Alice Adams

by Carol Sklenicka

  as window on culture of young for Adams, 273

  RELATIONSHIPS WITH MOTHER’S LOVERS Bob McNie, 253, 255, 268, 280, 392, 394, 395, 410, 417, 418, 429, 434, 446, 449, 494–95, 497n

  Dan Simon, 440, 455, 495

  dislike of Vasco Pereira, 215, 220

  Felix Rosenthal, 230

  Franz Sommerfeld, 227

  Max Steele, 197, 198, 208, 242, 343

  on meeting men Adams dated, 215, 228

  Norman Mailer, 170

  Lish, Gordon, 326–27, 362

  Listening to Billie (novel), 106 plot and themes of, 284–85, 327

  publication of, 327, 329, 337, 506

  reactions to, 329–31

  real-life inspirations for, 117, 170n, 239, 250, 266, 284–86, 288, 291–92, 315

  writing of, 283–84, 288, 305, 322, 326

  Little, Brown publishers, 242

  Loma Linda University Medical Center, California, 454–55

  London, Jack, 151

  Look Homeward, Angel (Wolfe), 22, 50, 65

  Looney, Maureen, 283, 284, 286–87, 537n

  Lopate, Phillip, 471–72

  Los Angeles Times, 329–30, 449, 492

  “Lost Luggage” (story), 321, 338–39, 345

  “Love and Work” (story), 438–39

  Love Out of Season (Leffland), 307

  Lowry, Beverly, 399–400, 411, 416, 421, 449, 494

  Lowry, Glenn, 399, 482

  Lubell-Naiman, Adeline, 91, 93, 109n

  Lurie, Alison, 378, 442 later friendship with, 309–10, 318, 335, 365, 387, 390, 438, 439, 457, 482, 483, 484

  Radcliffe enrollment with, 89, 92, 94, 106, 378

  Lying Low (Johnson), 307, 335

  Lynn, Kenneth, 122, 127–28, 135, 138, 139, 141, 145, 149–50, 159, 166, 170, 171, 172, 173n, 175, 178

  Lyon, Fred, 255, 256

  “Mac” (boyfriend), 73–74, 76, 77

  Mac (pet dog), 44, 47

  Macmillan, Dougald, 29, 36, 60, 61, 247

  MacMillan, Josephine, 29, 43–44, 374

  Macmillan, Robert, 29, 47, 48, 60, 61, 73, 482, 483

  Maddox, Brenda, 56

  Madison, James and Dolly, 10

  Maher, Jack, 91, 100n

  Mailer, Adele Morales, 168, 220

  Mailer, Barbara, 91–92, 100n

  Mailer, Beatrice “Bea” Silverman, 91, 133, 134–35, 136, 144, 145, 148, 157, 168, 384n, 504

  Mailer, Norman, 91, 143, 148, 152, 153, 168, 206n, 243, 267, 294, 366, 378, 403, 507 Adams’s relationship with, 1, 135–37, 139, 144, 153, 157–58, 159, 160, 162, 166, 168, 178, 220, 221, 235, 236, 245, 246, 279–81, 504

