For many, Ernest Hemingway remains more a compilation of myths than a person: soldier, sportsman, lover, expat and, of course, writer. But the actual life beneath these various legends remains elusive; what did he look like as a laughing child or young soldier? What was his handwriting like and what did he say in his most personal letters? How did the train tickets he held on his way from France to Spain or across the American Midwest feel, and what kind of notes did he take on his journeys? This remarkable book answers these questions. Featuring a foreword by Hemingway's son Patrick and an afterword by his grandson Sean, the book has the intimate feel of being a member of the family. It tells the story of a major American icon through the objects he touched, the moments he saw, the thoughts he had every day. Beautifully designed, including over 400 dazzling images of him at every stage of his life along with the letters, notes and miscellany that made his life so rich, it is an intimate, illuminating portrait like no other. It is a one-of-a-kind, stunning tribute to one of the most titanic figures in literature.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

In the late 1960s, while heading up the Western operations for Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Alan Kishbaugh met the distinguished writer Frank Waters in Taos, New Mexico. From 1968 until Waters's death almost thirty years later, the two wrote each other hundreds of letters. This annotated collection of their correspondence reveals Waters's profound engagement with the land and cultures of the Southwest. A lively introduction to the breadth of Waters's work, Deep Waters touches on themes of ecology, philosophy, pre-Columbiana, Eastern philosophy, Egyptology, American Indians, and a host of other subjects reflecting the great cultural shifts occurring at the time. Kishbaugh and Waters write of the women in their lives, mutual friends, writing and publishing challenges, and newly discovered books. Their letters offer new views of the legendary writers' colonies of Santa Fe and Taos and the arrival of the counterculture in New Mexico.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Front Cover; Title Page ; Copyright; Contents; Preface; Acknowledgments; Introduction; Chapter One: 1967 to 1970; Chapter Two: 1971 to 1974; Chapter Three: 1975 to 1978; Chapter Four: 1979 to 1982; Chapter Five: 1983 to 1986; Chapter Six: 1987 to 1990; Chapter Seven: 1991 to 1994; Chapter Eight: 1995 to 1996; Epilogue; Back Cover.

In the late 1960s, while heading up the Western operations for Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Alan Kishbaugh met the distinguished writer Frank Waters in Taos, New Mexico. From 1968 until Waters's death almost thirty years later, the two wrote each other hundreds of letters. This annotated collection of their correspondence reveals Waters's profound engagement with the land and cultures of the Southwest. A lively introduction to the breadth of Waters's work, Deep Waters touches on themes of ecology, philosophy, pre-Columbiana, Eastern philosophy, Egyptology, American Indians, and a host of other subjects reflecting the great cultural shifts occurring at the time. Kishbaugh and Waters write of the women in their lives, mutual friends, writing and publishing challenges, and newly discovered books. Their letters offer new views of the legendary writers' colonies of Santa Fe and Taos and the arrival of the counterculture in New Mexico.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

One of the Lost Generation modernists who gathered in 1920s Paris, Kay Boyle published more than forty books, including fifteen novels, eleven collections of short fiction, eight volumes of poetry, three children's books, and various essays and translations. Yet her achievement can be even better appreciated through her letters to the literary and cultural titans of her time. Kay Boyle shared the first issue of This Quarter with Gertrude Stein and Ernest Hemingway, expressed her struggles with poetry to William Carlos Williams and voiced warm admiration to Katherine Anne Porter, fled WWII France with Max Ernst and Peggy Guggenheim, socialized with the likes of James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, and Samuel Beckett, and went to jail with Joan Baez. The letters in this first-of-its-kind collection, authorized by Boyle herself, bear witness to a transformative era illuminated by genius and darkened by Nazism and the Red Scare. Yet they also serve as milestones on the journey of a woman who possessed a gift for intense and enduring friendship, a passion for social justice, and an artistic brilliance that earned her inclusion among the celebrated figures in her ever-expanding orbit.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Cover; Ttile Page; Copyright; Contents; Illustrations; Acknowledgments; Introduction; Editorial Note and Abbreviations; Chronology; Prologue: From St. Paul to Paris; 1 Apprenticeship of a Young Modern: Cincinnati, New York, Brittany, Normandy, 1919-1925; 2 The Revolution of the Word: Provence, England, Paris, 1926-1929; 3 Artist en Famille: Villefranche, Vienna, Kitzbühel, Devonshire, Mégève, 1930-1939; 4 In Love and War: Mégève and Vichy France, 1940-1941; 5 The Home Front: New York and the American West, 1941-1945; 6 In the Wake of War: Paris and Occupied Germany, 1946-1952.

