The Selected Letters of Willa Cather

by Willa Cather

  TO R. L. SCAIFE

  March 8, 1917

  New York City

  My Dear Mr. Scaife;

  As soon as I returned to New York at the end of November, I put aside the notes of “The Blue Mesa” to take up another novel,—a Western story which will run about the same length as “O Pioneers!” and which has a somewhat similar background. I am now about half-way through with the first writing of this story.

  Please tell me, what is the latest date on which I could turn in the manuscript for fall publication? I know that I will not have finished it by the end of April. By the end of May, or the middle of June, it may be quite ready for the printer.

  In case you give me a date so early that I feel I cannot make it, I shall probably put the long story aside and take up a set of six short stories which I have arranged to do for Reynolds. He can get me $700 apiece for them, so of course it would be better business than completing the novel. If it is possible to get the novel ready for fall publication without rushing it too hard, however, I would rather finish it, now that I am so far along in it.

  I think Mr. Greenslet is rather to be envied for having an enforced holiday in an interesting part of the world [England].

  Very sincerely yours

  Willa Sibert Cather

  Scaife replied that Houghton Mifflin would like the manuscript by June 1 for fall publication, but might be able to accept it as late as August. Cather’s response below suggests how invested she was in the physical design of this book from the very beginning.

  TO R. L. SCAIFE

  March 13 [1917]

  Dear Mr. Scaife;

  Since you can give me such good lee-way, I think I ought to be able to get the story done in time for fall publication. I can get you some sort of prospectus done when you need it, and, if you think best give you the first few chapters in time to have them set for your July program.

  Unless I can find just the right person to do some head and tailpieces, I had rather not have illustrations. As for the cover design, I rather wish you could reproduce the “Song of the Lark” cover in a darker blue, a strong navy blue, with, of course, quite a different jacket. I wish you could have a bright yellow jacket, with very heavy black type, if that paper would not be too expensive. However, we can take up these things later. For the present I will push ahead with the manuscript, and I shall try to give you some more definite idea of its length and character very soon––––by the middle of April.

  Faithfully yours

  Willa Cather

  On Cather’s suggestion, Scaife spoke with dance trainer Luigi Albertieri (whom Cather had written about in her 1913 article in McClure’s “Training for the Ballet”) about a proposed book on the dance, and he checked out the sales history of Green Mansions by William Henry Hudson, one of the young publisher Alfred A. Knopf’s first successes. He also suggested a couple of potential artists should Cather want illustrations for her new western book.

  TO R. L. SCAIFE

  April 7 [1917]

  New York City

  Dear Mr. Scaife;

  I will be glad to help in any way about Albertieri’s book. I don’t suppose he will want to split it, as from his point of view it seems a complete and logical presentation of the subject.

  With regard to the decoration of my book, I think [Wladyslaw T.] Benda might be able to do it. His half-tone illustrations are rather too mannered, but he used to do good head and tailpieces, and he knows the material. I will try to have a talk with him and let you know about it later. The samples of binding I will return soon, naming a first and second choice. Within the next four weeks I shall know whether this story is going to come together in time for fall publication or not. I think it will.

  I hear from a bookseller in Oxford Junction, Iowa, that he has had several orders for “O Pioneers!” and has been utterly unable to fill them. Will you please have a notice to the effect that there is a new printing of the book to; Mr. Arthur Grimwood, Oxford Junction, Iowa.

  Isn’t there a statement of sales due me sometime in April?

  If I can’t get better reports of “Green Mansions” than you did, I am afraid I shall have to send you some candy.

  Faithfully

  Willa S. Cather

  Despite her intentions, Cather was unable to get the manuscript for My Ántonia done in time for publication in 1917. She was also, like most Americans, distracted by the United States’s declaration of war on Germany in early April.

