The Letters of Shirley Jackson
Page 32
well. if the braves stay in first place and brooklyn wins the pennant it will have been a very successful baseball season. the little league dodgers are the big threat for the braves, and poor stanley is hopelessly confused.
lots of love to you both, and to barry and marylou and butch.
love,
s.
i forgot to tell you about laurie’s carpentry; it turns out he has two talents. he has been taking shop in school this year and got very much interested, so stanley gave him all the tools around the house, and i opened a charge account at the lumber yard. whenever we want a bookcase or a shelf it is very handy to have laurie around. when stanley was out of town last week he decided to make a surprise for stanley. by the time stanley came home there was a handsome pine-panelled bar in the living room, beautifully made and finished, and solid.
laurie reminds me very much of barry—my brother, i mean—sometimes, and i think there’s a strong resemblance right now. maybe it’s just because i always remember barry in a dirty t-shirt.
got to go make dinner.
love,
s.
• • •
[To Geraldine and Leslie Jackson]
august 16 [1955]
dearest mother and pop,
my big problem is that, having signed a contract for a sequel to savages, due next march, i now have to write it. it is to be called raising demons. they gave me an advance of five thousand of which half has been paid and the rest is to be paid “upon demand of the author,” the notion that there is twenty-five hundred bucks sitting in the farrar straus offices that i can get just by hollering is almost too much for me. every time i run out of grocery money i get to thinking about it. i’ve been doing some stories, thinking now that if they don’t sell they will at least go into the book; nothing has sold this summer, at least partly because it has been so hot and dry in new york; all my agent really wanted was rain, not stories. however, now they have had the tail end of two hurricanes, so new york is flooded and much cooler, and maybe the fiction editors will gather strength enough to get back to work.
jannie’s letters tend to be two lines long and say “i went swimming” or “i had to write this to get in to dinner” or “please send me…” but she seems to be enjoying herself. she did remark that she had learned to eat beets, so her summer hasn’t been wasted. she comes home next wednesday, and there are two surprises waiting for her. one of them is her room, which we have done over; she had a little room next to the playroom, and we cleared out the playroom and made it into a study for her, with her desk and a bookcase laurie made; she has been asking for more space and it is a very pretty suite now.
the other surprise is as much of a surprise to the rest of us, actually. the day we drove jannie to camp my car reached fifteen thousand miles, we had finished paying for it, and it was a little over two years old and stanley said no, certainly not, we could not get another one. so now i have a magnificent light blue brand new station wagon with a dashboard that looks like an airplane and all shiny and glittering. it just came yesterday and i am still trying to learn how to drive it.
sally and barry have been having a fine time while jannie is gone. sally suddenly discovered the oz books, and for the past few weeks has stayed up reading all night and has slept all day during the heat, which i suppose is as good a way to spend a vacation as any; she gets up in the early afternoon in time to have some fruit and go swimming. our friend bookhunter louis has been searching out books for jannie, which he sends in big batches; he finds them second-hand and buys them for a nickel apiece, and it is such a pleasure for jannie to get a big box of books. now sally is getting oz books, which are a good deal rarer and harder to find, and there are now only two which louis hasn’t found for her; when he gets those she will have the oz books complete.
louis got stanley in trouble, though; he was visiting here a couple of weeks ago (one of the few weekend guests i could stand having every week); and we took him to one of laurie’s little league games, when laurie was pitching. these games have gotten pretty exciting, and we go to all of them; laurie’s team won the first half of the season, and for the second half is rock bottom. his pitching was good enough, but not the wonderful things he was doing with no-hit games the first half of the season. at any rate, he hit a grand-slam home run, the third over-the-fence home run of our little league, and the first grand-slam. they got the ball back, and it will go into their hall of fame, along with laurie’s no-hit game ball. anyway we came home from the game and laurie was sad about losing but pleased about his home run, and louis remarked that such a fine hit ought to be commemorated, and handed him ten dollars. laurie cheered up considerably and then—as he does after every game—called stanley’s father to give him an account of it. when he told stanley’s father about the home run and the ten dollars the old man said he wasn’t going to be outdone by louis, and he’d add another ten and stanley would be a piker if he didn’t make it thirty. so laurie made thirty dollars and stanley was out twenty because he had to pay out his father’s ten. then he tried to borrow it back from laurie and couldn’t, because laurie had it all figured for lumber for his house. so stanley is broke and laurie’s house is nearly finished. besides lumber he bought two windows and a door and a stack of shingles and tar paper for the roof, which took care of his thirty dollars. now stanley is trying to get a mortgage on the house; if he can’t do that, he is going to sell laurie the land it’s on.
