Paterson (Revised Edition)

by William Carlos Williams

  69–70 As a corollary … manufactury Although Sankey 95 cites the Federal Writers’ Project’s Stories of New Jersey (New York, 1938), this passage is closer to the version in the four pages of the Federal Writers’ Project publication Stories of New Jersey, December 1936, School Bulletin #11—“prepared for use in public schools.”

  The first paragraph in the passage may be WCW’s version of the source’s “Though the Revolution had left America politically independent of Great Britain, leading minds soon realized that the fruits of liberty would be bitter if the new country could not secure her industrial independence as well.”

  The next two paragraphs follow the language of the 1936 text closely, with the exception of some minor changes in punctuation and definite and indefinite articles that occur through the retyping and rearrangement of these passages, and of the differences noted below.

  Between the two paragraphs in Stories of New Jersey appears a sentence on Washington’s coat at his inaugural that WCW revises and inserts as verse in a subsequent prose passage from this material, see p. 74. Other major differences:

  Hamilton/Alexander Hamilton WCW’s revision, on Buffalo E25

  a great Federal City Added by WCW. The title of the Stories of New Jersey article is “Paterson, ‘The Federal City.’”

  a national manufactury Added by WCW, picked up from a later passage in the source that WCW inserts into Paterson, see p. 74.

  72 that cold blooded … get it The details fit the crime and hanging of John Johnson, see notes to pp. 197 and 202.

  73 The Federal … high taxes Extracts from a mimeographed sheet—addressed to “Dear Citizen”—put out by Alfredo and Clara Studer and dated January 1947, see Sankey 98–99 for more details. WCW includes further excerpts below, and excerpts from the pamphlet “Tom Edison on the Money Subject” which accompanied the sheet. The Studer sheet is filed with Buffalo E17 and marked by WCW at the top, “Following the preacher’s clownish talk.”

  Clara Studer wrote to WCW on April 18, 1946, telling him that she had written to Pound and received “back several little notes” which included a request “to write and tell you what he ‘actually did say’ … [in] his [Italian] broadcasts.” Studer asks if WCW is interested in receiving some Social Credit materials (Yale uncat.). For Social Credit and WCW’s attitude and involvement see Weaver 103–114.

  WCW’s second paragraph reproduces the third paragraph of the sheet with two minor differences, which are present in the Buffalo typescripts. The source reads “over and over and over,” and “in war or peace.” The first paragraph reads in full: “The Federal Reserve System is a private enterprise. Ever since 1863 (1863 to 1913 it went under the name of National Banks) a private monopoly has had the power—given to it by a spineless Congress of that time—to issue and regulate all our money.”

  The paragraph WCW omits charges that “this was an act of treason” that “surrendered, to a handful of merchants, the most sacred right given to the people of the United States in Article I of the Constitution”; a “treason … committed as a result of pressure by … [the] Bank of England.”

  73 Witnessing the Falls … they called it Probably WCW’s own prose, see note to p. 67.

  74 The newspapers … his place Apart from one verbal difference (“all the cotton”), verbatim from Stories of New Jersey, see note to pp. 69–70.

  74 The prominent … goods From BH 408, the only remaining sentence from the earlier drafts of what was originally a longer extract from their entry for Paterson. BH reads “cotton cloths,” as do the drafts up to Buffalo E25.

  74 In other … work The fourth paragraph of the Studer mimeographed sheet, which reads “the Government of ours” for “our Government” (as Studer on Buffalo E23, but as printed on E18).

  74 In all … up Sentences taken and rearranged from the pamphlet that accompanied the Studer sheet, “Tom Edison on the Money Subject.” The original pamphlet, about two thousand words, is filed with Buffalo E23. The pamphlet reads “If people ever” and capitalizes “per cent to the stated cost.” The differences are on the Buffalo typescripts. For fuller details of the pamphlet see Joel Conarroe, William Carlos Williams’ “Paterson” : Language and Landscape (Philadelphia, 1970) 156.

