A Tragic Honesty (100 page)
Authors: Blake Bailey
“I felt like a teenybopper”: Int. Ellen Wilbur.
“I seem to recall ⦠clown”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, April 9, 1972.
“fragmentary, diffuse”: DeWitt Henry to RY, April 12, 1972.
“chances [were] very good”: David Milch to RY, June 27, 1972.
“must be beautiful”: Gina Berriault to the Yateses, July 14, 1972.
“Believe it or not”: RY to DeWitt Henry, July 24, 1972.
“A popular writer, a writer”: from Henry's transcription of original interview, found among RY's papers.
“cogent and back-to-work”: Int. DeWitt Henry.
“in all its carefully-edited”: RY to DeWitt Henry, November 21, 1972.
“I've just finished reading”: Lawrence to RY, November 13, 1972.
“So who knows?”: RY to DeWitt Henry, November 21, 1972.
“devilishly hard”: Hayes Jacobs to RY, February 13, 1973.
Various drafts of RY's résumé were found among his papers.
“a lot of commitment”: Arthur Roth to RY, January 30, 1973.
Yates's review of
The Morning After: New York Times Books Review,
January 28, 1973, 6.
“putting the story through”: McCall to RY, February 20, 1973.
“DickâI'm doing ⦠trust me”: Gordon Lish to RY, February 22, 1973.
“Your performance was an appalling”: Lish to RY, February 28, 1973.
“I am your daughter”: Monica Yates to RY, March 5, 1973.
Martha prepared a list of symptoms: found among RY's papers.
“Those monthly payments”:
RYAW,
59.
“How much do you need”: Int. Dan Wakefield.
“at his best he's a solid”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, October 26, 1978.
Yates would mimic him: Int. Sharon Yates Levine.
“become ⦠whiskey-head”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, July 22, 1973.
“Three thousand articles”: E-mail to author from John P. Lowens.
“taking his enormous success”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, July 22, 1973.
“What's most important ⦠right”: Lawrence to RY, February 7, 1974.
“lovable Irish alcoholic”:
RYAW,
29.
“Trouble with me and my friends”: Dubus to RY, July 12, 1976.
“Women have been oblique”: Martha Speer to RY, November 2, 1976.
Chapter Fourteen
Disturbing the Peace: 1974â1976
“that loneliness shit”: Dubus to RY, June 18, 1974.
“It always made me pleased”: Loree Rackstraw to RY, February 11, 1975.
“PERSONAL RECORD”: found among RY's papers.
“Whatever you do”: Int. Mitch Douglas.
“Yates was absolutely nonfunctional”: Int. Dr. George Hecht.
“What little I've accomplished”:
The Letters of F. Scott Fitzgerald,
ed. Andrew Turnbull (New York: Dell, 1963), 96.
“the desolate wastes”: “Some Very Good Masters,” 21.
“It may be an old one”: Lawrence to RY, September 14, 1974.
“I think about you often”: Martha Speer to RY, September 10, 1974.
“[M]y mind just wants things”: Martha Speer to RY, November 20, 1974.
“Jesus Christ,” he'd gasp: Int. Carolyn Gaiser.
“We should approach”: Ted Maass to Lawrence, January 24, 1975.
“You and I were the only”: Int. Marjorie Owens.
“call girls, dope addicts”: Quoted in Natalie Bowen to RY, February 22, 1965. As a matter of odd coincidence, Bowen dated Krim briefly in the mid-sixties.
“Oh, I just give everybody an A”: E-mail to author from Geoffrey Clark.
“Oh, bullshit!” he sneered: John Gilgun to RY, February 25, 1972.
“Where's my mail?!”
: Int. Carolyn Gaiser.
“envious but scornful”: Letter to author from Loree Rackstraw.
“My mother ⦠Dutch Act”: Krim to RY, November 7, 1975.
“Richard Yates has regained”: Quoted in Lawrence to RY, June 7, 1975, UM-SL.
“the best novel [he'd] read”: George Garrett to RY, August 30, 1975.
“I think it's okay”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, August 26, 1975.
“Things I regret”: RY to Joseph and Nancy Mohbat, September 15, 1975.
Reviews of
Disturbing the Peace
: Gene Lyons,
New York Times Book Review,
October 5, 1975; Anatole Broyard,
New York Times,
September 9, 1975; William Pritchard,
Hudson Review,
Spring 1976; Peter S. Prescott,
Newsweek,
September 15, 1975.
“that literary work ⦠achievement”: Dwight MacDonald to RY, February 20, 1976.
“Oh, what the hell ⦠$2,000”:
RYAW,
30.
