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’ll be delighted if you and Pat3 can stop to see me4. I am almost alone in the Inn5 now—about half-a-dozen left, but a crowd for week-ends. So far only two hard rains, so the walking has been grand. Do stop on the first of November if possible.
I am expressing the limit pages6 back to Mr. Jacobs7 this afternoon. Please thank him for the pains he took to make the sending-back so simple and convenient. Bullet’s8 book9 has not arrived yet, but will probably get in tomorrow.
Devotedly to you both Willa Cather RECEIVEDOCT 20 1936 AM
Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let2691.xml
- Letter identifier
- 2691
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, handwritten on recto only.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Alfred A. Knopf1
- Date letter was written
- October 19 [1936]
- Place letter was written
- Jaffrey, New Hampshire, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Cather-Knopf Correspondence, The Dobkin Family Collection of Feminism, New York, NY
Individual Annotations
On 16 October 1936, Knopf told Cather he would be near her on 1 November when he took Pat to Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, NH.
Shattuck Inn (Jaffrey, NH): Hotel built in 1910 in Jaffrey, N,H owned and operated by E. C. Shattuck until his death in February 1933, when operation was taken over by his daughter, Eleanor Shattuck Austermann, and her husband George Austermann. Cather stayed at the Shattuck Inn many times, often with Edith Lewis, finding it a useful place to work. In 1947, Cather wrote of the Shattuck Inn: “I have never found any place where I could work in such peace and happiness as in the little rooms up in the top of the Shattuck Inn” (#1748).
Front pages for Cather to sign for the limited, autographed editions of Not Under Forty.
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.
Knopf, Alfred, Jr. (1918-2009) (“Pat”). Publisher; son of Alfred and
Blanche Knopf. Born in White Plains, NY, “Pat” was the only
child of Alfred and Blanche Knopf. Preoccupied with the publishing business
of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., they left him to be cared for by nannies and sent
him to Phillips Exeter Academy, an elite boarding school in New Hampshire.
Willa Cather was very fond of him and corresponded with him about his
reading and education. When he failed to gain entrance to Princeton
University, he ran away with only $15 in his pocket, and his parents found
him in Salt Lake City, UT. Alfred Knopf shared this story, otherwise treated
as a deep family secret, with Cather. Pat subsequently enrolled in Union
College in Schenectady, NY. He wrote asking Cather about the structure of
The Professor’s House (1925), and she permitted
Burgess Johnson, Pat’s English professor at Union, to publish her remarks as
“When I wrote The Professor’s House” in the College
English Association newsletter (1938). Pat’s studies were interrupted when
he was called up for military service in 1941; he was awarded the
Distinguished Flying Cross. Awarded his BA in 1943 he joined the family
business, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., in 1946 as company secretary and trade
books manager, subsequently becoming vice president of sales and
establishing the Vintage Books paperback imprint. He cofounded the Atheneum
imprint in 1960 and retired as a senior vice-president of Macmillan in 1988.
Jacobs, Sidney M. Production manager of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Jacobs served as production manager of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., for more than forty years, and Cather corresponded with him about matters relating to the printing and design of her books. When Knopf merged with Random House in 1960, Jacobs became the Manufacturing Vice President of the merged firm.
Bullett, Gerald William (1893-1958). British writer and broadcaster. Born in London, England, to Robert Bullett and Ellen Pegg Bullett, Gerald Bullett graduated from Cambridge University in 1921 after having served in World War I in the Royal Flying Corps. Bullett wrote reviews for journals, including the Times Literary Supplement, and published around forty books. From 1940 to 1943 Bullett produced talks for the BBC Overseas, including the series, Life at Home. Willa Cather and Bullett were both published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.; Alfred Knopf sent Bullett’s novels, The Quick and the Dead (1933) and The Snare of the Fowler (1936), to Cather.
Place Annotations
Work Annotations
The Snare of the Fowler: A Tragedy of Time & Chance (1936) by Gerald Bullett