  76 Whatever … fashion From the same Marcia Nardi letter quoted elsewhere in Book II, see note to p. 45. WCW omits two paragraphs between this and the previous extract, on p. 64, paragraphs in which MN discusses her difficulties in obtaining employment.

  that note of yours WCW’s note of February 17, 1943, ending his side of the correspondence.

  part … Nor WCW omits “For you to consent to see me as you might consent to see one of your patients outside of office hours, in that entirely impersonal way—no, thanks; not that for me.” WCW marks the excision on the Buffalo E19 typescript.

  The Buffalo E5 version has four other differences from the printed text. The differences occur through the E19 and E25 retypings:

  mechanical/the mechanical

  at your office/there at your office

  some of/some one of

  written you/written to you

  78–79 The descent … indestructible WCW printed as a separate poem in his 1954 volume The Desert Music. See CP2 245–246, and the accompanying note on page 486 in which WCW links these lines to his concept of “the variable foot.”

  are towards/are toward Partisan Review (1948), Pictures from Brueghel

  to waken/to awaken Desert Music, Pictures from Brueghel

  80 Missing was … age From Mary McCarthy, The Company She Keep (New York, 1942), 239. McCarthy’s prose continues: “Jim reread these masters and tried to reproduce the tone by ear, but he could not do it. He became frightened and went back to the public library; perhaps, as someone had suggested, the material was under-researched.” The remaining eleven words of the Paterson prose passage appear as verse in early drafts.

  82 My feelings … damned thing From the beginning of a letter by Marcia Nardi, [May?] 1943. See note to p. 45. The original letter is not filed with any of WCW’s correspondence or typescripts, to my knowledge, although the Buffalo E5 typescript contains a longer version, which may be a transcription, and the Buffalo E19 typescript also contains this particular passage. The long prose section that closes Book II is from this letter, see note to p. 87, which also discusses a version of this letter at HRC.

  In the three typed drafts of this paragraph on E5 and E19 “responsibility” reads “all responsibility.”

  85 Seventy-five … last week Possibly a reference to one of the international conferences held by Princeton University in 1946 to mark its bicentennial.

  86 full octave/slow octave Partisan Review (1948)

  87–91 My attitude … pages A continuation of the letter from Marcia Nardi begun on p. 82, see note above. A blank page preceded this prose in IST.

  Although, as noted above, the original of this letter is not among WCW’s papers, the HRC holds a version in MN’s hand that she sometimes claimed many years later was a copy of what she sent WCW. The HRC document differs in a number of ways from the Buffalo E5 version and the printed version, and some of these differences have been discussed by Theodora R. Graham in “‘Her Heigh Compleynte’: The Cress Letters of William Carlos Williams’ Paterson” in Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams: The University of Pennsylvania Conference Papers (Philadelphia, 1983), ed. Daniel Hoffman, pp. 164–193. Professor Graham, working with what appears to have been a copy of the HRC document provided by MN, suggests that WCW rewrote parts of the letter to produce the printed version.

  However, my own conclusion is that the HRC document is probably a draft of the letter MN eventually sent to WCW, and that the Buffalo E5 typescript of the letter is, in the absence of the letter itself, the closest to the source document currently available, and the textual notes to this section of the poem are based upon this conclusion. Thus I note the verbal differences between the printed version and the E5 typescript below, but not the differences between the HRC document and the
Paterson text. (Interested readers may consult Professor Graham’s article, in which all the examples quoted match the HRC document.)

  Since WCW’s treatment of this letter has been the subject of some critical debate, I record below the reasons for my own conclusion:

  1)WCW’s practice elsewhere in Paterson with letters is to cut and condense, but not to add substantial material of his own. Changes he makes to letters can be traced in the various typescripts of the poem, but for this letter no changes beyond the cuts noted below can be documented in the Buffalo typescripts.

  2)The HRC document itself contains a number of revisions of vocabulary and style that are consistent with the letter being composed and revised as it is being written. It does not have the character of a copy of a letter already written, and indicates an on-going involvement with the process of composition that also makes unlikely the subsequently sent letter being copied verbatim from the HRC draft. On the other hand, Buffalo E; has some characteristics of a transcription. The differences between the HRC document and E5 could be explained as amplification and clarification by MN of her points as she rewrites from a draft.

