Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh (120 page)

, May 12, 1969.

492

“more deserving of a coroner’s report”: “New Plays,”

, May 23, 1969.

492

“Tennessee Williams appears to be”: Stefan Kanfer, “White Dwarf’s Tragic Fade-Out,”

, June 13, 1969.

492

“Tom, it’s time for you”:

, p. 213.

492

“Whatever the exact price was”:

, p. 197.

492

“Played out?”:

, June 10, 1969.

492

“I really began to crack”:

, p. 216.

493

“I had an evening with very sad Tennessee”: Yukio Mishima to Robert MacGregor, July 3, 1969, HRC.

494

“My condition had so deteriorated”: Williams to Oliver Evans, undated, 1971, LLC.

494

“rollicking nature”:

, p. 210.

494

“an almost suspect glamour”: Ibid., p. 208.

494

“Tennessee always preferred someone”: LLI with William Gray, 1986, LLC.

494

“He didn’t look after him”: LLI with Robert Hines and Jack Fricks, 1986, LLC.

494

“would get Tennessee knocked out”: Ibid.

494

“There’s a limit to what anybody”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1985, LLC.

494

“elected to be a zombie”:

, p. 210.

495

“shooting up with Dr. Feelgood’s amphetamines”: LLI with Charles Bowden, 1996, LLC.

495

“very attractive to ladies”:

, p. 210.

495

“perhaps . . . closest”: Ibid., p. 208.

495

“During our nearly five years together”: Ibid., p. 210.

495

“Tennessee made impossible demands”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1988, LLC.

495

“Tennessee, how do you dare live”:

, p. 211.

495

“being a madman”: Ibid.

495

“[Glavin] probably started”: Ibid.

495

“three favorite modern plays”: Williams to William Glavin, ca. Mar. 20, 1971, LLC.

495

“It isn’t so much my life”: Ibid. “It took a high level of desperate delusion to assign Glavin ‘The Dance of Death.’ The idea that he would’ve been able to read it and appreciate it in any way is crazy. He was actually kind of creepy to have around. I never heard Tennessee relate to him in any way about intellectual matters. The Tool Box, yes, Strindberg no.” (John Hancock to John Lahr, May 17, 2012, JLC.)

496

“Old men go mad at night”:

, “Old Men Go Mad at Night,” p. 85.

497

“He never knew where he was”:

, p. 290.

497

“He insisted someone”: Spoto,

, p. 283.

497

“The rest is not a blur”: Williams to Andrew Lyndon, Nov. 4, 1969, Harvard.

497

“Dakin, an attempt will be made on my life”: “Salty Author Williams Takes Catholic Vows,”

, Jan. 11, 1969.

499

“Queeny Towers”:

, p. 173.

499

“I thought Shirley was making”: Spoto,

, p. 283.

499

“thought he was in full control”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1985, LLC.

499

“a little Prussian officer in drag”:

, p. 219.

499

“There was now, quite clearly”: Ibid.

500

“He told me that I could sign a letter”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1985, LLC.

500

“by a wheel-chair with straps”:

, p. 220.

500

“fainting as Tennessee was being wheeled”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1985, LLC.

500

running for the U.S. Senate: Dakin’s campaign poster (in Tennessee Williams Papers at Harvard) read:

DAKIN WILLIAMS FOR U.S. SENATOR

Peace & Love Join GO-DAKE (Gun Owners for America; Stop Abortion Vote Dakin)

500

“Who are you?”:

, p. 293.

500

“It wasn’t voluntary at all”: Williams to Andrew Lyndon, Nov. 10, 1969, Harvard.

501

“a 2 by 4 situation”: LOA1, p. 417.

501

“Where am I?”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1985, LLC. Williams disputed the story.

501

“every half hour by an intern”: Williams to William Glavin, undated, LLC.

501

“Spooksville”: Williams to Audrey Wood, Nov. 4, 1969, LLC.