  TO ELSIE CATHER

  May 4 [1917]

  My Dear Bobbie;

  I have simply been ashamed to write you, because I had neglected it for so long. I’ve tried to write mother often this winter, and while Jack was sick I tried to get a few notes off to him because he seemed blue and hated Detroit, but I’ve neglected everyone else. I kept putting off writing to Mrs. Deland though I knew Mr. [Lorin F.] Deland was very ill, and yesterday he died, and I do feel more than ashamed. The war has made everything so much more difficult, housekeeping and meeting ones bills,—and it has taken all the fun of work away, somehow. One can’t feel that writing books is very important. I am fairly stuck on the novel I wrote you about, and will either have to give it up or try it over again a new way. Two Houghton Mifflin men were here last night and I had to make the sad admission to them that I couldn’t get a new book out this fall. They are disappointed, and so am I. There is a great deal that’s good in the new story, but I have not gone at it right, somehow, and I’m going to quit it for awhile and do some short stories to build up my bank account.

  Did you know that Kipling’s only son, John, who was the Dan of the Puck [of Pook’s Hill] stories, was lost in the war, and they don’t even know how or where. They have not heard of him for over a year and have given up hoping. Mr. Greenslet, of Houghton Mifflin, just back from England, told me last night that the old man is all broken up and sees nobody. Life has gone pretty hard with him, and he has given so much pleasure in this world.

  Edith has been pretty well this winter. I blue-stone her eyes for her every week, which saves occulists’ bills, and time, too. We are going down to Washington tonight for a few days. But the magazine business is cramped and made harder by the war. High cost of ink and paper take all the profits and shut down advertising.

  I have been to a lot of very gay musical parties with the Hambourgs, and I had such a joyful dinner party for Fremstad and her new husband [Harry L. Brainard]. Everything went just right and I never saw her enjoy herself so much. I wrote mother all about it, and she probably sent you my letter.

  People connected with the British war office tell me that they don’t hope to end the war under two years. Even at the best London hotels Greenslet could get only two courses for each meal, and a miserable bit of boiled beef three days a week, no other meat at all. He was uncomfortabl[y] hungry for the two months he was there, and hotels and public buildings were unheated all winter. The papers give no idea of what the submarines have really done. If America had not gone in, the allies would have been beaten, that is the grim truth. The submarines have cut off all chance of feeding the army. The food situation is much worse in England and northern France than it is in Germany. If we can build boats fast enough to keep the Allied armies going, and if we can reinforce their numbers with men, it may be over in two years. If we don’t do this, we will have to be Prussians in the end. Russia is helpless. Unless the allies can keep the whole German army busy on the French front, the Germans will take St. Petersburg, and enough Russian grain and farm land to enable them to go forever. The United States has never had such a chance before; no country ever has. We can literally save Democracy––––or lose it––––for the whole world. And [m]y nice guide on the Mesa Verde writes me that the war is “considered a joke” out there. We are a good deal like Russia; so big and unorganized. Take it from me, Bobbie, the next year is going to be a black one.

  Now I must stop for this time, dear girl. I’ll try to do better hereafter, if you forgive me.

  With h
eaps of love to you

  Willie

  TO ROSCOE CATHER

  June 23 [1917]

  Red Cloud

  My Dear Roscoe;

  I have never answered the nice letter you wrote me about Virginia’s tooth, though all my friends in New York had to hear the story. I came west suddenly because the University of Nebraska wrote me that they wanted to give me an honorary degree on their Semi-Centennial Commencement. They gave me and Edith Abbott (she is Jane Addams’ assistant and some wonder in sociology) Doctor of Letters, the first honorary degrees ever granted to women. They gave John Neihardt the poet Lit.D. also, and Doctor of Laws to [Theodore] Roosevelt, Roscoe Pound and Gen. [John] Pershing. Elsie was in Lincoln visiting, and Daddy came up from Red Cloud. I think it was so nice of him! Barnard McNeny was there and he seemed no end pleased. I was pleased because all my old teachers seemed pleased with me. There have been very few honorary degrees given to women in this country; not more than a dozen all told, and most of them to great educators like Alice Freeman Palmer and Jane Addams.