  Barbary Shore publication and, 168

  first meeting with, 133–34

  Linenthal’s Harvard literary group with, 111–12

  The Naked and the Dead publication and, 143–45, 149, 504

  Paris stay of, 133–37, 139, 141, 143–45

  Superior Women character based on, 384

  Malamud, Bernard, 290

  Malaquais, Jean, 144–45, 152

  Maltz, Albert, 157

  Mangum, Bryant, 86, 305n, 375, 379, 401–2, 500

  Mann, Thomas, 282

  Manso, Peter, 136, 144, 152, 158n, 280

  Martin, Peter D., 185–86

  Marx, Karl, 157

  Massey, Scott, 434, 488, 492

  Matson, Peter, 246n, 249, 261–62, 279, 288, 291

  Matthiessen, F. O., 88, 93, 527n

  Maxwell, William, 202, 328

  McBride, Diana, 127

  McCall’s magazine, 74, 506

  McCarthy, Eugene, 267

  McCarthy, Mary, 52, 82–83, 181, 215, 385, 473

  McClamroch, Sandy, 42

  McCorkle, Jill, 500

  McCullers, Carson, 215, 294

  McDermott, Alice, 423

  McFadden, Cyra, 466

  McFarland, Dennis, 368, 460, 479

  McGovern, George, 291

  McIntosh, McKee & Dodds, 237

  McMullan, James Baugham “Jim,” 64, 73, 77, 114

  McNie, Deen, 252, 254, 256–57, 316, 449

  McNie, Jesse Kyle, 315, 317

  McNie, Joch Allis “Winky,” 255, 257, 269, 273, 316, 317, 506

  McNie, Morissa, 257, 317, 497n Adams’s relationship with, 275, 293, 314, 315, 418–19

  father Bob McNie and, 255, 256, 276, 420, 421, 447, 448, 449

  Listening to Billie character and, 315

  Peter Linenthal and, 314–16, 497n

  McNie, Robert Kendall “Bob,” 251–52 bisexuality of, 292n, 446–47, 448–49

  death of, 448, 497n

  gay men attracted to, 338

  health problems and surgeries of, 410, 411, 412, 415, 418, 419–21

  interior design business of, 251, 253, 255, 256, 257, 258, 266, 292, 293, 322, 350, 351, 359–60, 363, 446, 481

  Norman Mailer’s attack on, 279–80, 281

  Peter Linenthal and, 395, 417, 420, 434, 494, 496

  physical appearance of, 252, 256, 258, 277, 280, 309–10, 316, 328, 331, 403, 420, 475, 494–95

  psychiatric hospital stay of, 419–20

  severe depression of, 359–60, 363, 410, 412, 414, 415, 417, 418–21, 484

  FAMILY BACKGROUND AND MARRIAGE, 256–57 children, 257, 268, 269–70, 273, 314–15, 316–17, 418–19

  divorce from wife, 251, 252, 253, 254, 257

  grandchildren, 314–15, 418, 419

  RELATIONSHIP WITH ADAMS, 240, 252–58, 265–66, 292, 305, 321, 331, 341, 353, 358, 366, 375–76, 377, 382, 390, 420, 468, 475 Adams on McNie, 251–52, 253, 254, 255–56, 259, 321, 331, 375–76, 416–17

  Adams’s decision to break with McNie, 418, 419, 420, 421, 422

  Adams’s desire for independence, 377, 394, 404, 417, 418, 429

  Adams’s notebook entries on McNie, 4, 251–52, 254, 257, 292n, 415, 417, 421, 422–23, 429, 431, 439

  birthday celebrations for Adams, 249, 251, 321, 403–4, 506

  clothing recommendations for Adams, 255, 265, 331, 437

  Diane Johnson on McNie, 421–22

  drinking and alcoholism, 253, 319, 417, 320, 348, 358, 359, 369, 370, 393, 394, 404, 410, 413, 417, 419

  enthusiasm and support for Adams’s writing projects, 265, 292, 302, 310–11, 345, 349, 381, 412

  extramarital affairs, 421n, 447

  fiction based on experiences with McNie, 253, 258–59, 292, 293–94, 319, 320, 322, 376, 377, 415, 425, 428, 431, 434, 435, 438, 440, 441, 443–44, 446, 457, 475, 486

  fights with Adams, 393, 394, 404

  financial difficulties of McNie, 359–60, 393, 410–11, 412

  first meeting with Adams, 251–52, 331

  growing discontent over Adams’s success, 369, 393, 404

  Judith Adams on McNie, 240

  living with Adams in 3904 Clay Street apartment, 254–55, 268, 350, 359, 390

  marijuana use with Adams, 273

  new house (2661 Clay Street) purchase with Adams and redecoration, 390, 391–92, 393, 410–11, 434, 465, 496–97