• 7 Cold War Exile: Connecticut, Tehran, San Francisco, 1953-19638 419 Frederick Street: San Francisco, 1964-1979; 9 Speaking Out in Act and in Art: Oregon, Oakland, Mill Valley, 1980-1992; Roster of Correspondents; Selected Kay Boyle Bibliography; Index.

One of the Lost Generation modernists who gathered in 1920s Paris, Kay Boyle published more than forty books, including fifteen novels, eleven collections of short fiction, eight volumes of poetry, three children's books, and various essays and translations. Yet her achievement can be even better appreciated through her letters to the literary and cultural titans of her time. Kay Boyle shared the first issue of This Quarter with Gertrude Stein and Ernest Hemingway, expressed her struggles with poetry to William Carlos Williams and voiced warm admiration to Katherine Anne Porter, fled WWII France with Max Ernst and Peggy Guggenheim, socialized with the likes of James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, and Samuel Beckett, and went to jail with Joan Baez. The letters in this first-of-its-kind collection, authorized by Boyle herself, bear witness to a transformative era illuminated by genius and darkened by Nazism and the Red Scare. Yet they also serve as milestones on the journey of a woman who possessed a gift for intense and enduring friendship, a passion for social justice, and an artistic brilliance that earned her inclusion among the celebrated figures in her ever-expanding orbit.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

"Meticulously edited and contextualized, Dean's edition of Woolson's complete letters opens the door to an extraordinarily gifted writer's world. It offers depth to Woolson studies, but it also connects Woolson to the nineteenth-century literary marketplace in new and fascinating ways. We see Woolson the tough but astute literary critic, the precise businesswoman, and the keen cultural critic of the North, the South, and Europe. Perhaps most importantly, Woolson's letters counter many false impressions of an isolated woman. This was a life lived."--Sharon M. Harris, University of Connecticut "Uncovers the complex, witty, cosmopolitan, imaginative Woolson, who appears more obliquely in her prose and poetry. Peopled by the famous, the infamous, and the unknown, the letters sparkle with intelligence and energy, providing insight into contemporary attitudes that Woolson sometimes shared, sometimes satirized, and sometimes defied, while they reveal an ample sensibility that anticipates today's concerns for the environment, regional and national identity, and global citizenship."--Karen L. Kilcup, author of Robert Frost and Feminine Literary Tradition "The Complete Letters of Constance Fenimore Woolson vibrate with the intelligence and sensitivity of an immensely private woman who reached out through her correspondence in search of like-minded souls. She found comrades among some of the most accomplished writers of her era as well as among men of science. Ultimately, these letters reveal the broad scope of a well-traveled life and the depth of an intensely observant artist. Every reader interested in the lives of nineteenth-century authors or women should savor every one of this extraordinary writer's letters."--Anne Boyd Rioux, president, Constance Fenimore Woolson Society Constance Fenimore Woolson (1840-1894) led a colorful life, travelling throughout the U.S. and Europe, becoming a literary star, whose work was published in the premier magazines of her day. She wrote critically acclaimed novels, short stories, and poetry before her mysterious and untimely death in Venice at age fifty-three. Sharon Dean has recompiled, dated, and, in many cases, physically reassembled Woolson's extant correspondence from nearly forty sources. A trenchant critic of the customs and mores of her age, Woolson, in her letters, offers rich personal detail alongside nuanced ruminations on contemporary political and social conditions. Sharon L. Dean is professor emerita of English at Rivier College in New Hampshire. One of the foremost experts on Constance Fenimore Woolson, her most recent publication is Constance Fenimore Woolson: Selected Stories and Travel Narratives.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Introductions
• Paris and love
• At home
• Marriage and families
• Complications
• Baby
• Tragedy
• Paris encore
• Productive days
• Pain and grief
• From Paris to New York
• End of a decade
• Good-byes.