  Tell me, Roscoe, do you think there would be a furnished house for rent in Lander from July 15 to August 15? Edith Lewis comes west then, and we may go up into your part of the world. Don’t bid us come to you, for Edith wont visit anyone, she won’t even stop here, I’m afraid. Let me know soon if you have heard of a house to let for that month. The Amoretti ranch at five dollars a day seems rather expensive for war times. Do they make a better rate by the month?

  Poor twin-ies! Their aunt’s degree cost them some dear little dresses. I had to close apartment and leave New York on three days’ notice and all my summer shopping and theirs went by the board. But someday they shall have some dresses from New York.

  Lovingly

  Willie

  Daddy and Elsie are both fine.

  Cather wrote about the same events to her friend Elizabeth Sergeant and to her editor Ferris Greenslet, providing us rare examples of the way the tone and content of letters vary with different addressees.

  TO ELIZABETH SHEPLEY SERGEANT

  June 23 [1917]

  Red Cloud

  Dear Elsie:

  Even if I could have answered your letter within a decent time, I could not have given you the least help. Your own book is the only new one I have read with any pleasure. Most of the ones I’ve tried have been thick slices of commonness. The New Republic would point you to Mrs. [Katharine Fullerton] Gerould would it not? Have you tried Mary Austin’s new novel “The Ford”—unfortunate title for anyone but the Williamsons!

  I came west unexpectedly and unprepared because the faculty of the University of Nebraska wanted to give me an honorary degree—Doctor of Letters—on their semi-centennial commencement. Edith Abbott, Miss Addams’ assistant was given the same degree. They were the first honorary degrees that university has given to women. I was pleased because it came from that institution and this state.

  After Commencement came ten days of intensive visiting. Lord, how many people I saw, and at how many parties did I try to be merry! I enjoyed the first few, but there is an innocent sameness about these festivities on green lawns with oldish girls in white dresses and stranded professors from “Maine, N.H., Rhd. I., VT”.

  Red Cloud is patriotic and bubbling hot—the amorous sinners of Dante were no more persistently singed by fire than are the corn-country dwellers in July and latter June. Corn-germination takes a terrific degree of heat, and we pant under a kind of magnificent fire all day, with the air full of sweet, hot smells.

  I go to Wyoming soon. This address will reach me, however.

  Yours.

  WSC

  TO FERRIS GREENSLET

  June 25 [1917]

  Red Cloud

  Dear Mr. Greenslet;

  I came West rather suddenly to receive an honorary degree from the University of Nebraska at its Semi-Centennial Commencement. Roosevelt, Dean Pound of Harvard Law School, and Gen. Pershing were given Doctor of Civil Laws—the latter in absentia, of course. John S. Neihardt, Edith Abbott, who is Jane Addams’ assistant at Hull House, and I were given Doctor of Letters. It was a rather joyful occasion because so many old friends from this town and other friendly little towns were there.

  I am now at home and will let you know when I flit away to Wyoming. I may join Isabelle at Dublin N.H. instead of going further west. Nebraska is bubbling hot for war!

  Yours

  Willa S.C.

  In September 1917 Cather’s cousin G. P. Cather, son of her uncle George and aunt Franc, sailed to France with the American Expeditionary Force.

  TO FRANCES SMITH CATHER

  September 9, 1917

  Shattuck Inn, Jaffrey, New Hampshire

  My Dear Aunt Franc:

  I don’t wonder that your patriotism does not always reach as far as France! But G. P. has always hankered after military life, and this is the day when the fellows with that hankering have their chance. And we’ve got back to first principles, it seems; everything goes back to the man who can carry a gun. I know it’s pretty hard on you to have him go, but I am glad he can go, and go as an officer. I’m ever so proud of him. I wish Jack were going, I really do, though I think he is very useful where he is.

  I was so disappointed not to get out into the country again, for a visit with you. But the hot weather used me up shockingly, and my friend [Edith Lewis] was more worn out by it than I. We had to give up and flee. I was exhausted when I got back to New York, and had to come up here to cool, green New Hampshire to recover from Red Cloud. I was too worn out to work. Unless I have a great deal of vitality, I simply do bad work, which is much worse than doing none.

