I am enclosing your Mass. ballot, in case you want to exercise your sacred and divine right to vote. I do think it might be a good idea even if it is a lot of trouble. Your trouble would involve, I think, having to go to the American Consulate in Madrid and having it witnessed by an official there. But hurry! Nov. 2 approacheth.
This afternoon Polly left all agog to fly to Nice, thence to Italy. She was so excited I thought she’d pop out of her skin. We had a fine time while she was here—fixing oysters and crabmeat. She has become so adult—it’s hard to believe, and she and her adored and adoring Charlie make a fine pair.
Your grandfather is now ensconced happily at River Glen in Southbury, about 10 minutes drive from here. I chartered a Piper Aztec from the Vineyard and Willie Morris and I flew down to N.C. to pick him up last Tuesday. He is pretty alert for his 87 years, cheerful, only now and then vague or confused, and asks often for his beloved granddaughter Susanna whom he misses. Drop him a postcard now and then: c/o River Glen, Southbury, CT, 06488.
The N.Y. Times Magazine wants to devote a whole Sunday issue (or nearly whole) to an article I intend to write on capital punishment.aaa As you know, the reactionary U.S. Supreme Court restored the death penalty and plans are afoot to execute large numbers of people, starting with three states: Texas, Georgia and Florida. I intend to go to one of these states (probably Florida) and do a long and detailed study of one of the condemned. In Florida there is a white boy exactly Tommy’s age awaiting the electric chair for murdering a little girl of 12. Chances are I’ll hone in on this case. It of course means an interruption of “Sophie” but my feelings are so strong about the awfulness of the death penalty that I think the time worth it—especially when it’ll be read everywhere (including Spain) and just may have some effect in altering people’s consciousness about the matter.
Out walking with Sundance and Aquinnah yesterday I happily lit up a post-lunch cigar which Aquinnah immediately snatched from my hand and chewed in half. In my rage I threw my walking stick at the little beast but the stick missed and broke in splinters on the asphalt. I could tell that Aquinnah was just laughing. Life in Roxbury goes on just as it always has.
Much love,
Daddy
TO SUSANNA STYRON
November 16, 1976 Roxbury, CT
P.S. Mrs. Vanderhoop sent me her check for BMW, so all is O.K. in that department, thanks to various forgeries.
Dear Susanna:
Looks like the South is going to rise again. Thanks to your absentee vote in Mass and Polly’s absentee vote in Roxbury our peanut-picker won and everyone is quite happy hereabouts.bbb What Jimmy is really up to, however, remains to be seen. Your mother and I spent the election evening (I am reporting this as counterpoint to your description of election night in Paris, which I loved) at Michael and Alice Arlen’s on Firth Avenue. We drove in my swank new Benz and all sorts of old friends were arrayed around the five TV sets—Bruce Jay Friedman and Jackie Kennedy (you might mention this to Albina), Norman Mailer (we’re back on speaking terms), and a lot of other folks I can’t recall at the moment. It was an exhilarating thing to see Carter win, but there is a curious lull at the moment, as if people really can’t figure out what this odd farmer is going to do about China, the Russians, the Economy, etc.
I loved your letter from the beautiful city and indeed I was wrenchingly nostalgic by the notion that my little girl was writing me from the place where 25 years ago (God!) I had such a good-bad time. I say that because basically I loved it but I did have some weary and lonely hours. I’m so glad that you’ve found friends to enjoy. I did too but it took me a long time and I pined away at the Hotel Liberia (rue de la Grande Chaumière, right around the corner from the Dôme in Montparnasse) and some nights I got so homesick I thought my heart would bust in twain. I think that is why out of sheer necessity I was able to write The Long March in a burst of 5 or 6 weeks at that dinky little hotel—loneliness is sometimes fruitful, though not often. I know what you mean about “things going to happen to you,” that feeling of anticipation. Paris helps create that feeling on its own. What a gorgeous city. I also felt that there was “something big” and that I was going to find it. So I’m sure, you will. It’s a great time of life and I think that your passion for the movies will pay off. I’m not knocking on my own chosen profession—I still think that “the novel” when it is working on eight cylinders is a majestic form of expression—but I do think that films are marvelously exciting at their best and it must be tremendously exhilarating for you to be involved in movies, knowing that eventually you will do something that fulfills your “vision.” I’m babbling … I’m so happy for you to be having the time of your life in that wonderful metropolis. Even if you are a bit queer about food and only eat Granola and other unspeakables.
