Saul Steinberg: A Biography

by Deirdre Bair

  Tino invited Saul to help him hunt: This was something ST and Nivola had done for many years: in a letter to Claire Nivola, October 25, 1976, in her possession, ST relates how they went mushroom hunting “across the dunes from the fish factory.”

  “in boarding houses in Milan”: ST to AB, May 10, 1976, SSF.

  One of the things he liked best: ST, diary, June 12, 1991, YCAL, Box 75. ST was also reading Nabokov’s Speak, Memory and unnamed books by Wittgenstein and Canetti.

  “I’m following your advice”: ST to AB, August 15, 1976, SSF.

  To thank Aldo for his concern: ST to AB, January 29, 1976. He also told AB that Rosa Esman, a gallery owner in New York, would be sending checks for $600; he was to keep half and send the rest to Ada, who had broken her arm. On March 25, 1976, he wrote again to tell Aldo that a $4,000 check would come to him; he was to keep $1,000 and the rest was to be sent to Lica Roman’s children, Stéphane and Dana. On June 19, 1976, he wrote that he would tell Aldo about his “dependent niece and nephew.”

  He was engaged by a text: First published 1979 by Adelphi Edizioni, S.P.A. Milano; translated by Guido Waldman for Bloomsbury, New York, and not published until 2005. Fourteen drawings by ST that he sent to AB from the 1950s on were all reprinted with permission from SSF.

  “I’m a little depressed”: ST to AB, October 23, 1976, SSF.

  “next year with pleasure”: ST, telegram to Aimé Maeght, September 1976, copy at SSF; ST to AB, October 23, 1976, SSF.

  Maeght instructed them to go to Springs: ST to AB, November 16, 1976, SSF.

  He told Aldo he wanted: ST to AB, January 19, 1976, SSF.

  But instead of cheering him up: The YCAL boxes contain articles about how to have sex after ninety, medical folders about which positions to assume after hip surgery or if suffering from chronic arthritis, and, when he was in his eighties, numerous articles and pamplets about the use of Viagra. There are also many guarded references to women who probably rebuffed his advances, but he does not commit the actual details to paper.

  “many emotional reactions”: ST to AB, November 16, 1976, SSF.

  “comfortably and naturally”: ST, Alexander Calder memorial service, Whitney Museum of American Art, December 6, 1976, copy in SSF files.

  “getting tongue-tied”: ST to AB, December 12, 1976, SSF.

  He thought Calvino’s preface: ST to AB, March 24, 1977, SSF.

  The show was to open on May 11, 1977: He referred to the adult children of his aunt Sali Marcovici, who were his contemporaries The Romanian letters in the YCAL boxes, copies at SSF, verify that he still sent them all regular financial stipends.

  “big worries”: ST to AB, April 1, 1977, SSF.

  “A retrospective usually comes”: Alexander Lindey to ST, May 1, 1978, YCAL, Box 61.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN: THE MAN WHO DID THAT POSTER

  “There is no frontier”: Undated transcript of a dialogue between ST and HR, catalogued as 7B-3 and 4, HR/Getty.

  “the man who did that poster”: Sarah Boxer, ST obituary, New York Times, May 13, 1999, pp. 1, B10.

  “one of the very rare times”: ST to Claire Nivola, March 6, 1967, in her archives. The anecdote was also used in S:I, Catalogue 65, pp. 184–85, and Smith, Steinberg at the New Yorker, p. 136.

  As she described her intentions: Dorothy Norman, The Heroic Encounter (New York: Grove, 1958). The Willard Gallery exhibition was the same year.

  In 1966 he did a series of drawings: Published on October 1, 8, and 15. The drawing where the artist is poised over the Pacific Ocean and looking at the city is reproduced in S:I, p. 70.

  Beyond the city, a sun peeked: Reproduced in S:I, p. 71, fig. 77, discussed in Catalogue 75.

  There was only a power station: For an idea of how the painting evolved, see Saul Steinberg: Fifty Works from the Collection of Silvia and Jeffrey Loria, pp. 41–49, figs. 18–23. The first drawing was colored pencil and graphite on paper; the last was colored pencil, crayon, watercolor, ink, and graphite on paper. All the drawings were signed lower right. For an extension of the idea expressed in “9th Avenue,” see Saul Steinberg: Drawing into Being, catalogue, Pace-Wildenstein, New York, October 1–30, 1999, pp. 68–72, “Looking West,” 1986, and “Looking East,” 1986.