The first book-length study of a gifted American writer and her life during the 1920s The Benet name immediately evokes Stephen Vincent and his older brother William Rose, Pulitzer Prize-winning poets and novelists during the first half of the twentieth century. Less well remembered are the remarkable women related to the Benet brothers, including Rosemary Carr, Stephen's wife; Laura, his sister; Elinor Wylie, William's second wife; and Kathleen Norris, the popular novelist who raised the children of her brother-in-law William. Darling Ro and the Benet Women presents a revealing glimpse of social and literary life in New York and Paris during the 1920s. Using a recently released collection of letters from the Benet Collection at Yale University, author Evelyn Helmick Hively extracts captivating anecdotes and impressions about a talented group of writers and impressive feminist figures. Written by Rosemary Carr Benet to her mother, Dr. Rachel Hickey Carr (one of Chicago's first women physicians), the compilation of letters and short dispatches from Paris provides the focus of the book. A gifted poet and journalist, Rosemary Carr was a prolific writer of articles for the New York Herald-Tribune, Harper's Bazaar, and Vogue; of stories and poems for The New Yorker and other magazines; and hundreds of letters. She belonged to a remarkably skillful, social, and artistic group of men and women who bonded early in life, and her letters paint fascinating portraits of their lives, careers, and relationships. Darling Ro and the Benet Women offers an insider's perspective of a well-known cosmopolitan American family.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

An image of Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) as a man of gloom and mystery continues to hold great popular appeal. Long recognized as one of the greats of American literature, he elicited either highly commendatory or absolutely hostile reactions from many who knew him, from others who claimed to comprehend him as person or as writer, and from still others who circulated as fact opinions intuited from his writings. Whether promoting him as angel or demon, 'a man of great and original genius' or 'extraordinarily wicked', the viewpoints in this dramatic collection of primary materials provide vigorous testimony to support the contradictory images of the man and the writer that have prevailed for a century and a half. Noted Poe scholar Benjamin Fisher includes a comprehensive introduction and a detailed chronology of Poe's sadly short life; each entry is introduced by a short headnote that places the selection in historical and cultural context, and explanatory notes provide information about people and places. From John Allan's letter to Secretary of War John Eaton about Poe's West Point life to John Frankenstein's hostile verse casting him as an alcoholic, from Rufus Griswold's first and second posthumous vilifications to James Russell Lowell's more sensible outline of his life and career, from scornful to commendable reviews to scathing attacks on his morals to recognition of his comic achievements, Fisher has gathered a lively array of materials that read like the most far-fetched of gothic tales. Poe himself was creative when he supplied information to others about his life and literary career, and the speculative content of many of the portrayals presented in this collection read as if their authors had set out to be equally creative. The sixty-nine recollections gathered in ""Poe in His Own Time"" form a dramatic, real-time biographical narrative designed to provide a multitude of perspectives on the famous author, sometimes in conflict with each other and sometimes in agreement but always arresting.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• [Letter about Poe's West Point matriculation] : 1829 / John Allan
• [Letter about Poe at West Point] : 1884 / Allan B. Magruder
• [Letter about commencement of Poe's professional literary life] : 1835 / John P. Kennedy
• [Letter about Poe's drinking and the Messenger] : 1835 / Thomas W. White
• [Letter about mixed modes in Poe's early tales] : 1836 / John P. Kennedy
• [Epistolary response with comment on humor] : 1836 / Edgar A. Poe
• [Harper's rejection of "Tales of the Folio club"] : 1836 ; [Letter advising Poe to compose a novel] : 1836 / James Kirke Paulding
• [Letters justifying Poe's critical practices' : 1836 / Lydia H. Sigourney
• [Letters seeking political appointment] : 1841 / Edgar A. Poe
• [Letter encouraging Poe's political desires] : 1841 / Frederick W. Thomas
• [Additional comments on political aspirations] : 1841 / Edgar A. Poe
• [Letter about Poe's political qualifications] : 1841
• Frederick W. Thomas.

• "Autographs" : 1842 / [Anonumous]
• [Letter about Poe's possible custom house appointment] : 1842 / Frederick W. Thomas
• [Letter about reasons for leaving Graham's] : 1842 / Edgar A. Poe
• From The poets and poetry of America : 1842 / Rufus W. Griswold
• From "Poets and poetry of Philadelphia ..." : 1843 / [Edgar A. Poe and Henry B. Hirst]
• "Mr. Poe's lecture" : 1843 / George Lippard
• "For the Delaware State Journal" : 1844 / Academicus
• "Lecture by Mr. Poe" : 1844 / George Lippard
• [Letter detailing life in New York City] : 1844 / Edgar A. Poe
• [Early criticism of Poe's works] :1845 / Lawrence Labree
• From "A Failure" : 1845 / Cornelia Wells Walter
• From "Edgar A. Poe" in Boston Evening Transcript : 1845 / P.
• "Quizzing the Bostonians" : 1845 / [Anonymous]
• "Mr. Poe's poem" : 1845 / [Anonymous]
• From Memories of many men and of some women : 1875 / M.B. Fields
• From "Hints to authors" : 1848 / [Anonymous]
• [Untitled headnote to reprint of "ulalume"] : 1849 / [Evert A. Duyckinck]
• From "Mr. Poe's lecture" : 1849 / [Anonymous]
• From "Edgar A. Poe" in Semi-weekly examiner : 1849 / John M. Daniel
• [Note requesting assistance for Poe] : 1849 / Joseph P. Wilson
• [Letter from Poe's attending physician] : 1849 / John J. Moran
• "Death of Edgar Allan Poe" in New York daily tribune : 1849 / "Ludwig" [Rufus Wilmot Griswold]
• From "Topics of the month" : 1849 / [C.F. Briggs]
• "To the reader" : 1850 / Maria Clemm.