Sophie is coming along well though as usual slowly and painfully. Along with its blessings, the wretched and insufferable part about “the Novel” is this dimension of Time—the sheer months and years it takes to get the thing finished. But I’m moving along with some sense of progress. I read some of it out loud to Bob Loomis and Hilary last week-end and I think they liked it a lot. It is so terribly weird to dare do what I am doing. I’m the only American writer (that is, writer as a member of my identifiable literary generation) who has faced the Holocaust head-on, the Concentration Camps, and I have made the amazing decision to embody the victim as a non-Jew. Certainly the hell I went through about Nat Turner will be a serene summer outing to what I will get for Sophie, or because of it. But I can’t go back. I’m committed like a bird in flight or a Boeing 747 in take-off and can’t go back! I have such an intense love-hate relationship with this work. Sometimes I can’t bear facing the pages, other times I feel it will be as good as anything written by anyone in this or any other decade.
Following are some random jottings and thoughts and reminiscences about happenings here since last I saw you.
Last week-end a fine masterpiece of a party here chez Styron for Francine Gray and her book (which has gotten excellent reviews generally and is doing very well).ccc Big sit-down bash for 30 people. Among those present: Millers, Sadri and Katy, Matthiessen and Maria (lovely gal), Warrens (looking fine), Millers, Tom Guinzburg (with pretty gal who is a Lie Down in Darkness adorer, always makes me feel good), Allens, Ed Doctorow (a truly superb gent). Smashing event. Marqués de Cáceres Rioja wine went over big, also my Va. ham. I gave a beautiful toast to Francine and her book. Several of us stayed up until 4:30 AM. Woke next day to find to my horror that in my generosity I had given away to the male guests all of the Havana cigars in my humidor.
I’m taking Tommy down to see Duke soon. He’s such a bright boy with such poor grades (like his father). I hope he likes Duke, the best school now in the South (he’ll never make Yale or Harvard).
He got kicked in the foot by a horse, X-ray revealed only a bad bruise. God, how I hate horses! I also hate that devilish Aquinnah, who can be charming but who chews everything in sight, worse than that goat Feather.
Sorry to hear that you want to do a film on a drop-out prostitute. Couldn’t you make a movie about a nice American boy who voted for Gerry Ford and wants to open a new Big Mac place somewhere near Danbury?
Grandpop is flourishing at River Glen (he loved your letter but can’t write back and told me to send love to you) and eats like a horse. Imagine, 87! It really turns out the poor sad Eunice in her dementia was starving him with Pepsi-Cola. Right out of Faulkner. But now he’s doing wonderfully, we pick him up and bring him here almost every day. Daphne is adorable to him and today, mirabile dictu! he and Terry ate chitlins together.
It is hideously cold, the coldest autumn all over the U.S. in 15 years. But barta to the weather, we’ll survive. I still take my walks.
In the Clap Shack, my sole foray in drama, is going to be produced in—of all places—Barcelona! Can you imagine! Do you think we should all go to opening night, armed with ampoules of penicillin?
Looking forward enormously to the Xmas
expedition. Right now it appears that we will show up in Paris on Dec. 17th thence to Klosters, although I’ll be damned if I will be caught on skis. What a blessing to spend a Yuletide, without ulcers, in a foreign ambience. All I want you to do when I arrive in Paris is to take me to the nearest outlet for Belon #00 oysters. I’ll buy all that any of us can eat.
Must shut up now. Please tell Albina that I got her nice note a week or so ago and would have replied but lacked her address (she didn’t write it down). I send my fond regards chez Casati and am looking forward to a happy get together in December.
Polly sends adorable heartwarming letters from Italy. Can’t wait to see her as well as you, my beloved Numero Uno fille.