  Nic Adams’s death’s impact on Adams, 276, 277, 278, 342

  People magazine profile of Adams and McNie, 331, 506

  reason for not marrying Adams, 256, 331, 420

  social events with Adams, 277–78, 286, 287, 308, 309–10, 316, 327–28, 338, 345, 346, 354, 358–59, 368, 369–70, 382, 403, 417

  Truckee River house, 257, 258–59, 287, 292, 306, 350, 354, 359, 417, 420

  vacations with Adams, 272, 289, 290–91, 293, 327, 333, 338, 345, 346, 354, 356, 360, 364, 376, 377, 379, 390, 410, 413, 438, 445n

  LIFE AFTER BREAK WITH ALICE Adams’s feelings toward McNie, after break, 423, 424, 427, 429, 431, 439–40, 441, 477

  attendance at memorial celebration for Adams, 494–95

  daughter Morissa’s supervision of McNie, 419–20, 421

  Elaine Badgley Arnoux relationship, 421n, 447–48, 449

  house with Linda Hogan, 448, 496–97

  living alone in Webster Street apartment, 420, 446–47

  visit wi
th Adams after her surgery, 454

  McNie, Robert Kyle II “Robbie,” 257, 425, 497n Adams’s relationship with, 255, 268, 275, 317, 365n, 420

  father Bob McNie and, 255, 280n, 316, 419, 420, 449

  Golden Gate Bridge climb by, 269–70, 537n

  Peter Linenthal and, 268, 270, 273, 497n

  McPherson, James Alan, 290

  Medicine Men (novel), 452, 480 plot and themes of, 464–65, 467

  publication of, 507

  reactions to, 465–67, 486

  real-life inspirations for, 454, 464–65

  Mehta, Sonny, 411

  Meigs, Mary, 180

  Mencken, H. L., 21

  Mendelsohn, Erich, 229

  Mendelson, Edward, 173

  Mexico Agatha Adams’s travel journal on, 56, 58

  Alice Adams’s love of, 56

  Almost Perfect setting in, 445–46

  Careless Love setting in, 217

  “Elizabeth” setting in, 348

  Nic and Agatha Adams’s trips to, 55–58

  Mexico: Some Travels and Some Travelers There (nonfiction), 356, 429, 431, 437–38, 507

  Michaels, Leonard, 289, 335–36, 428, 435, 494, 494n

  Middlebrook, Diane, 428

  Miller, Arthur, 137

  Miller, Blanton, 182–84

  Miller, Henry, 186

  Minsky, Margaret, 499

  Modern Language Association, 158

  Moffatt, Frances, 280

  “Molly’s Dog” (story), 400

  Moore, Lorrie, 236

  Moore, Sara Jane, 389

  “Mothering” (unpublished novel), 162–63, 257, 260–61, 279, 294

  Mother Jones magazine, 388, 390, 403–5

  Mount Airy plantation house, Virginia, 10–12

  Mount McKinley State Park, 360

  Mount Zion Hospital, San Francisco, 415, 417, 419, 465, 487–88

  Mrs. Munck (Leffland), 307

  Ms. magazine, 295, 330, 383

  Mufson, Phyllis, 282n

  Mukherjee, Bharati, 434

  Munford, Emma Tayloe (grandmother), 10, 12

  Munford, Thomas T. (great-grandfather), 12, 519n

  Munro, Alice, 265, 333, 361, 362n, 435, 442

  Murao, Shigeyoshi, 186

  Murdoch, Iris, 261, 400, 445n

  Murray, John, 176, 308–10, 352, 429, 472, 493

  Mussolini, Benito, 55, 56, 228–39

  “My First and Only House” (essay), 24, 35, 46–47, 349–50, 379

  Naiman, Adeline, 91, 93, 109n

  Naked and the Dead, The (Mailer), 133, 136, 143–45, 149, 158, 166, 383, 504

  National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) award, 318, 506

  National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) fiction awards, 379, 387, 506