• "Edgar A. Poe" : 1850 / James Russell Lowell
• "Death of Edgar A. Poe" : 1850 / Nathaniel P. Willis
• "Memoir of the author" : 1850 / Rufus Wilmot Griswold
• "Edgar Allan Poe" in McMakin's model American courier : 1849 / Henry B. Hirst
• From "Edgar Allan Poe" in Southern literary messenger : 1850 / John M. Daniel
• "The late Edgar Allan Poe" in Southern literary messenger : 1849 / John R. Thompson
• From "Editor's table" : 1850 / John R. Thompson
• Editorial note to "Poe on Headley and Channing" : 1850 / [John R. Thompson]
• "Estimates of Edgar A. Poe" in Home Journal : 1850 / Nathaniel P. Willis
• From Athenaeum : 1852 / Anonymous
• "Authors and books. Edgar Poe" (1854) / "Apollodorus" [George Gilfillan]
• "Preface" to Works of the late Edgar A. Poe : 1856 / Rufus Wilmot Griswold
• "Edgar Allan Poe : a letter to the editor of The train" : 1857 / William Moy Thomas
• From "Edgar Allan Poe" in Edinburgh review : 1858 / Bryan W. Proctor
• "Editorial etchings : 1858 / [Anonymous]
• From "National Hawthorne" : 1860 / [Anonymous]
• "Reminiscences of Edgar Poe" : 1863 / Mary Gove Nichols
• From American art : 1864 / John Fankenstein
• "Autobiographic notes. Edgar Allan Poe" : 1867 / Elizabeth Oakes Smith
• "The facts of Poe's death and burial" : 1867 / Joseph E. Snodgrass
• "Another view of Edgar A. Poe" : 1867 / Margaret E. Wilmer
• From Edgar Allan Poe : 1891 / William Gowans
• "Edgar Poe" in Temple bar : 1874 / John Henry Ingram
• " A mad man of letters" : 1875 / Francis Gerry Fairfield
• From "The poet not an epileptic" : 1875 / F.R.M.
• From "Poe, critic, and hobby. A reply to Mr. Fairfield ..." : 1875 / Sarah Helen Whitman
• From [Editorial notice of reply to Fairfield] : 1875 / [Anonymous]
• From "Edgar Allan Poe, a letter ..." : 1875 / Francis Gerry Fairfield
• "The personality of Poe" : 1877 / Charles Frederick Briggs.

An image of Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) as a man of gloom and mystery continues to hold great popular appeal. Long recognized as one of the greats of American literature, he elicited either highly commendatory or absolutely hostile reactions from many who knew him, from others who claimed to comprehend him as person or as writer, and from still others who circulated as fact opinions intuited from his writings. Whether promoting him as angel or demon, 'a man of great and original genius' or 'extraordinarily wicked', the viewpoints in this dramatic collection of primary materials provide vigorous testimony to support the contradictory images of the man and the writer that have prevailed for a century and a half. Noted Poe scholar Benjamin Fisher includes a comprehensive introduction and a detailed chronology of Poe's sadly short life; each entry is introduced by a short headnote that places the selection in historical and cultural context, and explanatory notes provide information about people and places. From John Allan's letter to Secretary of War John Eaton about Poe's West Point life to John Frankenstein's hostile verse casting him as an alcoholic, from Rufus Griswold's first and second posthumous vilifications to James Russell Lowell's more sensible outline of his life and career, from scornful to commendable reviews to scathing attacks on his morals to recognition of his comic achievements, Fisher has gathered a lively array of materials that read like the most far-fetched of gothic tales. Poe himself was creative when he supplied information to others about his life and literary career, and the speculative content of many of the portrayals presented in this collection read as if their authors had set out to be equally creative. The sixty-nine recollections gathered in ""Poe in His Own Time"" form a dramatic, real-time biographical narrative designed to provide a multitude of perspectives on the famous author, sometimes in conflict with each other and sometimes in agreement but always arresting.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• 1. Introduction
• 2. John Brown: "A Muse of Fire"
• 3. Translating a Terrorist: The Business of Public Intellectuals
• 4. Confronting Conspirators: Re-examining Thoreau's "A Plea for Captain John Brown"
• 5. "Self-Reliance:" Emerson's Antidote to Political Abdication and Judicial Compromise
• 6. In the Shadow of John Brown: Refusing Violence in Harriet Beecher Stowe's Dred.
• 7. Epilogue. Appendix A: Letter from Ralph Waldo Emerson to Charles Wesley Slack. Appendix B: Letter from Theodore Parker to Charles Wesley Slack. Appendix C: Letter from Frederick Douglass to Charles Wesley Slack. Notes. Works Cited. Index.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

