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 |
I would like to have your advice about this letter before I answer it. I do not know
what the Traveller’s Library3 is, or
upon what terms he
Cape4
has taken the book over5. He says
nothing at all about royalties.
If the book6 is to be re-published in
England7, I wish Cassell8 had got hold of it. I don’t feel that it is worth
while to write a preface for Mr. Cape,- though perhaps it would be wise to do so in
order to mark it
this as an early book and not a late one.
What do you think9 about that? Greenslet10 told me that a lot of people were
insisting that his new edition11 was a
new book. I wish Flower12 had got it; I would
have been willing to take some pains about it for him. Please return Cape’s letter
to me with a word of advice.
Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let2650.xml
- Letter identifier
- 2650
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, typewritten on recto only.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Alfred A. Knopf1
- Date letter was written
- July 2 [1932]
- Explanation of conjectured date
-
The year of this letter is established by Alfred Knopf's response of July 7, 1932.
- Place letter was written
- Grand Manan, New Brunswick, Canada2
- Location of original letter
- Cather-Knopf Correspondence, The Dobkin Family Collection of Feminism, New York, NY
Individual Annotations
On 7 July 1932, Knopf told Cather the Travellers' Library was a series of three and six penny reprint editions of the sort in which Cather had refused to publish her work.
The British edition was originally published by John Murray of London in 1916.
Cassell, a London publisher, had recently become Cather's British publisher, publishing the British edition of Shadows on the Rock. Cassell would continue to be the British publisher of her new works for the rest of her life. In 1938, Cassell was also able to take over The Song of the Lark.
On 7 July 1932, Knopf advised Cather that she might write a very brief preface identifying The Song of the Lark as an early work, depending on how strongly she felt about the matter.
On Houghton Mifflin's 1932 reissue of The Song of the Lark, see #1087.
Person Annotations
Knopf, Alfred A. (1892-1984). President of New York
publisher Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Knopf received his BA from
Columbia University in New York City in 1912 and founded Alfred Knopf, Inc.,
in 1915 with his future wife Blanche Wolf. They married in 1916, and their
son Alfred “Pat” Knopf was born in 1918. Cather chose him as her publisher
beginning with Youth and the Bright Medusa (1920) and
One of Ours (1922), partly because she was
dissatisfied with the promotion of her books by Houghton Mifflin but also
because she recognized the high quality of Knopf's books, as well as what
she regarded as his intelligent advertising. Knopf was noted for publishing
the work of leading European and South American writers in translation, as
well as original works. Knopf and Cather’s extensive correspondence
testifies to their mutual professional respect and to what also became an
important personal friendship.
Cape, Herbert Jonathan (1879-1960) (“Jonathan”). British publisher. Born in London, England, Cape began his career in his early teens as errand boy at Hatchard’s bookstore. He worked for the London branch of Harper’s as clerk and salesman, and then at publisher Gerald Duckworth’s company, rising to manager by 1911. In 1920, he and George Wren Howard founded the publishing company Jonathan Cape, which was known for the high quality of their design and fine list of authors, including some Americans. Cape bought the rights to Cather’s The Song of the Lark (1915) from the first British publisher John Murray and brought out a pocket edition in 1932. Cather was unhappy at the reduced royalties and transferred the rights to Cassell, which had become her British publisher.
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.
Flower, Walter Newman (1879-1954). British publisher and writer.
Newman Flower, as he was usually known, was born and educated in
Dorset, England. He began working in publishing when he was seventeen and
joined the British publisher Cassell in 1906. He took charge of its book
publishing division in 1912 and bought the company in 1927. Cather
corresponded with Flower after Cassell began publishing the British editions
of her books in 1932; the company also took over The Song
of the Lark from the earlier British publishers, John Murray and
Jonathan Cape.
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.
Work Annotations
The Song of the Lark (1915) by Willa Cather
