J. Powers - Suitable Accommodations - An Autobiographical Story of Family Life - The Letters of J. F. Powers, 1942-1963

Standing: Mary and Katherine; sitting: Hugh, Betty, Jim, and Boz

Jim’s short-story collection, The Presence of Grace , was published by Doubleday in March 1956.

HARVEY EGAN

FROM THE DESK OF J. F. POWERS, AMERICA’S CLEANEST LAY AUTHOR, PUBLISHED BY DOUBLEDAY, THE HOUSE THAT MEANS BUSINESS

February 29, 1956

Dear Fr Egan,

So glad to hear from you, to hear that you enjoyed “Zeal”1 at least until the end. […] I am trying to shake down some British publisher for a decent advance. I have a contract (which I haven’t signed) from perhaps the best one over there, Gollancz, but he won’t go over a hundred pounds (and I’ve heard that that much changes hands in seconds in poker games). There is an error on the front of the jacket, but then the effects of original sin are always with us — ain’t that right? But they’ve used better materials in the book than is commonly done nowadays. I am presently seeing no one much. (Fr Ong, SJ,2 was here with George, briefly, a month or so ago.) Adlai Stevenson is coming to St John’s on Saturday. I ought to call up the Hyneses and tell them Jacques Maritain3 will be here at our house on Saturday and see where he really stands; Hynes, I mean. They do love a lion, Arlie and Em. […]

Jim

HARVEY EGAN

Thursday morning, 1956

Dear Fr Egan,

Your letter came just now, and I hasten to reply (not that it calls for that). I was writing to you the other night when despair overcame me and I tore up the letter and went to bed.

Yes, the Waugh review is good.4 There is much to meditate in it, as I told him in a thank-you note I got off yesterday. I hadn’t realized my diction was a difficulty; I had always thought I wrote without benefit of a private argot, not doing the sort of thing, say, that Algren, with his thieves’ language, does. I suspect you’re right in thinking with Waugh I don’t have the gift of fantasy. I wish that I did, of course, but until I know what is meant by fantasy, I must pass. I mean I actually don’t know. […]

I have signed with Victor Gollancz in England, for £200 instead of £100. There was a note in a recent CW 5 that he’d visited Hospitality House in N.Y. He is a first-class publisher — Sean O’Faolain said he was the best in Britain — and lots more, as his visit to the CW might indicate. I have been difficult in my dealings — amazing my N.Y. and London agents, I’m sure — but in the end it was worth it. We will now get through June, or a good part of it.

I don’t get enough mail, contrary to what you might think. No offers at all. Well, there was one to speak before some creative writing group in Mpls. The letter was written on Pillsbury Mills stationery, and for a long time I just gazed at the envelope, smelling a grant. Not a word about expense money even. I should come down there on a Sunday evening and listen to their manuscripts being read. I gave them the green Montini.6

I haven’t got TV yet. Am waiting for the big break still. I crave it but can’t bring it off. Lots of surgery coming up: Boz’s eye (same kind of deal KA had) and KA’s tonsils. And I haven’t made good on my pledge to Cathedral High School. […]

Did you know that Mickey Spillane is a Jehovah’s Witness? I read it in an English paper. His publisher was in London and said Mickey has decided to mend his ways as an author. Won’t that be awful? All for now.

Jim

JACK CONROY

509 First Avenue South

St Cloud, Minnesota

April 4, 1956

Dear Daddy-O,

Thanks for that flattering review.7 Whatever else you were, we’ll say, he was good to his friends. I have had some good reviews, though nothing as far west as Chicago until yours; nothing at all in Minneapolis or St Paul; and I guess this is what comes of not playing the regional author game, of not seeing anybody who can read. […] I don’t recognize this colony you call the Huntington Hartford?8 What kind of purses? I prefer to race on turf, you know. Actually, I am a victim to family life. Four children now, Jack. And this year, the man said, bock beer is not available in this area. This is one hell of an area, Jack. I am ordering Whey-Plus.9 I hope it changes my life. I haven’t been to Chicago for a couple of years, and the last time just passed through, from station to station at night. All for now, and again thanks for going to bat for me, Jack.

Jim

HARVEY EGAN

Saturday afternoon, 1956

Dear Fr Egan,

Has spring come to Beardsley? Has any thing? I am engaged in reading twelve MSS, about half of them book-length, for the Hopwood Awards, University of Michigan, for which I am to receive $200. It is not nice work, but I can get it. […] We are going through our worst period, economically, in many years, but in two weeks, when I get these MSS read, and the money comes from England, and I come to another agreement with Doubleday, we’ll be all right. I am not complaining, understand, but would welcome the chance — like the French and Italians — to register a protest vote. […]

I can’t think of anything you should be told. No TV here yet, to put it mildly. I don’t know what I’m doing next, as a writer, I mean. Fr Kelly resists me. Enough of this raillery (which will hardly make the judicious grieve).

Jim

There was no trouble about the girls and First Communion. They were examined for an hour and a half yesterday by our pastor, passed, and, as Betty found out later, had been given a half-dollar by him. The Polish in him, I guess.

JACK CONROY

509 First Avenue South

May 20, 1956

Dear Jack,

[…] Life is very dull here, Jack. My only friend, a silversmith who makes chalices, who had been doing that for a living for several years, has taken a job.10 That leaves me St Cloud’s last self-employed artist, and sometimes I think I can make out my name on the wall. Still I turn down jobs now and then, at good money, but teaching writing courses in remote places for a year or two. We have an old house here, the use of it, with a big yard, and get by on very little, and so I stay on. When I move, I want it to be abroad — but how, with taxation worse in Ireland and England than it is here, I’ll make it isn’t clear yet.

All for now, Jack.

Jim

ROBERT LOWELL

509 First Avenue South

St Cloud, Minnesota

Memorial Day 1956

Dear Cal,

Very happy to hear from you, after so long and after sending you a copy of my book — I’d begun to think it was a mistake. I sent Buck Moon a copy and have not heard from him; as a result, I can only deduce … I wasn’t pleased to hear that you are driving a car still, even if you are getting better. Is it the Packard still? Elizabeth is right in criticizing you. To have great drivers, we must first have great critics. […]

When Betty read of your coming blessed event, she said, “Poor Lowell.” Which is no reflection on Elizabeth, who must bear it and, doubtless, take care of it single-handed. I guess we think of our contemporaries — those who are writers — who are childless as gods, sporting about the world and going out for dinner with no thoughts of babysitters. We go nowhere. Of course, here in St Cloud there isn’t much temptation to go out.

Aren’t you a little young to be writing your autobiography? I expect to bring out a book of verse before I do mine. That means I haven’t given it a thought. When I do — and it first occurred to me when you mentioned yours — I realized that is one book I don’t even have material for in my dreamiest moments. In those moments, it isn’t hard to compile a long list of novels and plays I might write. Well, if you get to Yaddo in the first volume, and I realize you probably won’t, I have several nice glossy prints of my old car with whom you were on such intimate terms. Also a nice snapshot of Ted Roethke in a rowboat smiling at a little bass he caught. And one of you not smiling at one you caught. This is from your wading and night-fishing period. All for now. Best to you both, and write again.