“in the home stretch”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, December 8, 1975.
“about that second-rate”: Int. Carolyn Gaiser.
“The tenants were on rent-strike”: Int. John P. Lowens.
“This is
not
a rush book!”: Delacorte office memorandum from Lucy Hebard to John Carter, found among RY's papers.
“pay and pay and pay”: Fitzgerald to Hemingway, September 9, 1929,
Letters of FSF
, 333.
“As I fled down the street”:
RYAW,
30.
“whiskery old bullshit artist”: Clark, “The Best I Can Wish You,” 30.
“When do I see the head honcho?”: Int. William Pritchard.
“Went ⦠sweaty business”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, April 26, 1976.
“tepid” ⦠“climbing all over”: Ibid.
“Three guesses how”: Streitfeld, “The Great Unknown,” 28.
Details of RY's fire are mostly derived from interviews with his daughters.
Russell soaked the manuscript: Int. Franklin Russell.
“Aren't you celebrating”: Int. Sharon Yates Levine.
“You look fabulous in green”: Int. Joan Norris.
“I'm looking for a girl”: Int. Galen Williams.
asked Ruth to pick up a broom: Int. Ann McGovern.
“ennobling brotherhood”: Arthur Roth to RY, September 21, 1976.
“My father spent years in Northport”: Ibid.
“The abandonment of Yates, tied”: E-mail to author from Franklin Russell.
“the most intensely dramatic”: Arthur Roth to RY, September 21, 1976.
“I was surprised and disappointed”: Grace Schulman to Arthur Roth, August 18, 1976, papers of G. Schulman.
Chapter Fifteen
Out with the Old: 1976â1978
“ugly and humiliating”: Quoted in Arthur Roth to RY, September 21, 1976.
“You know several people”: Lawrence to RY, August 7, 1976, UM-SL.
“dashed it off in eleven months”:
RYAW,
21.
“Ask me about
The Easter Parade
”: Quoted in Galen Williams to RY, July 6, 1976.
“we murmured together”: Cassill to RY, July 17, 1976.
“You write so damn well!”: Michael Arlen to RY, September 23, 1976.
Reviews of
The Easter Parade
: A. G. Mojtabai,
New York Times Book Review,
September 19, 1976; Ross Feld,
New Republic,
October 9, 1976; Richard Todd,
Atlantic,
October 1976; Anatole Broyard,
New York Times,
September 7, 1976.
“If I were you ⦠Bermuda”: Int. Richard Levine.
“Henri Troyat, the biographer”: Lacy, “Remembering Richard Yates,” 212.
yogurt ⦠“great discoveries”: Int. Sharon Yates Levine.
“Dick's glass”: Int. Jennifer Hetzel Genest.
only times ⦠“rowdy”: Int. Michael Brodigan.
Yates referred to her as a
personage
: Int. DeWitt Henry.
“I'm not calling back just now”: Penelope Mortimer to RY, undated.
Yates had a fascination ⦠answering machine: “Please call any time if you feel like it, either to talk to me or the machine (you're good at that),” Mortimer to RY, January 20, 1977.
“it's a lot like a lot of Updike”: Mortimer to RY, undated.
“Two scared people”: Ibid.
“exceptionally courteous” author: Int. Lynn Meyer.
“I was impressed ⦠persevered”: Int. Madison Smartt Bell.
a party was given for Penelope Mortimer: Int. Sayre Sheldon.
“
Please
will you understand”: Mortimer to RY, c. June 1977.
“He couldn't grasp”: Int. Dr. Winthrop A. Burr.
“Imagine going to California”: Int. William Keough.
“I have gotten the impression”: Martha Speer to RY, November 2, 1976.
“Does an apple tree give skirts”: Martha Speer to RY, April 20, 1977.
“I was so pleased”:
Contemporary Authors,
1981, 535.
“Thanks for the invitation”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, November 7, 1977.
“As soon as I finish [a story]”: Monica Yates to RY, undated.
“She was the one ⦠crush on”: Int. Susan Braudy.
“What's that over your head”: Int. Carolyn Gaiser.
“I was told at a very early age”: E-mail to author from Gina Yates.
“I am planning to make”: Bonnie Lucas to RY, December 13, 1977.
“gentle passion”: Tommie Cotter to RY, June 5, 1978.
“salvation not mere pussy”: Dubus to RY, February 25, 1974.
“You've heard me say”: Quoted in Dubus to RY, August 22, 1973.
“For fifteen years”:
RYAW,
45.
