The Letters of Gertrude Stein and Carl Van Vechten, 1913-1946
Page 70
McCullough wrote Stein on 10 February 1941 (YCAL) thanking her for a letter she had sent on 10 December [1940] and reporting on the project of a first reader that he and van Vechten had discussed.
2. The first reader consists of twenty lessons (lesson one has a separate “Part Two”). When the book was published in 1946, Stein added three plays: In A Garden A Tragedy In One Act; Three Sisters Who Are Not Sisters A Melodrama; and Look and Long. In A Garden was written for a fête for neighborhood children in and around Belley. It was first performed on the terrace of the Château du Béon by Rose d’Aiguy, Mark Godet, and Maurice Godet. Pierre Balmain, who had been demobilized and was living with his mother in Aix-les-Bains, designed the costumes. The performance took place in the spring of 1943.
To Gertrude Stein
[13 March 1941]
Thursday [101 Central Park West
New York]
Sweet Baby Woojums:
Norman Holmes Pearson who is everything at Yale and yet not actually a member of the teaching or library staff, writes me: “Poor [Donald] Gallup was drafted, and left for Ft Devens on the Thursday morning before the exhibition opened. . I finished putting it up myself and worked up to within a couple of hours of my wedding on Friday afternoon. I felt a little like a peasant, leaving the fields to get himself wed. And one of the librarians warned me lest I say, ‘I take thee, Gertrude,’ when the proper moment arrived. The next day my newly acquired wife and my newly acquired daughters and I made a short honeymoon trip to the exhibition room to see how it looked. It seemed fully as scenic a trip as one to Niagara, and much warmer and gayer. So Gertrude and the exhibition will have a particular and unique spot in my memory. Tell her, if you think it will amuse her … It was a labor of love for Gertrude on my part and one which it was a privilege to do. .”1
Maybe I’ll go up next week and I hope to take Mark [Lutz] if he can get away.
So you see I write you nearly every day. . Ida is getting some fine reviews.
Love and kisses to you and Mama Woojums,
Papa Woojums!
1. Pearson to Van Vechten, 1 March 1941, NYPL-Berg. Pearson at this time was working on his doctorate degree at Yale University and was helping with the development of the Yale Collection of American Literature. Pearson was married to Susan Bennett Tracy on 21 February 1941 in New Haven.
To Carl Van Vechten
[postmark: 18 March 1941] [Bilignin par Belley
Ain]
My dearest Papa Woojums
Here it is and do you like it, I will be most dreadfully anxious until I hear whether it pleases you or not, dearest papa Woojums, I am sending you another copy by ordinary mail, and I hope they both reach you and I do so hope that you will like it, the translation of Paris France is going to be printed in Algeria, and I imagine will be out in a couple of months, it will amuse you to have a book of mine printed not in Algerian but in french in Algeria, dearest Papa Woojums I do hope you are liking The First Reader.
Always
Baby Woojums
To Carl Van Vechten
[postmark: 22 March 1941] Bilignin par Belley
(Ain)
Dearest Papa Woojums,
This is the second ms. copy, and I have just had a nice letter from the librarian of Yale, he says I suppose you have heard from Mr. Van Vechten of his recent superb gifts to us, of your ms. letters from you to him, (Under restrictions specified by Mr. Van Vechten) and photographs which he has taken of you, and then he goes on to tell how sorry he was you would not speak, I would like Papa Woojums to have spoken but Papa Woojums always knows best, and I am full of happiness,1 and I have had a long letter from [John] McCullough2 and I have written to him that I am sending you the ms, and that I am very interested in the idea of the first reader and that I am just waiting to know what Papa Woojums thinks and whether you want these, or more of the same or something different, I really like doing them immensely, and I am so xcited about your idea about To Do and what it is, which we do not know, and I ask Alice to guess and she can’t guess and neither can I, but it will be satisfying, it is an xciting world and thanks dear Papa Woojums and you know we had the cable and the Christmas card, and Phyllis [Cerf]’s picture, and the pigeons and all our love, in this lovely spring weather to you and to Fania, bless you
Baby Woojums
1. Bernard Knollenberg to Stein, 11 February 1941 (YCAL). Van Vechten had declined to speak at the opening ceremonies of the Stein exhibition. Earlier he had declined an invitation by William Lyon Phelps, professor emeritus at Yale University, to deliver a lecture on Stein as part of the Bergen Lecture series (Phelps to Van Vechten, 21 November 1940, NYPL-Berg).