  3)MN made contradictory statements concerning the relationship of the HRC material to the printed version in Paterson. In material held privately, she asserts in one letter that the HRC document is an “exact copy” of the printed version, but in another that WCW made only trivial changes to what she sent him. Both comments are in letters written forty years after the event. In addition, the 1966 letter from the HRC agreeing to purchase material from MN, including this document, describes the items purchased as letters from WCW, and drafts of letters to WCW.

  4)A number of the passages present in the E5 version but not the HRC document concern details either that WCW could not be expected to know, or that he is unlikely to have added to the letter. In one example he is unlikely to have invented—the references to Miss Fleming, ST and SS—WCW has to disguise identities, including that of Harvey Breit, for the printed version (see note to pp. 87–88 below). In his correspondence with MN, WCW is very careful in his references to her aborted relationship with Breit, a mutual acquaintance, and WCW never mentions MN in his letters to Breit. In another passage that is part of a longer section WCW cut from E5, but which is not in the HRC document, MN discusses her relationship with her son and includes details that WCW would be unlikely to invent. A collation of the HRC document with E5 reveals a number of similar examples.

  5)The HRC document does not contain the postscripts of the printed version, although its final page contains space for the first postscript to be started. The missing postscripts support the possibility that MN rewrote and revised the letter from the HRC draft, and—in her continuing concern to strike the right tone and convey what she wanted to communicate—she added the postscripts before sending off the letter. The postscripts also contain information, concerning the circumstances of the stolen money order, for example, that WCW would be unlikely to know or invent.

  6)MN’s papers, privately held, indicate that on occasion she would write a preliminary draft before the sent version of a letter. This is the case with the letter of March 30, 1949, to WCW noted below.

  87 the Introduction to your Paterson In the early 1940s WCW was calling the whole poem as then conceived an “Introduction.”

  woman’s need to/woman’s needing to

  “sail free in her own element” MN paraphrases WCW in his review of Anaïs Nin’s The Winter of Artifice. The review appeared in New Directions Seven (1942), 434.

  relationships with other women/friendships with other women

  awareness/awarenesses

  doctor/Dr. P.

  88 almost in/in almost

  W/Woodstock [New York]

  so simple /as simple

  Miss Fleming HRC and E5 read Hawkins. WCW had written to Iris Barry, Film Library Director at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in December 1942 concerning a possible position for MN and the letter had been passed on to Frances Hawkins, who—as she wrote to WCW on March 9, 1943—handled personnel matters at the Museum, and she offered to talk to MN (Yale uncat.). In the fall of 1942 Marianne Moore also made some job inquiries on MN’s behalf at WCW’s request (Moore to WCW, October 1942 and October 11, 1942 (Yale uncat.).

  S.T. and S.S…. Clara … Jeanne E5 reads H.B. for S.T. but the other initials are unchanged. Harvey Breit’s wife was named Clara, and S.S. may be Sydney Salt, who, as Elizabeth O’Neil has pointed out to me, dedicates two books of his poetry to “Jeanne.” Salt lived close to MN in Greenwich Village at this time. In other letters to WCW, MN refers to a “Sydney.”

  89 I asked for/I asked you for

  and maybe/and then maybe

  And then All previous printings have a printer’s error “And the”

  Miss X/Miss Hawkins

  so badly On E5 the paragraph continues for twenty additional lines, discussing the poor employment prospects at the Office of War Information, and “at the Museum itself,” and MN’s relationship with her son.

  That I’m in the/I’m in the

  with the social/with social

  welfare All previous printings and E5 have “wellfare,” but MN spells correctly on HRC

  kind at all/sort at all

  90 acceptably/acceptedly

  I was able/I was then able

  like measles/like the measles

  that introduction to my poems In New Directions Seven (1942), 413–414.

  91 the only thing/the only happy thing

  La votre C. WCW alludes to Criseyde’s signature in writing to Troilus in Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde, see SL 233.