Much much love,
Daddy
TO WILLIE MORRIS
May 3, 1977 Roxbury, CT
Dear Willie:
Jim and Gloria told Rose and me the other night about your mother, and I wanted to say (for both of us) how sorry I am. It is, I know, a terrible wrench to suffer and I am thinking of you—all the more, I’m afraid, because my own poor old daddy seems to be failing badly, losing practically all of his memory, and all I can do is help him go to the toilet to do the peepee and stand there cursing God as he dribbles. Who thought up this idea of the end of life anyway? My daddy never fails to remember Willie Morris though, which is something.
I’ll be seeing you at the Matthiessen-Guinzburg-Styron 50th party soon (I’m 66 but it doesn’t matter).
Thinking of you,
Bill
TO HERBERT MITGANGddd
June 17, 1977 Roxbury, CT
Dear Mr. Mitgang:
I am sure that you were never at a party with James Jones or myself, and I am also willing to believe that you don’t have a shovel. I’m sorry that you didn’t see that these references were metaphorical.
Contrary to the reaction you received about your obituary report, most of the readers I canvassed did not really think your piece was either fair or respectful. This had less to do with the so-called facts, which in general you set down with accuracy, but with a certain tone and lack of balance which invaded the piece and left most of the people I know who read it with a bad taste in the mouth. Just one example would suffice; it has to do with Jones’s life-style which you so gratuitously emphasized throughout at the expense of his work. I am speaking of the brief passage where you deal with Hemingway and Jones.eee There because of your emphasis and tone the reader is left with the distinct impression that it was pure and idealistic for Hemingway to abstain from writing movie scripts and somehow rather venal for Jones to do so (although of course many fine writers including Faulkner and Fitzgerald pursued this way of making money). There are many other places in which this kind of animus, whether unconscious or not, comes leaking out, and despite your disclaimer to the contrary many readers noticed it.
Certainly no one expected any writer for the Times to compose a eulogy, nor do I think that the piece was really composed in a spirit of ill-will. Maybe you just had a bad day. But my own feeling, reflected in a consensus of practically everyone I have talked to, is that you did Jones a disservice.
W.S.
TO ELIZABETH HARDWICK
September 30, 1977 Roxbury, CT
Dear Lizzie:
I was unable to get to the memorial for Cal at the American Palace Theatre—I heard it was fine—but I did come to Boston for that ceremony.fff I was quite awed by it even though I think that Cal would understand why for me—a Virginia boy brought up “low church”—all that incense smelled of popery. But it was, as they said, majestic.
I can’t tell you, though, how I will cherish that trip we made to Russia together. Cal’s face in repose at that table was so moving as the Fiedenenkos and Cousinses yammered away. And that walk through Red Square at night and the lousy salami sandwiches, and Cal’s sweet, sardonic resignation. Just to have been with him in a place like that during his last month or so—and with you—is something I will always treasure. I wish I had had the chance to tell him that after that drunken party at Vog’s dacha in Penedelkino, Yevtushenko and I got a couple of bottles of champagne and went out in the moonlight and sat until dawn at Pasternak’s grave. I think Cal would have relished that, but the next morning I was so hungover that I barely made it on the Aeroflot Flying Fortress to London.
Oh well, Lizzie, what can you say? A wonderful man. Wonderful memories. I hope to see you before long.
Much love,
Bill
TO STUART WRIGHTggg
September 30, 1977 Roxbury, CT
Dear Col. Wright:
Thanks for your letter with its agreeable surprises. I am sending the copy of In the Clap Shack back to you, signed, by separate mail. I appreciate the handsome photos, also the clipping from Bell Wiley’s book.hhh It is most illuminating, especially since it is true that the general impression one gets of that war is of life without erotic joys. Wiley sets the record straight.
As for publishing something of mine, I am taking the liberty of sending your letter on to a professor at Virginia Tech who knows all my work and who has done a bibliography of my so-called “oeuvre.”iii He is very bright and engaging and may have some good ideas for you. I imagine you will be hearing from him soon. I hope something develops.
Thanks again.