501

“nightmare alley”: Williams to William Glavin, undated, LLC.

501

“Upset the card table”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1985, LLC.

501

“I am a completely disenfranchised citizen”: Williams to William Glavin, undated, LLC.

501

“convulsive seizures”: Williams to Andreas Brown, Nov. 4, 1969, HRC.

501

seizures escalated to “heart attacks”:

, p. 175.

501

“The circumstances under which I was treated”: Williams to Robert MacGregor, Aug. 19, 1970, Harvard.

502

“De Profundis 200,502”: Williams to Audrey Wood, Nov. 4, 1969, LLC.

502

“I’m afraid I bear him malice”: Williams to Paul Bowles, Dec. 23, 1969, Delaware.

502

“sort of a Quixote”: Williams to Andrew Lyndon, Dec. 7, 1967, LLC.

502

“Brother Cain”: Williams to Andrew Lyndon, Nov. 1969, Harvard.

502

“legalized fratricide”: Williams to Robert MacGregor, Aug. 19, 1970, LLC.

502

“I know that you never intended”: Williams to Dakin Williams, Nov. 11, 1970, LLC.

503

“Redemption from what?”:

, p. 220.

503

“How terribly I’ve abused myself”: Williams to James Laughlin and Robert MacGregor, Nov. 10, 1969, Harvard.

503

“ ‘You say you do not sleep well’ ”:

, “What’s Next on the Agenda, Mr. Williams?,” p. 152.

504

“was fully aware of who Tennessee was”: LLI with Dakin Williams, 1985, LLC.

505

“The worst may be over”: Williams to William Glavin, undated, LLC.

506

“I was obviously quite ill”: Williams to Audrey Wood, Oct. 29, 1969, HRC.

506

“Today, for the first time”: Ibid.

506

“I’d planned to get a couple of suits”: Williams to David Lobdell, Nov. 12, 1969, LLC.

507

“sprung”: Williams to Andrew Lyndon, Nov. 1969, Harvard.

507

“The prospect of early release”: Ibid.

507

“My mind is quite clear”: Williams to Andrew Lyndon, Nov. 10, 1969, Harvard.

507

“Perhaps that’s for the best”: Williams to Paul Bowles, Dec. 11, 1969, LLC.

507

“to ship Glavin off”: Williams to Audrey Wood, Feb. 1970, LLC.

507

“With his facile Irish charm”: Ibid.

508

“without my knowledge or authorization”: Williams to Dakin Williams, Feb. 4, 1970, LLC.

508

“at best, he’s pitiable”: Williams to Jo Mielziner, Mar. 20, 1971, Harvard.

508

“Nobody knows the true desolation”: Ibid. Williams’s disenchantment with “the Charming Irishman,” as he began to refer to Glavin in letters, was compounded in February 1970 when Glavin didn’t come to Williams’s aid in an unprovoked bar fight during which Williams was thrown against a wall and the right side of his head was badly bruised. “A vicious-looking ape of a man at a bar began glaring at me. He got up and said, ‘Will you step outside?’ I said: ‘Why not?’ and followed him out,” Williams explained to Wood. “Glavin remained in the bar, sitting, until two strangers drove the man away from me. They then took me home.” Williams added, “He is not only a con-man of the first water, but a dangerous one, and one that is clever as the ‘Heathen Chinee.’ ” (Williams to Audrey Wood, Feb. 1970, HRC.)

508

“Tennessee wanted out”: JLI with Dotson Rader, 2013, JLC.

508

“most of the stuff”: Williams to Audrey Wood, Nov. 4, 1969, LLC.

508

“Dear, dear Tenn”: Audrey Wood to Williams, Nov. 9, 1969, HRC.

508

“On to the future”: Ibid.

509

“Time betrays us”: LOA1, p. 809.

509

“was choppy as hell”: George Keathley, unpublished Ms., JLC.

509

“Tennessee had been obstreperous”: Ibid.

