B007RT1UH4 EBOK (12 page)

To Edith Gaddis

Cambridge, Massachusetts

[12 August 1943]

Dear Mother—

Thanks for the lost check—debts etc cleared up and my clothes cleaned—so now am prepared to appear in public! Say I just realized about Labour Day weekend—I’ll have 4 or 5 days off! What do you think?

We were up last night writing Charley’s radio script—his ‘Man About Boston’ programme—he and Gardiner write the script, panning everything in town, having seen about
⅛
of it—but it’s a lot of fun.—

I am beginning to get scared—hour exam in psyc. next week—what a horrible course! But the others are coming along well. I don’t suppose you know W. H. Auden—a modern poet—Hazel probably knows him. I met him a few days ago—Mr. Spencer introduced me. Boy I was quite thrilled. And then we saw Rex Ingram do the
Emperor Jones
up here too.—and see him in the street occasionally.

If you haven’t sent Johnson Smith don’t bother because Mac was in a hurry for this thing I was writing—wanted it for the forthcoming issue—so I wrote it on what I could remember—it came out all right tho I don’t know yet whether he’s going to permit it or not.

There is little else doing—somehow we don’t feel the heat up here—and all your subtle cajolling can’t get me to Revere Beach! Just a jump in the pool downstairs when things get warm, or to wake up in the mornings is enough—and if things get too hot I just settle down with
Vanity Fair
which I am about halfway through. But I may start to row once in a while soon. Don’t know yet.—am going down today for a physical exam—and if they make me take conditioning—@!?*%!

Love

Bill

W. H. Auden: the British poet (1907–73) was teaching at Swarthmore at the time.

Hazel: unidentified.

Rex Ingram do the
Emperor Jones:
the protagonist of Eugene O’Neill’s 1920 play would have been a plum role for African-American actors like Ingram (1895–1969).

Johnson Smith: a mail-order company specializing in novelty items. The “thing” WG was writing apparently remained unpublished.

To Ida Williams Way

[
WG’s maternal grandmother (d. 1951), daughter of music educator Samuel E. Williams (1855– 1937) and a pianist and bass violinist in his family orchestra. She was a supervisor of music in public schools until 1920, after which she became a businesswoman.
]

Adams House B 34

Cambridge, Massachusetts

[16 November 1943]

Dear Gram

Thanks so much for the idea and the invitation—and financial backing!—but this is the one weekend we expect to turn out up here.

First off the first big dinner at the
Poon
this year, and after dinner we have our pictures (
Poon
staff) made for the ’45 yearbook—I won’t get in any other way—as a member of the class that is—so I’d at least like to get in as a member of the
Lampoon
!

Then Saturday is our one big football game—I don’t expect to go, but anyhow it will probably turn out to be a pretty big weekend. I would love to come down of course, but now see how it is—and then too, I have reason to believe that I can work the Thanksgiving weekend so I can get down—not sure of course, and something’s liable to crop up—probably will—but there’s a chance.

Everything up here is coming along wonderfully—including my work(!). A new issue ought to be out within a week and a half—I’ll send a couple of copies down when it does. And I’m glad (and somewhat surprised) that Aunt Emma liked it!

Thanks again—and I hope I’ll see you around Thanksgiving

Love

Bill

new issue: dated 19 November, it contains four items by WG.

Aunt Emma: Emma Bond, Mrs. Way’s cousin.

To Edith Gaddis

Cambridge, Massachusetts

[10 December 1943]

dear Mother

terribly sorry i haven’t written, and this time i can really say that i have been pretty busy well right through until tonight—haven’t had time to get a haircut and so you can imagine what i look like by this time!

we had ’
Poon
deadlines through that first week, and what with the dearth of prose writers i was called on and kept busy, as i am afraid the next issue will attest to. in fact, i even wrote the editorial! then of course there was that quantity of Spinoza which i had to get through my head (though i did get a B– on the quiz, so i feel all right about it) and a story to write (which i just got back with an A! he liked it and thought parts admirable—really gives me a lift.)