2. McCullough to Stein, 10 February 1941 (YCAL).
To Gertrude Stein
27 March 1941 [101 Central Park West
New York]
Dear Baby Woojums,
The Yale show is just a knockout. It is terrific. I took Mark [Lutz] up there this week and we both nearly died. We felt as if we were in the shrine of Dante or Goethe at the very least. In a beautiful room about 40 feet square on three sides of the wall (windows on the fourth with engraved roundels) and arranged cases. There were also cases in the center of the room. In these were manuscripts, books in several forms, letters, and over all a series of my photographs, about 25 of them, marvellously chosen and arranged.x Virgil [Thomson] sent three scores of Four Saints. . and the published score of The Wedding Bouquet was included. . It took about two hours to examine the show thoroughly and they are having it photographed just for YOU and Mama Woojums.1 . You haven’t told me if the Christmas card got through yet, but I KNOW now you got the birthday wire and the color picture of the Yale boxes. And have you received Mrs [Bennett] Cerf’s picture?. . There is no news of To Do. That appears to be not very hopeful at the moment. But sooner or later we are sure to find an eager publisher for this. . I do hope you will like the idea for Gertrude Stein’s Frist Reader. . Thornton [Wilder] apparently has gone to South America as a good will offering from the government but you doubtless heard from him about the show. I’m so pleased about Mrs Reynolds. Bennett and bride are in Nassau where the Duchess of Windsor lives.2 I got a letter from the Kiddie [W. G. Rogers]3 and he is mad about the Yale Show and you will hear from him too. . Don’t get mixed about the Bibliography. . [Robert] Haas and [Donald] Gallup finally collaborated over the Yale one and [Julian] Sawyer’s was done first and is much more elaborate. . I think both of these have been sent you … Mabel [Dodge] has come and gone. . She told [Georgia] O’Keefe she wanted to see me, but O’Keefe thought better leave things as they are and only told me after Mabel had gone. The wonderful maps [Miguel] Covarrubias did for the San Francisco Fair are here. . Great twenty foot square murals of the Western Hemisphere: One devoted to races, another to flora, another to fauna, another to habitations, another to locomotion. They are very pretty.4 . I gave Georges [Jacques] the message about the Greeks and he cried and he said: “It is my greatest pride that I can call Gertrude Sein my friend.” You are right and Mama W is wrong about the date of the Portrait because Mabel came to New York early in the fall of 1912: so it must have been 1911 if it was the fall.5 Lots of love, Baby Woojums and I think your idea of sending my letters to me, when you get an opportunity is a good one and I will put them away in another rosy box, after arranging them and they will go Yale too. LOVE to you both and Fania sends LOVE too and LOVE to you both!
[Carl Van Vechten]
x and in mats and with long descriptions type written at the side. Both Pepe and Basket were shown. St Therèse, St Ignatius, Ο many of Α. Β. Τ. and one of all three of us, also your favorite on the France, the back of your head.
1. The exhibition was held in the Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University, from 22 February to 29 March 1941. Van Vechten visited the exhibition on 24 March 1941 (Pearson to Van Vechten, telegram, postmark 17 March 1941, NYPL-Berg). There is no explanation why Van Vechten waited so long to go see the exhibition.
2. When France fell, in 1940, the
Duke and Duchess of Windsor were in their home on the French Riviera. They escaped to Spain and then to Portugal. The Duke had hoped he would be given suitable war work in Britain, but the authorities gave him the governorship of the Bahamas. The Windsors lived in Nassau for five years.
3. Rogers to Van Vechten, 26 March 1941, YCAL.
4. Covarrubias had done six mural-maps, Pageant of the Pacific, for the Pacific House in the Golden Gate International Exposition, San Francisco.
5. Van Vechten is incorrect. Dodge came to New York in late December 1912. See Van Vechten to Stein, 15 January [1941], note 3.