  In another version, “Jersey” showed up: On a copy that he sent to his cousin Judith Steinberg Bassow, ST made a mark on a boulder where Denver, Colorado, might have been and wrote her name there, “Judy,” followed by the comment: “This shows Judy on the mountain … love from Saul Steinberg 1976.” I am grateful to Ms. Bassow for this and other photocopies of ST’s work in her possession.

  Steinberg’s ordinary “crummy” New Yorkers: S:I, p. 241, n. 146, in which Joel Smith quotes an e-mail from PC, January 4, 2004; Smith, Steinberg at The New Yorker, p. 42.

  “glued to the television”: ST to AB, June 28, 1973, SSF.

  “Today you get from here”: Arne Glimcher, “Saul Remembered,” in Drawing into Being, p. 5.

  “boring parties and primitive conversations”: ST to Claire Nivola, July 17, 1964, in her archives.

  “ruined by invasion of the rich”: ST to Claire Nivola, March 10, 1986, when the depression that began in the late 1970s was entering its deepest trough.

  “everyone has left”: ST to AB, September 5, 1974, SSF.

  As years passed, it became a kind of public shorthand: The quotation is Sigrid Spaeth’s, from a collection of her correspondence, 1993, YCAL, Box 34. Apparently the speaker confused 7th and 9th Avenues.

  Steinberg complained that he hated: Accounts of ST’s anger and dismay over the rip-offs come from (among many others) interviews and conversations with HS, Claire Nivola, Vita Peterson, IF, Anton van Dalen, and Gordon Pulis.

  Steinberg insisted that he did: Examples abound in the YCAL boxes, but I cite in particular the one in YCAL, Box 61.

  After Steinberg paid his new lawyers: Correspondence pertaining to the settlement is in YCAL, Box 11, Folder “Rembar & Curtis Correspondence, 1988.” The case hinged on whether Columbia had infringed his intellectual property by reproducing buildings that Steinberg drew in his poster. In his deposition, YCAL, Box 64, Steinberg was asked if a building was “an actual building.” Steinberg replied: “I doubt it. It’s an invention based on a real building. I usually—the way a writer bases fiction on nonfiction—I took notes, sketches, and even a poloroid picture or two of the area in order to make the location probable.” In 1993, the original drawing of the poster was sold at auction by Christie’s as “Property from a New York Estate,” no. 128. The original drawing, “provenance Janis,” carried an estimate of $18,000–$22,000. On the catalogue ST wrote: “200,000; tax 22,500,” and below that “225,000.” The drawing did sell for $225,000, according to Christie’s listing of sales for Wednesday, November 10, 1993.

  “I accepted, I have to do it”: ST to AB, July 19, 1977, SSF. His letters throughout 1977 contain similar remarks.

  “It all reads like a novel”: Henrietta Danson to ST, “Wed. Apr. 26” [1977], YCAL, Box 20.

  He came to Springs: AB, interview, June 19, 2007.

  The first task was to select the pictures: YCAL, Box 79, consists entirely of photos of ST’s work, arranged chronologically year by year; probably assembled for the WMAA retrospective. See also ST to AB, August 13, 1977, SSF.

  Steinberg knew that was too many: ST to AB, April 25, 1978, SSF.

  “the Art Book I’ve feared”: ST to AB, August 13, 1977, SSF (his emphasis).

  Part of his animus: ST to AB, June 2, 1978, SSF.

  It paid off, and he thanked Aldo: ST to AB, April 25, 1978, SSF (his emphasis).

  Also, although the museum staff was in charge: Some of the collectors who were delighted to loan their paintings included Jean and Dominique de Ménil, “Soria of Milano,” Hedda Sterne, S. J. Perelman, Jean Stein vanden Heuvel, Carter Burden, and Max Palevsky. A complete list is in YCAL, Box 21.

  One of her earliest duties: Information and quotations that follow are from Sheila Schwartz, e-mail, June
8, 2010.

  “Most chronologies read like tombstones”: John L. Hochmann to HR, January 10, 1978, HR/Getty, Accession #980048, Box 45.

  He still had to complete the poster: Some of the collectors who loaned pictures were Billy Wilder, Claude Bernard, Ivan Chermayeff, Ernst Beyeler, Max Pahlevsky, Eugene Meyer, Carter Burden, Charles Benenson, Richard Anoszkiewicz, Warner LeRoy, Gordon Bunshaft, and Richard Lindner. Museums and galleries included Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas; Housatonic Museum, Connecticut; Galeria de Milano; Hirshhorn Museum, D.C.; and Israel Museum.