the house has been a whole summer’s project for laurie and his friend robert. robert’s father is a carpenter, and both boys love carpentry, so they set out this summer to build themselves a house. they earned all the money for the lumber themselves, robert with a paper route and laurie cutting lawns. the house is beautifully built, solid and neat, with two windows and a door.
right now they are also excited about the idea of another dance in our barn this friday night; their committee has been at work with mops and brooms and we have set up our chaperone system again—five people here playing bridge, so that one is always free to step out to the barn every few minutes. there are twenty kids coming.
once jannie comes back school will be starting soon. stanley is working on class notes already. every time i say school shoes to stanley he turns pale. laurie will be in eighth grade, and expects to be in the school band with his trumpet. jannie will be a girl scout, sally will be a brownie scout, and a year from now barry will be in kindergarten and will have to walk to school with the other kids. one more year of taxi service and then i am free.
must go make lunch. since it’s raining everyone wants something hot. bah. have a lovely trip, lots and lots of love from all of us.
s.
• • •
[To Bernice Baumgarten]
September 13 [1955]
Dear Bernice,
You talked me into it; I sat down last night and wrote this, typed it this morning, and here it is. So I will correct the witchcraft book and mail that tomorrow. The rest of the week I shall spend reading Dickens.
I told all the children to go out and find plots for me.
Best,
Shirley
• • •
[To Geraldine and Leslie Jackson]
wednesday [October 1955]
dearest mother and pop,
i guess the reason i always think i have written you is because i write the same material in stories; if i sent you the first drafts of all my stories you would have twice as many letters but i guess not as much true news. actually i have been working at the typewriter steadily, doing all kinds of things.
i have been working mostly on the witchcraft book; they send all those books to a historian for checking, and then back to the author for revision. the historian was very nice about the witches, since of course much of the stuff is hearsay and rep
orted in half a dozen different manners. the historian was very upset over one paragraph in the book discussing the estimated numbers of demons working for the devil; i had two figures, both in the billions, and when the historian questioned them i could refer him to an ancient pamphlet in french, which i have naturally not read but didn’t say so. of course the way to count the demons is to multiply the great pythagorean number by 666. that ought to hold bennett cerf for a while, i should think. the book was always scheduled for spring 1956, and they seem to be getting moving on it.
i am also working away at the sequel to savages, which is due march first, not that anyone thinks it will be done by then. and a new story for life magazine, a christmas story which it is very hard to do in october. and revising an old story for harper’s. i got an unexpected check for five hundred dollars from the people who have the option on bird’s nest for the movies; apparently they are keeping it for a while longer. i don’t seriously think they will ever do anything with it, but as long as they keep sending me checks i am perfectly satisfied. also, i got a letter from someone named jerry wald at columbia pictures, a very respectful letter about how many distinguished writers tended to look down upon the cinema, but actually it was surprising how tenderly and thoughtfully the moving picture organizations dealt with really great literature; as a matter of fact, if i had any old manuscripts, even a narrative poem, he would be very pleased to consider them for movie production. since i happen to have a long narrative poem on the landing of the pilgrims which i wrote in high school, i suggested to my agent that she send it along to mr. wald, but i haven’t heard any more about it. i want to keep the letter and frame it, because no one has ever written me such a respectful letter before. maybe hollywood is the place for us distinguished writers.
stanley is very busy at the college; he is acting head of the literature department this semester which means a lot of odds and ends of business. he is learning greek, too, because he always wanted to and now finds that he prefers to stagger through a greek play in the original and do his own translating for class. he is learning greek and jannie is learning to ride a bike and they go about it the same way, i think. one or the other of them is always complaining that it’s too hard, it’s impossible, no one could ever learn this. i’m so glad i don’t have to learn anything.
stanley and laurie went down to new york for three of the world series games; they saw the three in ebbetts field which brooklyn won, and then came home to see the fine ending on television. i’m just as glad they got out of brooklyn before the end of the series; stanley’s father said it wasn’t safe to go out on the streets that week. they went to see pajama game, which laurie loved.
jannie is taking dancing lessons, this time tap dancing, with a pair of tap shoes she dearly loves. it looks as though she will have to get glasses for reading and schoolwork. she was unhappy until i told her we would send to new york for the fanciest, most jeweled, brightest pair of glasses we could find.
sally keeps on being a little crazy girl, as i told you, and spends her time reading, drawing, and sleeping. she is perfectly healthy and lively, but like a cricket. she is still reading anything she can get her hands on, and she and jannie are working through the entire stock of two libraries, north bennington and bennington.
barry will be writing you a letter one of these days; sally has taught him to make letters clearly and he can now copy half a dozen words so they can be read. he likes to copy messages on the kitchen blackboard, so that we come in and find a message, for instance, to call someone written in a strange straggling writing and barry swears that he answered the phone and took the message. he is very wise and quiet.
the predictions are for a heavy winter…maybe pop is right and we should live in california.
lots and lots of love to you both from all of us. laurie and i can play a duet, me on the piano and laurie on the trumpet. when you get here pop can make it a trio.
lots of love,
s.