  Native Son (Wright), 25

  “Natural Woman, A” (essay), 436–37

  Nemerov, Howard, 150, 324

  Nesbit, Lynn, 318, 323, 325, 337, 343–44, 363–64, 372, 378, 411, 427, 506

  New Yorker magazine, 99, 145, 161, 306, 327–28, 352, 357, 375, 385, 411, 425, 435, 436, 473 Adams’s stories in, 108, 264–65, 270–71, 286, 288, 289, 302, 319, 337, 340, 349, 361, 362, 365, 370, 371, 442, 469, 476, 482, 505

  Adams’s submissions to, 136, 262, 276n, 279, 302, 331, 361, 436, 476n, 479

  first-look (first-reading) contracts at, 331, 436, 476n

  Shawn’s ouster from, 409–10, 507

  Nicaragua, 387–88

  “Nice Girl, The” (story), 69, 70, 71, 72–73, 74

  Nichols, Luther, 225, 308

  Nick, John, 103

  “Night Fears” (unpublished story), 197

  Nixon, Richard, 176, 202, 215, 267, 291, 306, 364, 386, 506

  Norma Jean the Termite Queen (Ballantyne), 307

  North America (Trollope), 11

  North Carolina: The WPA Guide to the Old North State, 26

  Oakes, Nancy, 273

  Oates, Joyce Carol, 185, 289, 304, 336, 361–62, 399n, 400, 433, 435, 507

  O’Brien, Edna, 328

  O’Brien, Tim, 387

  O’Connor, Flannery, 294, 366

  O’Connor, Frank, 478

  O’Flaherty, Liam, 135

  Of Woman Born (Rich), 164

  Ogle, Benjamin, 11

  O’Grady, Patty, 258

  O’Hara, John, 150, 215

  O. Henry Awards, 289, 290, 302, 337, 362, 400, 505, 506

  O. Henry Prize Stories, The (anthologies), 225, 289–90, 302, 327, 362

  O. Henry Special Award for Continuing Achievement, 362, 362n, 506, 507

  “Old Love Affairs” (story), 439, 476, 477

  Ontario Review, 400

  “On Turning Fifty” (essay), 249, 321

  “Opened Heart, An” (unpublished story), 288

  Ott, Phyllis Silverman, 91, 134, 136

  Ozick, Cynthia, 248, 328, 442, 459

  Pacific Medical Center, San Francisco, 283, 288, 465

  Pain, Duncan, 221, 248

  Pain, Frances Jaffer, 221–22, 237, 238, 266, 313

  Pain, Lincoln, 269, 312, 313, 221

  Pain, Louis, 238, 248

  Pain brothers, 268, 270

  “Pale and Perfectly Oval Moon, A” (story), 292, 337

  Paley, Grace, 294, 330, 353, 400, 442

  Palo Alto, California as setting for novel, 176

  Paris Review, 144–45, 194, 224, 241, 479, 482, 499

  Park, David, 232

  Parker, Charlie, 101

  Parker, Dorothy, 143, 157

  Parmenter, Derek, 457–59, 477, 483, 489, 494, 497, 508

  “Partial Truths: Why I Left Home” (unpublished essay), 223, 225, 483

  Partisan Review, 276n

  Pastrick, Marie, 387–89

  Paul Green of Chapel Hill (Agatha Adams), 462

  Peacock, Mary Ellen, 308

  People magazine, 182n, 222, 331, 506

  Pereira, Vasco, 211–12, 425, 503, 507, 533n Adams’s relationship with, 211, 212–18, 219–20, 223, 224, 227, 233–34, 252, 317, 342n, 376–77, 381, 391, 416n, 423, 471, 477, 503

  Careless Love character and, 211, 214, 215, 216–17, 218, 224, 533n

  later career of, 218–19, 328n, 376, 379, 380–81

  “Sintra” short story and, 213–14, 219, 376, 377, 380, 381, 545n

  Pereira, Vera Futscher, 211, 212, 533n

  Perlman, Anne and David, 306

  Piercy, Marge, 312

  Playboy magazine, 26

  Plimpton, George, 145, 194, 224, 482

  Ploughshares magazine, 461

  Pocket Books publishers, 330

  Poetry Center San Francisco State University, 185, 187, 222, 268

  Poirier, Richard, 43n, 225, 237, 245n, 289, 352, 363, 367, 418, 429, 478, 486, 497