To Carl Van Vechten
[postmark: 30 March 1941] Bilignin par Belley
(Ain)
My dearest Papa Woojums,
Thanks for getting news of Gerald Berners, I have not had any word from him since the troubles, and I was so upset at hearing of Sherwood [Anderson]’s death. I had had a very sweet letter from him just on the eve of his departure for S. America, and he was looking forward to the trip as going to be so interesting and now he did not have it, I am so awfully sorry for his wife for I think the first time in his marital history he was really happy and suited, dear Sherwood.1 By this time you will have had my first effort at the First Reader and I am awfully anxious to hear what you will say; everything that is mailed does pretty well come through, sometimes there is quite a long delay, and sometimes it comes through astonish[ing]ly quickly, and the birthday cable was prompt, also Phyllis Cerf’s picture, the Christmas card took longer and all were most enthusiastically received.
The only other idea I have about To Do, is to send a copy to Margot Johnson, of the Anne Watkins Inc. 77 Park Avenue New York Telephone Caledonia 5–5576, she seems to want to do something for me, she is the American representative of my English agents, she might have a try,2 and Bobby Haas in California, might be able to do something with a copy, out there. Did I tell you that they are bringing out Paris France in french in Algeria, would you mind if they used one of your photos, the one of Basket and me in the garden near the little summer-house,3 the Baronne D’Aiguy has a copy of the photo and she has done the translation, and she would like it, the girls at the Post Office at Belley, get so xcited over your stamps, they try their best to give you new ones in return,4 we were very xcited over the 13 amendment one, Captain Putz was here when it came, and he would love it,5 lots of love and lots of thanks dear dearest Papa Woojums, and are you liking the first reader
B. W.
1. The Stein-Anderson correspondence has been collected in Sherwood Anderson/Gertrude Stein: Correspondence and Personal Essays, ed. Ray Lewis White (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1972). Stein is referring to Anderson’s letter of 4 November [1940], (pp. 110–11). Anderson wrote about rumors that Stein and Toklas had secretly, and in disguise, arrived in New York. He also reported on his meeting with Maxwell Perkins, Scribner’s editor, who had told Anderson about Stein’s new book, Paris France. This was not, however, Anderson’s last letter to Stein. On 26 January 1941 (pp. 113–14), a month before sailing on a goodwill tour of South America, Anderson wrote Stein thanking her for her letter of [? December 1940] (pp. 111–12), in which she praised his novel Many Marriages. In his letter Anderson also informed Stein of the sudden death, on 21 December 1940, of F. Scott Fitzgerald. This letter was, for some reason, returned to Anderson. It was remailed on 2 November 1941 by Eleanor Anderson, who described it as “a letter which Sherwood wrote you before we left for South America—I hope that you will get it this time. He spoke of you with affection often” (p. 112).
2. Margot Johnson was the executive vice-president of Ann Watkins, Inc., the American representatives of Stein’s English agents, Pearn, Pollinger & Higham Ltd.
Johnson wrote to Stein first on 3 January 1941, establishing the connection with her English agents and telling Stein that they had had no reply from her about the galleys of Ida A Novel and had therefore asked Ann Watkins to approach Cerf about the possibilities of an English edition. On 31 March 1941 Johnson wrote Stein and said that when Cerf got back she would speak to him about the children’s book. It is not clear from Johnson’s letter whether it was The First Reader or “To Do.” In subsequent letters Johnson concerned herself with placing “To Do.” Johnson’s letters to Stein are in YCAL.
3. The French edition of Paris France used the same photograph by Van Vechten of Stein that had been used as the frontispiece of Everybody’s Autobiography, Stein in profile wearing the dress she wore when giving her lectures in the United States, 1934–35.
4. One of the girls who worked in the Belley post office was Mlle Bouvier. “Her parents owned a farm not far from Bilignin. Their barn is a landmark, an old Knights of Templars tower” (letter received from Joan Chapman, 5 February 1982).
5. Captain Gabriel Putz was the husband of Marie-Anne du Vachat, the woman who owned the house in Bilignin that Stein and Toklas rented.
