The Letters of Gertrude Stein and Carl Van Vechten, 1913-1946
Page 61
Love to you and Mama Woojums,
[Carl Van Vechten]
XI dote on this!
1. The Spanish Civil War, which had been raging since 1936, was near an end. The Loyalist forces had lost much of the territory they once held. With the fall of Barcelona, in January 1939, the war was almost over. Madrid surrendered in March 1939.
2. The conductor of the 1934–35 performances of Four Saints in Three Acts.
3. Neither Stein nor Hemingway wrote about this meeting.
To Gertrude Stein
[Postcard: Kiss Building. Photograph by Carl Van Vechten]
[postmark: 4 December 1938] [101 Central Park West New York City]
Dear Baby Woojums!
Thornton Wilder & I met at last yesterday & had a grand time & I am going to photograph him!—Kitty Cornell was there too & everybody talked about Baby W!
l[ove] & K[isses] to you both
Papa W!
To Gertrude Stein
[Postcard: Portrait of Carl Van Vechten at the Prospect Park Zoo in front of the Cheetah Cage. Photograph by Mark Lutz]
[postmark: 23 December 1938] [101 Central Park West New York]
Dearest Baby Woojums,
I guess I wrote you I had met Thornton Wilder enfin & the Bromfields have been here & we talked endlessly about you and Mama W. They have become most pro-American. I see you are in the Oxford Dictionary of American Literature1 & I love Ida!—one of my favorites, please & a merry Xmas to all from
Fania & Papa Woojums!
1. Stein had been approached by William Rose Benét for permission to include Stein’s Choate lecture, “How Writing is Written,” excerpts from Tender Buttons, and “The Life of Juan Gris” in an anthology he was editing with Norman Holmes Pearson. Stein replied, granting permission, on 31 October 1936 (YCAL). Pearson wrote Stein on 31 January 1937 (YCAL) that at the suggestion of Thornton Wilder he would like to include an excerpt from Stein’s “A Long Gay Book,” instead of the Tender Buttons excerpts. Wilder had suggested the paragraph beginning “When they are very little just a baby” through the end of the paragraph (“A Long Gay Book,” in Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein, pp. 25–26). When The Oxford Anthology of American Literature, ed. Benét and Pearson (New York: Oxford University Press, 1938), appeared, only “How Writing is Written” was used (pp. 1446–51). See Stein to Van Vechten [9 November 1936], note 2.
To Gertrude Stein
[Telegram]
[postmark: 25 December 1938] New York
MOTHER AND FATHER SEND ENDLESS LOVE AND MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU AND MOTHER
CARL VAN VECHTEN
To Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas
[Telegram]
[postmark: 25 December 1938] New York
LOVE TO BOTH
FANIA CARLO
To Carl Van Vechten
[Rose motto]
[postmark: 26 December 1938] 5 rue Christine
[Paris]
Dearest Papa Woojums,
On Christmas day I am wishing Merry Christmas and the happiest of New Years to you and Fania, may you live long and prosper and always be the sweetest dearest onliest Papa Woojums in the world, which you are, we have been having a hectic time with Francis Rose and his troubles but now he is going to have a good show a good show in London, he is to paint some interesting houses in England he has begun to do some successful designing in Paris and he has been separated from entangling alliances and he goes off to England this afternoon and it has been a good two months work, but I guess he is coming out of it all very much alright,1 and now I am going on with the great American novel which I have begun so often and under such different titles—now I have forgotten just which it is now but I think it is Jenny and Arthur, it was Ida but it is not Ida any longer,2 and Fanny Butcher sent me Walker Evans’ photos of three American houses3 you know how I felt about them and so I have just been hunting out all those you did of houses in our Virginian trip, we did have a wonderful time, there is snow on the ground here and cold just like it was down there and ice just like it was down there but no alligators and no papa Woojums please come and bring an alligator and then it will be all the same and always now dear papa Woojums happy new year to you from4
Mama and Baby Woojums.