Radical abolitionist and freedom-fighter John Brown inspired literary America to confrontation during his short but dramatic career as a public figure in antebellum America. Emerging from obscurity during the violent struggle to determine how Kansas would enter the Union in 1856, John Brown captured the imagination of the most prominent Eastern literary figures following his dramatic, though failed raid on Harper's Ferry.Impressed by Brown's forthright defense of his attempt to initiate the end of slavery, Whittier, Whitman, Melville, Longfellow, and Howells responded to the abolitionist with poetic tributes suggesting that Brown was a liberating hero, while Emerson and Thoreau celebrated his effort to inspire the nation to a new moral awareness of the common humanity of all men. Responses, however, were not uniform, as these and other figures debated the merits and meanings of Brown's actions. This exceptional book sheds new light on how John Brown inspired America's most significant intellects to take a public stand against the inertia of moral compromise and social degeneracy, bringing the nation to the brink of civil war.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Before Mark Twain became a national celebrity with his best-selling ""The Innocents Abroad"", he was just another struggling writer perfecting his craft - but already ""playin' hell"" with the world. In the first book in more than fifty years to examine the initial phase of Samuel Clemens' writing career, James Caron draws on contemporary scholarship and his own careful readings to offer a fresh and comprehensive perspective on those early years - and to challenge many long-standing views of Mark Twain's place in the tradition of American humor.Tracing the arc of Clemens' career from self-described ""unsanctified newspaper reporter"" to national author between 1862 and 1867, Caron reexamines the early and largely neglected writings - especially the travel letters from Hawaii and the letters chronicling Clemens' trip from California to New York City. Caron connects those sets of letters with comic materials Clemens had already published, drawing on all known items from this first phase of his career - even the virtually forgotten pieces from the ""San Francisco Morning Call in 1864"" - to reveal how Mark Twain's humor was shaped by the sociocultural context and how it catered to his audience's sensibilities while unpredictably transgressing its standards.Caron reveals how Sam Clemens' contemporaries, notably Charles Webb, provided important comic models, and he shows how Clemens not only adjusted to but also challenged the guidelines of the newspapers and magazines for which he wrote, evolving as a comic writer who transmuted personal circumstances into literary art. Plumbing Mark Twain's cultural significance, Caron draws on anthropological insights from Victor Turner and others to compare the performative aspects of Clemens' early work to the role of ritual clowns in traditional societies.Brimming with fresh insights into such benchmarks as ""Our Fellow Savages of the Sandwich Islands"" and ""Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog, "" this book is a gracefully written work that reflects both patient research and considered judgment to chart the development of an iconic American talent. ""Mark Twain, Unsanctified Newspaper Reporter"" should be required reading for all serious scholars of his work, as well as for anyone interested in the interplay between artistic creativity and the literary marketplace.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Acknowledgments; Abbreviations; Prologue for a Comic Performance; Act One; Scene One: Backwoods Civility; or, How the Roarer Became a Gentleman; Scene Two: The Backwoods Roarer and the "Literary Comedian"; Act Two; Scene One: Sam Clemens Clowning on the Comstock; Scene Two: Playing with Comic Dynamite; Act Three; Scene One: "Strike Up Higher" in the Periodical World; Scene Two: Satire and the Bohemian Journalist; Scene Three: American "Flâneurs"; Scene Four: "Flânerie" That Subverts the News; Scene Five: "Foremost of the Merry Gentlemen of the California Press"; Act Four.