  21 Pine Street The letter is written from 21 Grove Street, New York.

  Brown’s/[James] Laughlin’s

  is dead now/is now dead

  he took any/he who took any

  or antisocial/or any antisocial

  I’m reminded/I am reminded

  A.N./Anaïs Nin See note to p. 87 above.

  those pages/these pages

  On March 30, 1949, the correspondence between WCW and MN resumed when MN wrote of discovering her letters in Paterson II while browsing in a Woodstock bookstore (ND Archives). This resumption continued until 1956 when WCW was forced to curtail most of his correspondence following his strokes.

  WCW’s final letter, congratulating MN on having a book of her poems published by the Swallow Press, concludes: “You are one of the hardiest women and one of the most gifted and generous women I know. I am happy at your success” (October 5, 1956, HRC).

  BOOK III (1949)

  The dust jacket of the first edition carried “A Note on Paterson Book III” by WCW, dated September 28, 1949:

  Paterson is a man (since I am a man) who dives from cliffs and the edges of waterfalls, to his death—finally. But for all that he is a woman (since I am not a woman) who is the cliff and the waterfall. She spreads protecting fingers about him as he plummets to his conclusions to keep the winds from blowing him out of his path. But he escapes, in the end, as I have said.

  As he dies the rocks fission gradually into wild flowers the better to voice their sorrow, a language that would have liberated them both from their distresses had they but known it in time to prevent catastrophe.

  The brunt of the four books of Paterson (of which this is the third, ‘The Library’) is a search for the redeeming language by which a man’s premature death, like the death of Mrs. Cumming in Book I, and the woman’s (the man’s) failure to hold him (her) might have been prevented.

  Book IV will show the perverse confusions that come of a failure to untangle the language and make it our own as both man and woman are carried helplessly toward the sea (of blood) which, by their failure of speech, awaits them. The poet alone in this world holds the key to their final rescue.

  94 Cities … Santayana From George Santayana, The Last Puritan: A Memoir in the Form of a Novel (New York, 1936) 140. (The next two sentences in Santayana read: “No: for him cities were congested spots, ugly, troublesom
e and sad. Boston, when he first passed through it, seemed to him nothing but Great Falls multiplied.”)

  sets up her trophies Santayana’s text reads “sets up all her trophies”

  95 Avery Samuel Putnam Avery (1822–1904), who made a fortune advising American buyers of European art, see Weaver 209.

  97–98 Blow! … from the reading In 12th Street (December 1949) WCW published material from various parts of Book III as a single piece under the title “Paterson Book III: Preface.” In addition to this passage the material included “The “Castle’ too … So be it” p. 99, “Papers … Unabashed. So be it” pp. 117–118, “Upon which … So be it. So be it. So be it” p. 130.

  97 So be it WCW told Pound “the ‘so be it’ I copied verbatim from a translation of a Plains Indian prayer. … It meant what it says: if it so is then so let it be. In other words, to hell with it” (December 1949, Lilly Library, Indiana University).

  97 Cyclone, fire/and flood On February 8, 1902, a devastating fire consumed much of central Paterson, destroying the Danforth Free Public Library (and most of its contents) among other buildings. Nelson and Shriner record “there was a strong gale blowing … [which] acted like a huge bellows” (505). The following month the Passaic river “which flows through a large part of the city” flooded. “With the enormous volume of water that poured down the river bed and the territory adjacent, came huge floes of ice, carrying destruction wherever they went” (507). Later in the year a freak tornado struck the city. The library was rebuilt on a new site, and reopened in 1905.

  98 no wind/no winds 12th Street (1949)

  doors … hands In 12th Street reads “doors/that the wind holds; wrenches from our hands/—and arms.”

  98 Old newspaper files … Works As Weaver 209 notes, the various details are from 1936 issues of The Prospector: “two little girls, firmly locked in each other’s arms,” July 10, p. 6; a photograph of the Paterson Cricket Club in 1896, August 21, p. 6; the story of the “two local millionaires” appears in the issue of October 9; the “Indian rock shelter” is described in the October 2 issue; the August 28 issue carried an article on the Rogers Locomotive Works.