1. Rose had returned from an extensive visit (1935–38) to the Near and Far East. He spent a great deal of time in 1938 in Paris. The French government organized a retrospective of his work in the Petit Palais, Paris, and he also participated with the English group, which had a section in the Salon d’Automne in Paris. See Stein to Van Vechten [25 November 1938], note 3. Rose’s difficulties may have resulted from this exhibition; it is more likely, however, that he had involved Stein in one of his numerous and difficult homosexual relationships.
In 1939 Rose designed the costumes and scenery for Lord Berners’ ballet Cupid and Psyche, which was presented by the Sadlers’ Wells Ballet Company. He also had a one-man exhibition at the Mayor Gallery in London.
2. Stein struggled with various titles for her book Ida A Novel.
3. Butcher had sent Stein Walker Evans’ American Photographs, with an essay by Lincoln Kirstein (New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1938).
4. Note by Van Vechten, 24 January 1941: “A reference to the alligator in the Franklin Street lobby of the Hotel Jefferson in Richmond.” Stein had stayed in that hotel when she visited Richmond, Virginia, in 1935.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Postcard: Two cats in sailboat]
[postmark: 1 January 1939] [5 rue Christine Paris]
My dearest Papa Woojums
That is the photograph I like the best of all the ones in print of the Cheetahs, the best of papa Woojums it makes him feel just as if he was here, I wish he was we do, I am once more in the throes of writing the great American novel, now it is called Jenny and Arthur,1 lots of love on this New Year day,
B. W.
1. Stein’s Ida A Novel.
To Gertrude Stein
[Postcard: Unidentified building in Boston, Massachusetts Photograph by Carl Van Vechten]
10 January 1939 [101 Central Park West New York]
Dearest Baby Woojums—
Please. Alexander Woollcott called up and he is doing a paper about Poodles & he wanted to know all about Basket & he borrowed your letter about that & I said he could only use it if he got your permission.1 Ethel Waters (Negro) in Mamba’s Daughters is our latest sensation and she is a GREAT ACTRESS2—and of course we’ll all have alligators together again! Wait & see. In the meantime, LOVE to Both—
Papa W
This “fortress” is in Boston!
1. On his Columbia Broadcasting System program of 21 June 1939, Woollcott mentioned Stein in a group of people who owned poodles. The broadcast, titled “Cocaud,” after Woollcott’s dog, is printed in his Long, Long Ago (New York: Viking Press, 1943), pp. 189–94.
2. Ethel Waters, the black actress and singer, played the role of Hagar, the mother of a celebrated radio singer, in the play Mamba’s Daughters, adapted by Dorothy and DuBose Heyward from the latter’s novel of the same name. The play opened at the Empire Theatre, New York, on 3 January 1939. In the New York Times of 6 January 1939 (p. 24) nineteen people, including Van Vechten and Marinoff, signed an advertisement praising Ethel Waters’ performance and urging readers to go to see the play.
To Gertrude Stein
[Postcard: Portrait of Carl Van Vechten at the Bronx Zoo. Photograph by Mark Lutz]
[postmark: 16 January 1939] [101 Central Park West New York]
Dear Baby Woojums,
I’m glad you like the cheetah picture. I do too. Here is another one made in the Zoo. . Jenny & Arthur is a good name for a great American novel, & I am sure it will be.1 Is this going to be long?—Gertrude Atherton is here & we were talking about you & Mama W today & I wish you & Mama W were here.
Love Papa W
1. Stein’s Ida A Novel.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Postcard: Photograph of Mango trees—Bulacan]
[postmark: 25 January 1939] [Paris]
Dearest P. W.
Here we have had a beautiful Chinese dinner and all we want is Papa W. for a truly Chinese [afternoon?] thanks to you.
B. W.
Carl,
We are all here this moment and wish you were among us. Greetings to you both. Expect to see you alligators or alligator pears to Paris.
[Lin] Yutang
Hong [Yutang]
We’ve had a lovely time with your friends and have been talking about you.
Love from
Baby [i.e., Mama] W.