“There are many things ⦠thank you”: Mary Robison to RY, undated.
he'd been “used”: Int. Robin Metz.
“I've loved you for a decade”: Robison to RY, July 20, 1986.
“soft-edged and idealized”: Int. Monica Yates Shapiro.
“It's this combination”: Krim to RY, January 17, 1978.
“various stages of partial”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, April 16, 1978.
“
A Good School
is magnificent”: Lawrence to RY, February 19, 1978, UM-SL.
“the mellow Yates”: Krim to RY, September 24, 1978.
“so moving and so perfect”: Hannah Green to Seymour Lawrence, October 15, 1978.
“I'm moved by a blessed irony”: Cassill to Lawrence, undated.
“The best free advertising”: Lawrence to RY, June 11, 1978, UM-SL.
Reviews of
A Good School
: Christopher Lehmann-Haupt,
New York Times,
December 8, 1978; Julian Moynahan,
New York Times Book Review,
November 12, 1978; “Briefly Noted,”
The New Yorker,
September 4, 1978; Jonathan Penner,
New Republic,
November 4, 1978; John Skow,
Time,
August 21, 1978; Nicholas Guild,
Washington Post,
September 10, 1978; Thomas R. Edward,
New York Review of Books,
November 23, 1978.
“If writing were baseball”: Jerome Klinkowitz,
The New American Novel of Manners: The Fiction of Richard Yates, Dan Wakefield, and Thomas McGuane
(Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1986).
“complex, generous voice”: Stewart O'Nan, “The Lost World of Richard Yates,”
Boston Review,
October/November 1999, 45.
“I want to reassure you”: Lawrence to RY, December 17, 1978, UM-SL.
“Since reading your book”: Richard E. T. Hunter to RY, February 19, 1979.
wrote ⦠mollifying letter: E-mail to author from Geoffrey Clark.
“She knows that I also read”: Mary Nickerson to RY, undated.
accepted an invitation: Int. Mary Nickerson, Ann Wright Jones.
Chapter Sixteen
Young Hearts Crying: 1979â1984
“Since then I've read all the novels”: Laura âââ to Margaret Blackstone, June 20, 1979.
“I'm the one ⦠stalking you”: Int. Monica Yates Shapiro.
“[I worried] your friend Mary”: Laura âââ to RY, undated.
“Dick was bombed”: Int. Booghie Salassi.
“too academic”: Lawrence to RY, March 5, 1979, UM-SL.
“Nobody's eyes light up”: RY to Booghie Salassi, December 29, 1979 (unmailed).
“I wanted to tell you”: Raymond Carver to RY, September 17, 1979.
“a few traces of roach shit”: RY to Joseph Mohbat, September 23, 1979.
“horrified” ⦠“guide him about”: Clark, “The Best I Can Wish You,” 36.
“I think this ⦠last foray”: RY to Joseph Mohbat, September 23, 1979.
“Notes Toward an Understanding of Laura Mâ”: found among RY's papers.
“She's offered ample assurance”: RY to Booghie Salassi, December 29, 1979 (unmailed).
“Ahh, mind your own”: Int. Geoffrey Clark.
“You guys ⦠grownup clothes?”: Int. James Crumley.
“I just love your work”: Int. John Casey.
“He was a wonderful source of solace”:
RYAW,
53.
one nurse reported seeing: Int. Ivan Gold.
“The mere presence of sweet”: papers of Wendy Sears Grassi.
“That was ⦠literary parties”: Lawrence to RY, November 25, 1980, UM-SL.
“a homosexual novel in disguise”: RY to Geoffrey Clark, October 26, 1978.
often given a “snitty” lecture: Int. Monica Yates Shapiro.
“All I want ⦠goddamned
New Yorker
!”: Int. William Keough.
“John fucking Cheever”: E-mail to author from Joseph Mohbat.
“I don't know if you usually”: RY to McCall, September 7, 1979, ICM files.
“This is written with admirable”: Quoted in McCall to RY, September 25, 1979.
“magnificent ⦠perceptive”: Lawrence to RY, December 30, 1980, UM-SL.
“false and hollow”: Roger Angell to Mitch Douglas, February 23, 1981.
“This didn't come close”: Angell to Douglas, February 26, 1981.
“I know these rejections”: Douglas to RY, March 6, 1981.
find Angell's letters ⦠shaky voice: Int. Robin Metz.
“Dick drew me into labor”:
RYAW,
37.
“Ivy League wino”: Int. George Garrett.
“What does your character”: Elizabeth Cox, “Meet Richard Yates,”
Pif
(
www.pifmagazine.com
), February 4, 2001.