509

“sort of like Sister Elizabeth”: Williams to Cheryl Crawford and Paul Bigelow, May 29, 1971, Columbia.

509

“petrified”: Williams to Oliver Evans, May 21, 1971, LLC.

510

“It’s a cold world without you”: Williams to Lady St. Just, Dec. 2, 1970,

, p. 221.

510

“The results were awful”: Keathley, unpublished Ms., JLC.

511

“He could not respond”: Ibid.

511

“We should not again make the mistake”: Audrey Wood to Williams, Nov. 11, 1970, LLC.

511

“In one of our arguments”: Keathley, unpublished Ms., JLC.

511

“Did you notice how Audrey was?”:

, p. 231.

511

“an uncanny sense”:

, p.132.

511

“Tennessee, I have a thought”: Keathley, unpublished Ms., JLC.

512

“will to manage”:

, p. 131.

512

“too much domination”: Ibid.

512

“Now Williams whirled on her”: Keathley, unpublished Ms., JLC.

512

“I became a sort of madman”:

, p. 228.

512

“quiet ferocity”: Ibid.

512

screaming hysterically: Williams acknowledged as much to St. Just a few weeks later, when he recounted another outburst, which he referred to as “one of my really apocalyptic rages the sort usually reserved for ‘the Widow’ [Wood].” (Williams to Lady St. Just, July 23, 1971,

, p. 232.)

512

“And you, you bitch”: Keathley, unpublished Ms., JLC.

512

“No one knew what to say”: Ibid.

512

“For the first time in all our years together”:

, p. 200.

512

“to get the hell out of there”: Ibid.

512

“That bitch!”: Ibid.

512

“After such a trauma”: Ibid.

513

“I have been through similar Williams scenes”: Ibid., pp. 200–201.

513

“ ‘Don’t come’ ”: JLI with Alan U. Schwartz, 2009, JLC.

513

“Dear, dear Maria”: Audrey Wood to Maria St. Just, Aug. 6, 1963, Columbia. Wood was proprietary about Williams and quick to scuttle loose talk about any rift. To the

’s columnist Charles McHarry, who alleged in an item that her relationship with Williams’s might “be over,” she wrote, “I don’t know where you picked up this bit of misinformation, but I am happy to say that Mr. Williams and I have been working together since 1937 and the relationship has continued for all these years through eleven full-length plays. It would be fine one day if you would run a correction, if you please.” (Audrey Wood to Charles McHarry, Mar. 19, 1962, HRC.)

513

“

DEAREST AUDREY

”: Williams to Audrey Wood, Mar. 28, 1963, HRC.

514

“Tenn’s defection”: James Laughlin to Audrey Wood, Aug. 21, 1971, HRC.

514

“I wonder what part”: James Laughlin to Audrey Wood, Oct. 1, 1971, HRC.

514

“I don’t believe”: Dotson Rader,

(Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1985), p. 42. Rader adds in a letter, “Peter Glenville, who directed ‘Out Cry’ on Broadway in 1973, told me that Maria was the one behind the sacking of Audrey. Milton Goldman, the head of theatre department of ICM, agreed with that assessment.” (Dotson Rader to John Lahr, Oct. 1, 1971, JLC.)

514

“she could share”: Williams to Ardis Blackburn and Oliver Evans, July 26, 1971, LLC.

514

“I find myself thinking of you”: Williams to Audrey Wood, Mar. 1970, HRC.

514

“I had stupidly feared”: Williams to Lady St. Just, Mar. 16, 1970,

, p. 199.

515

It had gone undelivered:

, p. 198.

515

unavailable to Williams: “You haven’t heard from me by mail in any detail primarily because each time you have written me you have indicated you were going on to another address and when you gave your next stop there was no reference to any hotel or how I can reach you. So please understand it has not been negligence on my part,” Wood wrote to Williams. (Audrey Wood to Williams, Nov. 11, 1970, HRC.)