  Douglass writes discouraging reports about mother. I don’t know whether I ought to go to California or not. I hate to break in on my work. I live at a comfortable hotel and have a little tent a mile away in the woods, where I go to work every morning. My friend Mrs Hambourg, (Miss McClung when you met her) was here with me for three weeks, and she asked about you and was disappointed that I had not seen you.

  Elsie is so fortunate in her schools—I expect a cheerful disposition is largely responsible for the fact that she finds each place lovelier than the last. She is delighted with Albuquerque and is so happy there. I will send you her letter when Jack returns it. Both she and Jack are a great deal of satisfaction to me.

  I would feel very cheerful and happy if only mother were better.

  Mother’s address is

  Hotel Garfield

  354 O’Farrell St.

  San Francisco

  Do send the letter that was returned from Los Angeles to her there. Now I must write her a little note. Elsie got to like Frank’s wife [wife of Frank Cather, Franc’s son] so much. I wished I could have seen her again, too. Families are pretty good things to have, after all, aren’t they?

  With a great deal of love to you, dear Aunt Franc,

  Yours always

  Willa

  I shall be at home on Bank Street after October 1st.

  In a letter in mid-October encouraging Cather to have her book ready for spring 1918 publication, Ferris Greenslet also passed along a contract from French publisher M. Conard for the “Continental rights” to Cather’s next book.

  TO FERRIS GREENSLET

  October 18, 1917

  Dear Mr. Greenslet:

  I return M. Conard’s contract herewith and think it a good proposition.

  Surely, I’ll be glad to take the reduced royalties on “O Pioneers!” sold to Soldiers Libraries.

  I’m so sorry I was fussy about the date of the statement from the business office. I’ll try to make your date for spring publication, but I can’t tell you surely for about a month from now.

  The Century people begin the series “Office Wives” in January. They want the book rights also. I don’t imagine you will mind, as there is not much money in a book of short stories, and this series would not be ready for book publication until next fall. I told [Century editor Douglas Zabriskie] Doty I thought they could
have the book all right, but I did not absolutely promise. At least, I don’t think I did.

  Do let me know when you come to New York. I want very much to talk to you about the physical make‑up of the next book. I want to try something a trifle new in color of the binding and jacket. I am going to ask Benda to dinner and talk to him about head and tail-pieces. If he doesn’t get the idea, no one else would, and I’d rather go un-illustrated.

  The truth is, I’ve tried to make my own head and tail-pieces in the text itself, and unless the artist can echo them, I’d rather not.

  Faithfully yours

  Willa Cather

  Only three stories for the proposed book Office Wives were ever completed and published: “The Bookkeeper’s Wife” (Century, May 1916), “Ardessa” (Century, May 1918), and “Her Boss” (Smart Set, October 1919).

  TO CARRIE MINER SHERWOOD

  October 29, 1917

  My Dear Carrie;

  I have been up in New Hampshire all fall, and did not know of your dear mother’s death until a few days ago, when I was looking over a pile of Red Cloud papers that had accumulated in my absence. Father does not write to me very often, and he always hates to write bad news.

  You said last summer that your mother was so changed by her illness that you felt that she got very little satisfaction out of life, and for that reason I feel that her going may have been a release for her. But I know you must all feel heavy without her. Even after her memory failed and her mind wandered a good deal, there was still something fine and forceful in her, and last fall she seemed to me as much “Mama Miner” as ever she was.

  While I was in New Hampshire I was working on a part of my new novel in which a character very much like your mother appears, and all during September I was thinking about her about every day, trying to recall certain tricks of voice and gesture. I have had a little of Mrs. Miner in almost every mother I have ever done, but this character in this new story is quite a clear little snap-shot of her as I first remember her, and I hope you will like it. I want, by the way, to dedicate this next book to you and Irene, and I hope you wont [mind] appearing in print along with me. It will give me a great deal of pleasure to have your names in a book of mine that will in some places recall to you places and people that have interested you as well as me. The older one grows, the dearer, and the clearer, one’s early impressions somehow become.