• Scene One: Work and Leisure in Two CulturesScene Two: Mark Twain's Comic Raid on the Kingdom of Hawai'i; Scene Three: Writing Travel Letters; Act Five; Scene One: American Travel Letters; Scene Two: Comic Performance; Afterword: The Clown and the Satirist; Works Cited; Index.

Before Mark Twain became a national celebrity with his best-selling ""The Innocents Abroad"", he was just another struggling writer perfecting his craft - but already ""playin' hell"" with the world. In the first book in more than fifty years to examine the initial phase of Samuel Clemens' writing career, James Caron draws on contemporary scholarship and his own careful readings to offer a fresh and comprehensive perspective on those early years - and to challenge many long-standing views of Mark Twain's place in the tradition of American humor.Tracing the arc of Clemens' career from self-described ""unsanctified newspaper reporter"" to national author between 1862 and 1867, Caron reexamines the early and largely neglected writings - especially the travel letters from Hawaii and the letters chronicling Clemens' trip from California to New York City. Caron connects those sets of letters with comic materials Clemens had already published, drawing on all known items from this first phase of his career - even the virtually forgotten pieces from the ""San Francisco Morning Call in 1864"" - to reveal how Mark Twain's humor was shaped by the sociocultural context and how it catered to his audience's sensibilities while unpredictably transgressing its standards.Caron reveals how Sam Clemens' contemporaries, notably Charles Webb, provided important comic models, and he shows how Clemens not only adjusted to but also challenged the guidelines of the newspapers and magazines for which he wrote, evolving as a comic writer who transmuted personal circumstances into literary art. Plumbing Mark Twain's cultural significance, Caron draws on anthropological insights from Victor Turner and others to compare the performative aspects of Clemens' early work to the role of ritual clowns in traditional societies.Brimming with fresh insights into such benchmarks as ""Our Fellow Savages of the Sandwich Islands"" and ""Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog, "" this book is a gracefully written work that reflects both patient research and considered judgment to chart the development of an iconic American talent. ""Mark Twain, Unsanctified Newspaper Reporter"" should be required reading for all serious scholars of his work, as well as for anyone interested in the interplay between artistic creativity and the literary marketplace.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• The solitary spirit and the comic mask
• Setting the stage: 1918-22
• Playing the part: 1923-26
• Changing the scene: 1926-30
• Writing the play: 1931-37
• The final performance: 1938-46.

Here, for the first time, is the life story of one of the South's most beloved men of letters. Over the course of his literary career, Lyle Saxon was a journalist, novelist, historian, folklorist, editor, manager of the WPA Writers' Project, and recorder of local colour. In his private life, he was a gracious host, preservationist, bon vivant and mentor to young artists. However, behind Saxon's glittering social persona lay an often-troubled soul. Drawing on his many books and private letters, Chance Harvey explores the real man memorialised as Mr New Orleans.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

After twenty-six-year-old author Breece D'J Pancake took his own life in April 1979, the West Virginian's posthumously published short-story collection made a considerable impact on the world of letters. His work was praised for a controlled muscular style reminiscent of Hemingway, for its strong undercurrent of emotion, and for its evocation of the blighted lives of the mountain poor. In A Room Forever, Thomas E. Douglass offers a detailed portrait of Pancake's short life, examining the varied circumstances and emotional forces that led to the writer's suicide and exploring Pancake's influence on contemporary fiction generally and Appalachian writing in particular. Drawing on notebooks, letters, and manuscripts left by Pancake as well as numerous conversations and interviews with family, friends, and others, Douglass has recreated the key events of the young artist's life: his West Virginia childhood, his romantic losses, his education as a writer at the University of Virginia, and the acceptance of his work by the East Coast literary establishment. Through analysis of the story fragments reproduced in this volume, including "The Conqueror" and "Shouting Victory", Douglass illustrates the recurring themes -- such as fear of failure and the inability to escape disaster -- that Pancake expressed so eloquently in his work, and he shows their origins in the writer's own personal history. Douglass examines the degree to which Pancake drew on his memories of life in Appalachia and discusses Pancake's influence on other Appalachian writers such as Pinckney Benedict. Douglass argues that Pancake's posthumous collection, The Stories of Breece D'J Pancake, brought a renewed interest inregional writing to the national literary scene. A Room Forever brings to life the artistic sensibility and inner turmoil of a legendary figure in contemporary southern letters.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)