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

Jim

Please try to make it up for the fete, for which you’ll soon have an invitation.

BETTY POWERS

507 Church Street

Ann Arbor, Michigan

Sunday, 2:30 p.m., December 9, 1956

Dear Betty,

I carried your letter to church. […] They had the pledge,13 after a long fatuous explanation, and I remained seated, conspicuously. I didn’t have anything but exasperated thoughts all during Mass. To hear that awful apology for what the man himself knew better about, but making the most of it because it was demanded by the cardinal.14 I think there is nothing drearier than that aspect of the Church in America and cast around in my mind for a way to act. In Grace , though, that story, I’ve said about all there is to say. I noticed a little more nervousness in the man about to ask the people to rise and join the Legion, but of course it will go on and on. So much for that. My Sunday Sickness is on me, and bad today.

Much love,

Jim

The payoff on my experience in church this morning was that I stumbled going up the steps on the way out (it was in the basement of the church proper) and was down for a moment. Pride goeth before a fall!

Did you see Mr K.’s poem in Dec. 8 New Yorker ?15

Invitations look good.

BETTY POWERS

507 Church Street

Ann Arbor

Monday, 12:15 p.m., December 10, 1956

Dear Betty,

I’ve just finished a morning of heavy reading of MSS. The mail came a few minutes ago: two from you, one from Fr Egan, who wants to know what to wear and when it is and, if there is to be boxing, whether he should wear his aluminum cup. […]

I was dismayed to hear about KA and Mary getting lost. I must reread it when I have time, your account, and see if it makes any more sense to me. Yes, that should be the end of such junkets unchaperoned. […]

You can look for Fr Egan at the conversazione, and probably George, though maybe not. For he’s sure to have something planned. I do hope Barnharts won’t come. But if they do, I think it won’t make much difference, considering how gala everything and everybody will be. […]

Much love … and keep things under control, as you’ve been doing.

Jim

HARVEY EGAN

507 Church Street

Ann Arbor

December 11, 1956

Dear Fr Egan,

Your letter rec’d, and I hasten to fill you in. Boxing Day, as any dictionary will tell you, is the day after Xmas. You are to come at 8:30 p.m., though in your case we’d like it if you came earlier, since you are so handy. I have a lot of decanting to do at the last minute, and somebody will have to park cars — I am buying one of those batons they use to direct traffic at night. Can you see Snyder’s Drugstore (or Fr Stelmes) about the use of klieg lights, or searchlights, or whatever you call them? I want this thing to be memorable, plenty gala. Yes, do wear your cup. It may get rough later on, with most of the guests (I daresay) only one short generation away from utter alcoholism: prim characters like Doyle and Hynes, I mean, their closets jam-packed with skeletons: it is these I hope to bring out. We are serving Xalapa Punch, and no substitutions. I am of the opinion that none of us is as bad as we seem to all the others. I am making one more effort to encompass us all with fellowship. […]

I am also inviting, from St Cloud, Mr and Mrs Wormhoudt: he is the author of The Demon Lover and other books dealing with literature as a kind of wet dream (a Freudian).16 Hyneses have been wanting to meet the Wormhoudts, regarding them with some alarm, I think, as perhaps representing a threat to Christian family life and its approach. Me, I say they’re all, intellectually, very shady characters. If that Legion of Decency pledge came from the hand of your new archbishop, as I think it did, he is still suffering from the same thing as my own bishop, as you’ve noted on occasion, tautology. I say “still” because his statement on Abp Murray’s death might have come from Amos and Andy, from the latter to be exact. However … it becomes more and more apparent to me that the function of the American hierarchy is to test the humility of those under their guidance. I thought this as I listened to the priest here Sunday explain the purpose of the Legion of Decency pledge. I am still unpledged. I wish the whole thing would get lost. I am sending you some Trollope, a paper edition, and suggest you read Barchester Towers ; Mrs Proudie’s reception is sort of what we have in mind for Boxing Day.

Academically,

Jim

BETTY POWERS

507 Church Street

Ann Arbor

December 12, 1956

Dear Betty,

[…] Late last night I got to work on Fr Urban. I had my best night since coming here and also, I think, one of the best nights ever: it is Christmas Eve at Duesterhaus17 and all through the house … only the noise of checkers. […]

Much love,

Jim

The door to their apt stood open, the apt was bare, and obviously Dwight and Pansy had flown.

BETTY POWERS

507 Church Street

Ann Arbor

December 13, 1956

Dear Betty,

[…] I’m worried about all the sickness, though the last things you said were hopeful. I wish we could find out why we have so much of what KA has now.18 It is really a disagreeable habit for a family to get into, and we seem to have done that, for several years now. I am not blaming anybody, understand: it is a development I don’t like to see, and that is all I have to say. […]

I had a malted and hamburger at a drugstore where I came across an article by Leslie Fiedler in The Reporter .19 I then went to work on a letter to the editor, a copy of which I enclose.20 I don’t know if they’ll use it of course, or what the effect will be, but I think it’s time someone made the points I do. Or think I do. […]

A letter came yesterday, airmail from England, for a James Purdy. This morning I see it is still outside the mailboxes, now marked “not at this address.” I went down, after thinking about it, and had another look, brought it up, compared the typing on the envelope with that on an envelope of Gollancz’s. I decided to open it, remembering that Austin has some Scotch tape and the phrase “opened by mistake.” It is a letter from Victor,21 which I enclose. […]

I was amused to hear of everyone having so much trouble with Boxing Day. I think they have more than we planned: I think of them, more than ever, as barnyard animals going their familiar paths from stall to pasture and back, day in and day out. Any kind of reading would have familiarized them not with the exact day but with the word. […]

Jim

JACK CONROY

507 Church Street

Ann Arbor, Michigan

December 18, 1956

Dear Jack,

I’m sorry to say that I have joined the academy too, and so what you say about us two, degreeless and alone, isn’t true for the moment. Yes, in fact, it is true. I am still degreeless, and I’m left pretty much alone. I came here in September and will finish up in mid-January. I thought I needed the money, Jack. We had been running down ever since 1953, my last good year, everything wearing out and machinery giving up. I see by my little calendar, which I keep amending, an old con doing time, that I have only five classes to go; one tomorrow and four in January. Then back to St Cloud and Ignorance!

Yes, I did see Leslie Fiedler’s article. I have written to the editors about it. If they publish my letter, it will be worth reading. I concentrated on the dig about publishing in The New Yorker . I know Fiedler, and like him, but decided to return the frankness, if that’s what you call it. It is a problem what to do about the books of one’s friends, a problem I’ve tried to avoid. What I really dislike about the article, and this I don’t mention at all, is that I and the others were invited to the ball, as it were, but in the end he’s dancing every dance with Saul. I doubt that Saul’s as good as he says in this book.22 Someday I’ll read the book and see. At the moment I’d rather not confirm my suspicions. Actually, as you must know, Jack, I don’t have much heart for literary controversy. What I’d like to be is a horse trainer, or simply a man of great wealth, and go about doing good, not forgetting myself.