With kindest regards,
Wm Styron
Maj-Gen CSA
TO STUART WRIGHT
October 12, 1977 Roxbury, CT
Dear Col. Wright:
I hope that by now you’ve been in touch (or he with you) with Jim West at Va. Tech. It seems that he knows of a thing (unpublished) which I had forgotten—a spoken tribute, rather brief in length, to Robert Penn Warren which I gave several winters ago in New York City.jjj I think it might be just right for your series. The MS is with my papers at Duke, and Jim will ferret it out if you decide that you want it.
Appreciate the Forsyth Co. book.kkk I used to know a lot of Winston-Salem boys when I was at Davidson, but I’ve lost touch with them. I also spent a very frustrated night at the Zinzendorf Hotel. I’d come up to visit a W-S. girl who, in the fashion of the time, rejected me, and I had to pass the night at the hotel listening through those thin walls to the most impassioned erotic activity one can imagine. That is my forlorn memory of Winston-Salem.
I will be here Xmas and will look forward to your generous gift.
Best regards,
Wm Styron C.S.A.
TO STUART WRIGHT
November 12, 1977 Roxbury, CT
Dear Col:
I think perhaps the piece should be called “Admiral Robert Penn Warren and the Snows of Winter”—(“a tribute by William Styron”—if you so wish). I don’t think there is any further permission needed from Duke. I already signed a release sent to me by Jim West. I think there should be a note to the effect that it was a speech given by me at the Lotos Club, N.Y.C. (4/10/75) and there should be somewhere a copyright © by William Styron, with the year.
Herewith also a snapshot. It was taken at Luxor, Egypt, in March 1967 (by my wife Rose). There is no other photo I can lay my hands on but I think it’s right nice anyway. The personae (l. to r.) are Red Warren, behind him (partly hidden) his wife Eleanor Clark, his daughter Rosanna, his son Gabriel (foreground), my daughter Susanna, me, my daughter Polly.
I hope all this is satisfactory. I am eagerly looking forward to the final product. Incidentally, I’m sure I can get Red to co-autograph the pamphlet with me if you would like it—certainly any number up to 250 or so. Let me know.
Yours in the rebel cause.
W.S.
Gen. C.S.A., etc.
P.S. The piece is hardly literature, I see upon re-reading, but certainly nice enough as a speech before some assembled drunks.
William Clark Styron, Sr., died in Southbury, Connecticut, on August 10, 1978.
TO WILLIE MORRIS
August 11, 1978 Roxbury, CT
Dear Willie:
I thought you would want to know that my dear o
ld father died Thursday night, in peace and no pain. In a little over a month he would have been 89, so with three good wives and rich life behind him there is sadness but no grief. He was really fond of you and I think he remembered that plane ride from N.C. with as much wonderment as you and I did.
See you soon,
Bill
TO DANNY ROBBlll
September 21, 1978 Roxbury, CT
Dear Danny:
I had a great teacher at Duke University, who sent me on my way as a writer. Go to a good school and have the luck to find a teacher who cares: that is my advice.
Sincerely
William Styron
P.S. Also, it doesn’t hurt to do an enormous amount of reading.
TO ROXBURY ZONING BOARD
September 23, 1978 Roxbury, CT
Gentlemen:
I would like to build a wall in front of my property on Rucum Road in Roxbury.mmm The wall would extend the full length of my property, approximately 300 feet, and would be a maximum eight feet in height. The bottom four feet or thereabouts would be of stone, which in turn would be surmounted by approximately four feet of wooden palings. It would be attractively built. The reason for this wall is to effectively shut out the noise and sight of traffic from my house and studio, both of which are built very close to the road. During most of my residence in Roxbury for the past twenty-four years Rucum Road has been a quiet and peaceful street. In the last two or three years, however, the road has become one of the busiest in town, largely due to the establishment of the housing development at the top of Rucum Hill.
I am a writer who works at home and whose livelihood depends literally on reasonable peace and quiet. The new influx of traffic with its nearly endless stream of cars, trucks and construction equipment causes at times distraction and noise which I find nearly intolerable. A wall with its necessary height of eight feet would, I am almost certain, provide an effective barrier against this intrusion and allow my family and me the quiet and privacy we need. The proposed wall would satisfy all reasonable aesthetic requirement and would prove to be no traffic hazard whatever. I respectfully request that the Zoning Board accede to this proposition.