  When Schneider phoned to ask about: Alexander Schneider to ST, June 13, 1977, YCAL, Box 61. ST’s pocket diary for 1978 shows that he attended Schneider’s concert at the New School on October 21, 1978, YCAL, Box 82.

  Steinberg asked him not to come: ST to AB, March 13, 1978, SSF.

  “classic way to show muscle”: ST to AB, April 25, 1978, SSF.

  “separated (but did not divorce)”: Enid Nemy, New York Times, April 15, 1978. The article featured a photo of ST with Jacqueline Onassis, Woody Allen, and Jean Stein vanden Heuvel.

  She was a genuine friend to Steinberg: Dore Ashton, interviews, January 20, 2009, and February 24, 2010.

  So too did several others: Vita Peterson was one among the several who told me of this incident in an interview, March 7, 2009.

  Her embarrassment was magnified: Stefan Kanfer, People, May 29, 1978, pp. 79ff.

  In a diary entry from 1985: The chronology of this collection of diary writings is confused, but in the sentence before this one, she says she is typing it on August 16, 1985. Also, she mistakenly attributes ST’s interview with People to Time; YCAL, Box 111.

  “a dazzling gallery”: From a proof of the review, n.d., HR/Getty.

  “one of the best pieces”: Paul Goldberger, “Design Notebook,” New York Times, May 25, 1978; Kim Levin, “A Spy in the House of Art,” ARTS, June 1978 (she is referring to Anaïs Nin’s A Spy in the House of Love).

  The International Herald-Tribune: Alexandra Anderson and B. J. Archer, “The Swift Canonization of Cartoonist Steinberg,” International Herald-Tribune, May 27–29, 1978, p. 7.

  Anatole Broyard wrote an article: Anatole Broyard, “Books of the Times,” New York Times, April 29, 1978, p. L21; reprinted in Stars and Stripes, May 15, 1978, p. 15.

  a devastating blow with a punch: John Russell, “The Many Humors of Steinberg,” New York Times, April 14, 1978. Scattered throughout the YCAL boxes are numerous letters from Steinberg’s friends, fans, and total strangers who objected to Russell’s review.

  “intentionally malicious”: Leo Steinberg to ST, November 22, 1987, YCAL, Box 69.

  They had been neighbors during the years: Lindner’s iconic painting of a group of friends, The Meeting, hangs in the Museum of Modern Art: It pictures ST and HS, Evelyn Hofer, mad King Ludwig of Bavaria, and Lindner’s archetypal woman. Hilton Kramer, in an article in New York Times, Sunday, April 30, 1978, p. D 25, calls it “the key to his oeuvre as a whole.”

  “a sad cemetery in the suburbs”: From two versions of ST’s tribute to Richard Lindner, both in draft form, YCAL, Boxes 38 and 75.

  Ironically, John Russell wrote: John Russell, HR obituary, New York Times, July 12, 1978, p. D16.

  Hilton Kramer posited: Hilton Kramer, New York Times, July, 13, 1978.

  Indeed, for Steinberg it had: ST to AB, July 19, 1977, SSF.

  “In my mind, the conversations with Harold”: The folder containing the various versions of the speech is in YCAL, Box 75.

  When he set up the meditation room: The photo of HR is now in YCAL, Box 50. The caption reads “This hung in Saul’s meditation room.”

  He did not want to be alone: ST to AB, June 2 & 13, 1978, SSF.

  Instead he created a series of portfolios: Smith, Steinberg at The New Yorker, p. 43 and p. 228, n. 70. A description of some of ST’s output in the next decade is also given on p. 43.

  And perhaps when he wrote: ST, 1978 pocket diary, YCAL, Box 82.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT: WHAT THE MEMORY ACCUMULATES

  “Nothing is lost of what the memory accumulates”: ST, random notes of his life through 1978, probably an early version of the chronology prepared for WMAA, as corrected by “BS,” n.d., YCAL, Box 38.

  his only fairly regular correspondence: Judith Steinberg Bassow married a doctor and became a lawyer. One of her two daughters graduated from Brown and Brown Medical School and the other from Princeton, with a doctorate from Harvard. The Bassow family resides in Denver. Judith Bassow prepared the Steinberg family genealogy, for which she and ST exchanged correspondence and information throughout the 1980s. She has a personalized collection of art given to her by ST; she inherited one example of Lica Roman’s art from Martin Steinberg, another was given to her by ST, and a third was given to her by Stéphane Roman.

  He formed a close friendship: A copy of the Steinberg family genealogy is in YCAL, Box 9; related materials may be those classified as “miscellaneous” or “unidentified” in YCAL, Boxes 6 and 7. Correspondence between Judith Bassow and ST is scattered throughout these boxes and in some correspondence folders from the 1980s.