and no sooner had that got by than an hour exam in Eng 5, and
Bleak House
seemed to go on interminably. the exam was today, and also more Spinoza quiz, and one in the criminology course, all of which give me a sort of warm feeling, because i think i did fairly well.

ever and above these banal and mundane topics, however, my social life seems to have taken a turn for the better. i am not sure, but Middendorf informed me that i had been elected to the Hasty Pudding, though that was some days ago and i haven’t heard anything about it. but also the Speakers Club has invited me to two punches, and i seem to know quite a number of the fellows (many of whom are ’
Poon
men), so i may make a club yet.

thanks so much for the check and money—and please don’t think that this letter is merely to enclose the Coop bill (which is rather high this month, but as always with the beginning of a term, mostly books), and the impending 7.80 for
Poon
dues, though there is not any rush—i’ll be there whenever they want me!

i don’t think i told you that Mr Dick (Amer Field Ser)’s son is on the
’Poon
! it may not help, but then again . . . i haven’t had time to get to the Boston office, but plan to do it soon, perhaps the weekend.

heard from Mark, having a simply terrible time in texas with a bunch of illiterates, and
prays
for a letter. really, it sounds pretty bad.

must write a 4500 word story this weekend too, so will probably be occupied far into the night. but i don’t mind, if i can get into the subject.

that’s about all—will let you know how things work out

Love Bill

next issue: published 10 December, it contains five contributions by WG, including two short stories (“I Want You for Christmas” and “The Kid in Upper Five”).

Bleak House:
Charles Dickens’s esteemed legal novel (1852).

Hasty Pudding [...] Speakers Club: the first was founded in 1770, the oldest collegiate social club in America; the second was founded in 1908 as an intellectual, not social, club.

Mr Dick (Amer Field Ser)’s son: C. Mathews Dick (class of ’46); the American Field Service was founded in 1915 as a corps of ambulance drivers before becoming a student-exchange program.

To Edith Gaddis

Cambridge, Massachusetts

[12 February 1944]

dear Mother

how are things going?—and are we still hanging on? i haven’t realized that we were so involved, or at least that i had got you so involved. i thought that everything was just about breaking even. and now i do want to stay on here, unless i get thrown out by the language requirement which is sort of a mess. but aside from these problems seemingly everything at hartford college are going quite well.

discounting my last letter, i shall start this angle out again freshly; you remember telling me to fall in love (i am afraid that i am going to be throwing that up continutally!). there is an awfully nice and attractive girl whom i have been coming across twice a week in my short story writing class. i thought that i was the only one that knew about her, but was suddenly surprised when i met her with Bob Ward over at the
Lampoon
a few evenings ago—and Saturday evening he was with her at the
Lampoon
dance. and so as the evening wore on and we all wore on i danced with her(!) though you could hardly call it dancing i’m afraid because i spent most of the time standing and looking at her and just being pretty happy about the whole thing. her name—Jean Campbell. she is really awfully nice, but early in the morning (at the moment) i can’t get onto just what i want to say. but she’s going to be up here until october, and i am hoping to be able to get to know her better. i think that spring is on its way!

i still find it difficult to conceive that another term is ending. probably when exams are done i’ll realize it, and they are quite imminent. except for this girl, things should be easier next term, because so many are leaving, and i suppose a lot of the little temptations will be gone. my class graduates in february, you know. and a number of the little outlets for flings will be carried off. but i do want to see more of Miss Campbell.

my sophomoric troubles will be done with the twenty fourth, and we come back the sixth of march. do you think that it would help things out if i were to stay up here and get a job for a few days. at this point (and you may say that it is Miss C—if you wish, tho she is only a contributing factor) i want to hold on at hartford college if it can be worked out.

Love

Bill

Jean Campbell: born in Vermont (d. 2001), Campbell graduated from Radcliffe in 1944 and went on to become a writer and Beauty Editor of
Seventeen
. Not to be confused with a later acquaintance of WG’s, the British heiress and journalist Jeanne Campbell (1928–2007), daughter of the 11th duke of Argyll, and briefly married to Norman Mailer (1962–63).