[signature] Harriette G. Miller
[signature] Harlan Miller1
1. Friends of the Van Vechtens’ and the Lin Yutangs’.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Rose motto]
[postmark: 8 February 1939] 5 rue Christine
[Paris]
My dearest Papa Woojums,
This is an additional bit of Faust and there are the catalogues of Francis Rose[‘s] show and will you give Mark [Lutz] one,1 and we had a wonderful trip to Bordeaux and we got a very lovely baby Basket and he is not Basket but we make believe he is Basket’s boy and Papa W. will take his picture and that will be a pleasure, we had a wonderful trip full of xcitements and now we are back and I am going on with my novel, it goes better in the summer than in the winter, winters seem more occupying than they used to be, and we all send all our love all the time
always Baby W.
1. The catalogue for Rose’s January 1939 exhibition at the Mayor Gallery, London, was a single sheet of paper folded twice to make a triptych, 5 x 7¼ inches. It contained, “Introduction by Gertrude Stein” (p. 5).
To Carl Van Vechten
[Rose motto]
[postmark: 18? February 1939] 5 rue Christine
[Paris]
My dearest Papa Woojums,
We have been so busy with the new baby Basket, it takes a lot of time to take a baby Basket in and out and sit with him while he eats a bone so that he does not take it on the bed on the couch, and to see that he does this and not Alice’s wool and not my best shoes and poor Pepe was so neglected he just had to get an attack of rheumatism and now we are all petting him, and there is lots going on, the World is Round is getting on, they are trying to find Rose colored paper to print blue on and the Hockaday girls were here and I read it to them and they loved it and they know what children like because they read to their sisters and brothers and they say it will go,1 and Julian Sawyer says he wants to read Faust so do let him, and Francis Rose is doing Cupid and Psyche a ballet with [Gerald] Berners in London and they are all pleased, and Oklahoma university buys all my books and wants me to contribute to their quarterly2 and I have and I have changed my car for a new one, hoping The World is Round will make it all easy and we love Papa Woojums and I guess that’s all.
Always Baby W.
1. Elizabeth Jarmon, of the Hockaday School, wrote Stein, 6 February 1939 (YCAL), that she and a Miss Ryan were in Paris and brought Stein greetings from the school. Stein invited them to dinner on 10 February.
2. For a symposium on literary influences in Books Abroad (Summer 1939), 13(3):307–8, Stein contributed “My Debt to Books.”
To Gertrude Stein
8 March [1939] [101 Central Park West New York]
Dear Gertrude,
Here is how the value of Tender Buttons keeps on rolling along. I’m very curious to see The World is Round on pink paper! Will that be soon now? I hope so. Think of you having a new car! Do you know I’ve never had any yet! I guess this is something I’m saving for my old age. And a new Basket! Is his name Basket too please? And is he also a white caniche? . . The weather is warm one day and freezing the next, but nobody talks about war any more and maybe the war scare is over. I’Ve noticed they never have wars when people don’t talk about them. Do you know a painter named Coutaud and what is his first name?1. . Edward Waterboy2 is here but goes back to Paris samedi on the Queen Mary. .
Love and kisses to Baby and Mama Woojums!
Papa W!
1. Van Vechten had posed the same question to Stein in his letter of 13 April 1936. The painter was Lucien Coutaud.
2. Edward Wasserman.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Correspondence card]
[postmark: 12 March 1939] [5 rue Christine Paris]
Dearest Papa Woojums,
Such a large postal card they give you in France to tell Papa Woojums how much the Woojums love him and they do, and I want to tell you about Serge Roche, who did the furniture which will support the french provisions that are being shown at the fair1 and you would like him he and his wife are both charming she is not there but he is and I wish you would see him, he has done about the most interesting interior decorating that has been done here and I said you would like him and be good to him, his name is Serge Roche, and he is wonderful with mirrors and I have sold The World is Round to Harpers Bazaar which is very nice,2 and the Baby Basket is admirable and we love you so and come now do come soon always and always