  Phil’s letter was an honest: Phil Steinberg to ST, June 28, 1978, YCAL, Box 22.

  “the mysterious cousin”: ST to AB, September 4, 1978, SSF. ST had just returned from a trip by plane and car to Monument Valley, Arizona; Logan, Utah (where he thought of living for several months); Idaho; and Wyoming.

  “a powerful desire to meet a cousin”: ST to AB, October 24, 1978, SSF.

  “These days,” he told Aldo: ST to AB, September 18, 1978. SSF; also “random notes” in YCAL, Box 38.

  “where dignity was the most important thing”: The drawing and its companions was first published in The Passport; the one in question appears on p. 23 of The Catalogue. ST drew the woman from a drawing by Lica Roman that she made from a photograph of Judith Bassow and told Bassow he meant it to be her; he also told her there was another portrait very like her in the book, but he did not identify which one. From Judith Steinberg Bassow’s notes appended to photocopies of her collection for DB, February 14, 2011.

  Over the years he had amassed: ST clipped advertisements from New York newspapers about the regular flea markets on 26th Street and some of the occasional ones that happened at various times of the year; YCAL, Box 32. In many of the other boxes there are business cards and advertisements for dealers in stamps, books, and photographs, all of whom he frequented.

  Eventually both his new drawings: TNY, December 1978 and May 1979. A description of ST’s technique is in “Old Photographs” [AB #4], R & S Outtakes.

  “He thinks he’s funny”: ST to AB, May 15, 1979, SSF.

  “First and Second Class Reality”: ST to AB, April 25, 1978, SSF. The quotations that follow are from notes in YCAL, Box 38, in a folder titled “Notes and Dreams,” n.d. but internal evidence suggests 1979.

  One of his most famous first- and second-class realities: The photo is the frontispiece in R & S. In ST to AB, November 20, 1982, he writes that the rug came from a house in Barnes Landing owned by the descendants of Alexander Graham Bell. Bell’s widow left the contents to her church when she died, to be sold at auction; ST attended and bought the rug for $100.

  During the fourteen years they had lived: Information about Phil and Rita Steinberg and all quotations are from ST to AB, October 21, 1979, SSF.

  In the end he stayed there: ST to AB, October 21, 1978, SSF. Many of his friends could not understand how ST could live in such a dark apartment, Mary Frank among them: “It seemed like a grim place to me. It was very dark, while Washington Square Village was very light and bright”; Mary Frank, interview, January 25, 2009.

  “playing it loudly”: ST to AB, December 9, 1979, SSF.

  “with admiration”: ST to AB, January 12, 1980, SSF.

  He made no reply: Mary Frank, interview, January 25, 2009.

  He was disgruntled all evening: ST to AB, November 19, 1980, SSF; Mary Frank, interview, January 25, 2009.


  “Johann Christian Bach”: ST to AB, January 12, 1981, SSF. In YCAL, Box 9, he notes the dates for lessons as October 28, 1980, through January 8, 1981.

  “made progress”: ST to AB, December 1, 1980, and April 4, 1981, SSF.

  He thought the structures were interesting: ST to AB, January 12, 1980, SSF.

  Besides these renderings of buildings: ST to AB, July 27, 1981, SSF, with brief remarks or allusions in other 1981 letters to AB.

  He caught Sigrid in many different poses: ST to AB, August 13, 1978, SSF.

  He played with postcards: ST to AB, January 12, 1980, SSF.

  He liked to use airmail envelopes: ST to AB, August 25, 1982, SSF: he asks AB to stick some stamps on a fake letter and send it back to him; in ST to IF, April 28, 1983, he writes that he still gets “strong emotion at the sight of airmail envelopes with striped borders. What a cheerful invention!”

  In his almost frenetic search for pursuits: ST to AB, February 4 and 25, 1980, SSF.

  “horror of hotels”: ST to AB, February 4, 1980, SSF.

  “periods of paranoia”: ST to AB, November 30, 1979, SSF.

  While he was visiting Phil in Tucson: ST to AB, October 21, 1979, SSF.

  “greedy, avaricious characters”: ST to AB, November 30, 1979, SSF.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE: THE DEFECTS OF THE TRIBE

  “I realize that for many years”: ST to AB, June 7, 1980, SSF.

  “It’s clear that the desire for stamps”: ST to AB, August 18, 1980, SSF.

  Steinberg believed that one of the best ways: ST to AB, February 4, 1980, SSF; Mary Frank, interview, January 25, 2009.