Boy (1930) by Oliver LaFarge
My Ántonia (1918) by Willa Cather