To Carl Van Vechten
[Postcard: Environs de Belley—Pont d’Aignoz sur le Seran]
[postmark: 8 April 1941] [Bilignin par Belley
Ain]
Dearest Papa Woojums
That was a charming letter of Norman Holmes Pearson, do tell him how much I liked it, and may he be most happily married, daughters and all, and someday we will meet, daughters and all,1 and I can’t wait to get your letter that will tell all about it, lots of love for Easter, always to you and Fania
Tell Mark [Lutz] to write
B. W.
1. See Van Vechten to Stein [13 March 1941]. Pearson’s wife had two daughters by a previous marriage.
To Gertrude Stein
24 April [1941] [101 Central Park West
New York]
Dearest Baby Woojums,
So MUCH has happened! Mr [Bernhard] Knollenberg of Yale wrote me and said Columbia University wanted to borrow the Stein Show and what did I think? And Papa Woojums thought YES on the spot . . Then Mr Adams of Columbia asked Papa Woojums to come up and put it up and I said I would but obviously the person to get was Norman Holmes Pearson who put up the major part of the Yale show, after Donald Gallup was drafted. So Knollenberg said Pearson was writing his doctor’s thesis and was very busy. So we telegraphed him. So he came down and put up the show and it is another knockout.1. Really, Baby Woojums, I wish you would WRITE Norman Holmes Pearson, 39 Goodrich Street, New Haven, Conn. and tell him how much we appreciate him.2 I really don’t know what we would do without NHP! After Gallup was drafted, he was the only one at Yale who knew all the material and he came in and set up a beautiful show. On this occasion he drove down and set up another beautiful show under entirely different conditions … Also he goes back and forth carrying valuable manuscript in his car, so it won’t get lost and he adores and dotes on Baby Woojums … I am enclosing an invitation for the opening, to which, unfortunately, I can’t go, as I shall be out of town,x but I went up yesterday and everything looks as well as it can. . At Columbia the show is giving [i.e., being] given in the Rotunda of the great library which is a room like the Pantheon in Paris with an enormous dome … The cases are dwarfed by this and there are not so many as at Yale (which is one of the most beautiful and wonderfully arranged libraries in the world) but nevertheless the material is well presented and is most astounding in its cumulative effect. I loaned them several items and there are a great many of my photographs, tho’ not as many as at Yale.
THEN the Museum of Modern Art is giving a performance of Four Saints, WITH the ORIGINAL CAST, with either Virgil [Thomson] or [Alexander] Smallens conducting, In CONCERT FORM, i e without scenery or costumes or acting. . It is intended to repeat this performance at Town Hall.3 Virgil called me up about this and said he would write you. He said, I believe, that the terms would be as usual with you and him. Virgil is now one of the great celebrities here. He has made a knockout as a music critic and is more talked about than [Greta] Garbo. His second string quartet was played at a concert at Town Hall recently.4 I am going to Four Saints (May 7 is the date) and I’
ll write you all about it.
THEN The First Reader, Gertrude Stein’s FIRST READER with the lovely dedication arrived and I am crazy about it. Of course it may not be at all what they want.5 I mean we all wrote you to wait for a model before tackling this chore, but I guess Baby W was inspired and Couldn’t wait for a model. Anyway, it is YOUR first reader and both a child’s book and also a wonderful way to FIRST read GS ... So I gave it to [John] Mc-Cullo[u]gh with this advice, last Friday which is just a week ago and I was to hear from him by Monday and I haven’t and you know that No gnus is good gnus, SO! Let’s hope anyway …
And there is the matter of Robert Haas … When I gave the mss to Yale it was understood he was to have access to them at the University of California and this was agreed and arranged … He had plenty of time to get them there but DIDN’T and has only recently written for them from Pomona College at Stockton where he seems to be now. . Mr Knollenberg the librarian at Yale knows NOTHING about the responsibility of these people and doubts if the mss would be safe in their keeping … So he said if they were to go I should take the responsibility of their being lost and of course I wouldn’t do that and so here we are at loose ends, so to speak, with Bobby Haas … I would suggest he wait either till he can get back to the U[niversity] of C[alifornia] or until he comes east to see these most valuable papers, which NOW could not be replaced.
I have recently had SIX letters or cards from you. Happy Papa W. Please send me the Algerian Paris-France. BUT YOU HAVENT TOLD ME YET IF YOU HAVE RECEIVED the CHRISTMAS CARD, tho everything else seems to have got through. . Please report on this, YES OR NO.