  Pollak, Louis, 112

  Porter, Katherine Anne, 99, 215, 294

  Portrait of a Lady, The (James), 4, 142, 227, 372, 376

  Potrero Hill Archives Project, 315

  Prentice Hall publishers, 437

  Prohibition, 27, 37

  Publishers Weekly, 307, 465

  Quair magazine, 80, 84

  Quart, Barbara, 383

  Quest/78 magazine, 329

  Quinn, Alice, 345, 476n

  Rabin, David, 422

  Radcliffe College, 111, 161, 172, 402 Adams at, 1, 86, 88–95, 99, 105, 108–9, 110, 113–14, 196, 263, 403, 504

  decision to attend, 85, 88

  fiftieth class reunion speech at, 478–80

  friendships at, 91–92, 133, 143, 240, 309, 318, 378

  romantic relationships at, 108–9

  Superior Women setting and, 372–73, 386

  World War II and, 85, 88–89, 92–93, 105, 110

  “Radiant Ghost” (poem), 500

  Raleigh News and Observer, 57

  Rand, Ayn, 363

  Randolph-Macon Woman’s College, 12–13, 22, 54, 95, 114, 160–61, 163, 302

  Random House publishers, 242

  Raney, William, 136, 143, 159, 166–68

  Rascoe, Judith, 290, 309, 3
92, 449, 494, 497

  Ravid, Joyce, 457

  Reagan, Ronald, 273, 348, 373, 384, 387, 388, 389, 425, 433, 506

  Redbook magazine, 74n, 180, 261, 262, 279, 295, 303, 304, 305n, 328, 333, 436, 479

  Reed College, 172, 173n, 175, 438, 504

  Rehder, Jessie, 163, 195, 210

  “Related Histories” (story), 125–27

  “Return Trips” (story), 24, 35, 60–61, 64, 227, 314n, 375n

  Return Trips (story collection), 398–99, 507

  Revolutionary Road (Yates), 332

  Revolutionary War, 16

  Rice, Jacqueline Miller, 236

  Rich, Adrienne, 164, 325

  Richmond News Leader, 365

  Rich Rewards (novel), 402 gay and lesbian characters in, 398

  plot and themes of, 350–52

  publication of, 343–45, 353, 506

  reactions to, 352, 360, 366, 370, 402

  real-life inspirations for, 31, 322n, 341, 344, 350, 351, 352, 354, 358

  writing of, 343, 352

  Rinehart publishers, 134, 136, 159

  Ritter, George, 138

  Rocca, Christy, 494

  Rodell, Marie Fried, 201–202, 235

  Rodriguez, Richard, 395, 396, 438

  Roetter, Friedrich, 75–76

  Roetter, Jean Salter, 70, 75–77, 83, 91, 109

  Roetter, Jurgen, 76n, 91

  “Room Alone, A” (unpublished story), 108n, 115

  Roosevelt, Franklin D., 37, 55, 75, 105, 152

  Rosenman, Ray, 422

  Rosenthal, Felix, 225, 228–29, 231, 234, 252, 468–69

  “Roses, Rhododendron” (story), 4, 35, 38, 48, 53–54, 272, 301–3, 323, 385, 506, 507

  Rowlands, Penelope, 424, 432, 470, 477, 488, 492, 493

  Rubin, Jerry, 266

  Rubin, Merle, 457

  Rubin, Stephen, 463

  Rumors of Peace (Leffland), 307

  Rush, Charles, 162

  Russell, Avery, 42, 43, 98

  Russell, Caro Mae Green, 42, 462

  Russell, John, 403

  Russell, Phillips, 22, 42, 97–98, 260, 263, 462

  Russell, Sandra, 427–28, 453

  Sage, Lorna, 149

  Said, Edward, 467

  St. Catherine’s School, Richmond, Virginia, 121, 504 Adams at, 78–80, 81, 83, 84–85