• • •
[To Bernice Baumgarten]
January 2, 1956
Dear Bernice,
I am embarrassed to confess that before I could start this letter I had to blow an inch of dust off the typewriter. Most of the Christmas tinsel is off the floor, so perhaps things will get to be a little more simple in a day or so.
I confess I was a little saddened by Life’s decision on the story, but hope that maybe they will give me a third chance; if I ran my household budget the way they run theirs Stanley would be cross, I think.
Through a series of necromantic deals with a series of British sorcerers Stanley got me a magic ring which has inspired a good deal of speculation around this house; I have been through all my magic books and can identify it only as a talisman controlling the liberal sciences and probably a demon named Gamygyn, who appears in the form of a donkey and can converse with the spirits of the drowned. Sally, who regards herself as an authority, says I may make three wishes a day on the ring, but I was scared, so she and Barry borrowed the ring and wished for a color television set. I am curious to know how old liberal-science Gamygyn copes with color television.
We got Laurie a trumpet for Christmas, not realizing that his friend Willie was getting a set of snare drums and his friend Ricky a clarinet. They call themselves the Sour Note Trio, which is perfectly accurate, and practice in our living room. I have been spending a lot of time out, just driving around and around in the car.
Now that the year has started itself off again, we can hit Farrar Straus and Cudahy for all that money waiting there. Can you ask them?
If Gamygyn produces the television set I am going to put him to work on the treasures of the earth, but until then I expect we will have to depend on the demon Straus. The manuscript may very well be ready by March 1.
I will honest get right to work. Barry is home from nursery school until March and the Sour Note Trio practices every afternoon, so I will either move my typewriter into the barn or find a little time in the late evening.
Best,
Shirley
• • •
[To Bernice Baumgarten]
February 21 [1956]
Dear Bernice,
With my well-known gift for making a damn fool of myself I have managed to involve myself once more in a mishmash. Are you acquainted with a Vermont farmer named Tommy Foster? He lives in Bennington, his wife teaches at the college, and Tommy himself, a chicken-farmer and bird-watcher, has some semi-official connection with Farrar and Straus. Many years ago when I had just finished Road Through the Wall, he got in touch with Roger and suggested they read it, and suggested to me that I have my then agent send it to F and S, which she did and they took it and Tommy thus regards himself as my literary discoverer although my own comparison, which regards taxi drivers and brothels, Tommy views with Vermont reserve.
I was taking tea and lemon puff cookies with Tommy’s wife a week ago, and Tommy joining us was talking about Demons, and remarked that in his official capacity he was much disturbed at rumors that I was leaving F and S, and I told him that in his official capacity as a friend of ours for the past eleven years I would tell him the main reasons I wanted to leave—advertising, millions of petty irritations like not knowing my correct address, and, primarily, the idea that I knew no one there, had never done business with anyone but John, and felt that my connection with them was largely non-professional, so that my entire business association was on the level of fond little notes from John and Margaret, with news of the family, and boxes of licorice and books sent to the kids. I believe I have only seen Roger three times in my life, not that I would regard that as a major catastrophe. it actually boils down to the feeling that so long as I am going to call myself a professional writer I would rather not publish in the general atmosphere of an indulgent old uncle who pats me on the head.
So I told Tommy
this, under the impression that I was having tea with him and his wife. When I was leaving his house he said he wanted to tell Roger and I said I would rather he didn’t, and he said Roger would want to know and I said it was silly, since all it would do was hurt John’s feelings, something I had been avoiding doing for a number of years, and if I had ever thought Roger could do anything about it I would tell him myself, and Tommy said it was his job to let Roger know things like this; if “his writers” were “dissatisfied” Roger would want to know it. So I finally said I didn’t care; I had done enough general whining about this to suppose that Roger knew anyway.
I’m writing you about it because I don’t actually know what Tommy finally said to Roger, except that Tommy called me yesterday to say that he Had Seen Roger and It Was Being Taken Care Of and Roger said I Was Not To Worry About It Any More. They are sending an editor up here care of Tommy, someone named Bad Sir Brian Botany, and it gives me some comfort to reflect that the Fosters are going to have to give a local party for him, Tommy as a chicken-farmer preferring to go to bed at nine-thirty. Although I would not for anything in the world cast any reflections upon the noble profession of chicken-farming, it does seem to be incompatible with politics. I did not even know that Tommy had discovered me, and I certainly did not know that he regarded his connection with F and S as official. And of course I would not have babbled so if I had suspected that he would regard it as his duty to tell Roger.