B. W. and M. W.
1. The New York World’s Fair, 1939–40.
2. See Van Vechten to Stein, 23 October 1938, note 1.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Rose motto]
[postmark: 19 March 1939] 5 rue Christine
[Paris]
My dearest Papa Woojums,
All the old paper is almost gone and then we will have some new but we cannot quite make up our minds just what, it is awful weather cold and cold but we love our place here so that we do not mind, the new Basket eats our handkerchiefs and then races madly around the terrace to have them come out at the other end they get stuck and sometimes there has to be a pull of all of which intimate family life we tell to Papa Woojums. Everybody seems to be xcited about the World is Round, the Harpers people seem to think it will make a very successful film I have kept all the movie rights for myself so I hope somebody will be interested, somebody said Walt Disney but of course I do not know anybody do you know anybody who does, I would like to make a lot of money off of it, now that it is written, I am so glad you like it I do think it kind of lovely, and now another thing, the editor William R. Scott 224 West Eleventh Street and the editor of it John McCullough have found an illustrator, I had suggested Francis Rose but they seemed to want an American, they sent me some of the illustrations by Clement Hurd, they seem sweet but very undistinguished, could you perhaps see them and tell me what you think, I would feel very much better if I knew what you thought.1 I do not know quite what to say, if you could would you, and I do not know the painter named Coutaud but I will look him up and let you know his first name and lots of love
B. W.
1. For the editions and illustrators of Stein’s The World Is Round see Van Vechten to Stein, 23 October 1938, note 1.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Postcard: Pont-Sainte-Maxence—Ecole Sainte-Marie du Moncel—Façade occidental et abbatiale]
[postmark: 22 March 1939] [5 rue Christine Paris]
My dearest Papa Woojums,
Coutaud’s first name is Lucien, and can I do anything more about him for you, I know the man who first found him if that is any help,1 Basket is a poodle a white poodle and very lovely, we are not faithless but we do love him and we do love you always
Gtrde.
1. Note by Van Vechten, 24 January 1941: “I asked about Lucien Coutaud because F[ania] M[arinoff] had bought a painting by this young French artist.”
To Gertrude Stein
[Postcard: Old Brownstone Façades, West 58 Street, New York. Photograph by Carl Van Vechten]
[postmark: 24 March 1939] [101 Central Park West New York]
Dearest Baby Woojums,
[Julian] Sawyer came & got Faust—you said he might have it—and brought it back safely. Serge Roche has not turned up yet, but everybody else has & Hitler is certainly giving us a lot of people!1 We take in Harper’s Bazaar & will watch for your contribution. .
Hap
py Easter to you both!
Papa Woojums.
1. A number of European intellectuals and artists had already begun to leave Europe since Hitler had come to power. Within the next two years, with the help of the American Rescue Committee headed by Varian Fry, intellectuals and artists such as André Breton, André Masson, Victor Brauner, René Char, Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp, Fernand Léger, and others would leave Europe for the United States.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Correspondence card]
[postmark: 31 March 1939] [5 rue Christine Paris]
Dearest Papa Woojums,
We are sending you messages by the Chinamen1 by Nathalie [Barney] by everybody and we wish we could send you messages by yourself, won’t you come over to get them, the Scott people write that they have tried the World is Round on various groups of children and there is no doubt about its effectiveness with them, so I am awfully pleased,2 they are translating Everybody’s [Autobiography] into french and otherwise we are very busy, and also very loving, happy Easter, and April fool’s day and everything
B. W. and M. W.3
1. Lin Yutang.
2. John McCullough wrote to Stein, 23 March 1939 (YCAL), and reported that they had tried the book out with various and varied groups of children with exciting results. Some of these results were quoted in a press booklet prepared by the publicist Joseph D. Ryle, Press Book for Gertrude Steins First Book for Children ‘The World Is Round’ (New York: William R. Scott, Inc., 1939), pp. 3–6. The booklet (15 leaves numbered 1–15) also contains excerpts from Stein’s letters to the publisher (pp. 11–13) and comments by Stein extracted from letters, p. 6 and p. 15.