The Selected Letters of Willa Cather Read online

  Now we must have the picture by the 18th. If you will not have time to make the changes or do not feel as though you can do so, please send it back to us at once as it is and we will try to use it.

  It has occurred to me that perhaps you may not have kept a sketch of the former drawing you made of Buchanan and Mademoiselle, so I take the liberty of sending back the scene of three figures, hoping that you can make Buchanan especially more nearly resemble his own self. Please send both of these pictures back to us, as we like to keep the original sketches from which illustrations are made.

  Yours sincerely,

  Willa Cather

  P.S. I think the tenor is just about right, but Buchanan and Miss DeKoch should be “keyed up” a little higher, more animated etc. And dont you think Miss de Koch’s gown is rather flimsy. She had such a decided air and style in the first picture last month that it perhaps makes one expect too much of her this. I hope you wont think we are chronic kickers, we were delighted with the first illustrations, but I think you will see yourself on comparing them that this last one is inferior.

  Sincerely yours

  Willa Cather

  The illustrations in question were for Cather’s own story “The Count of Crow’s Nest,” published in the September and October 1896 issues of the Home Monthly. While working hard on the magazine, Cather also published pieces in the Pittsburg Leader and in the Nebraska State Journal, managed by her mentor Will Owen Jones.

  TO WILL OWEN JONES

  January 15 [1897]

  Pittsburgh

  Dear Mr. Jones;

  I may not be able to get my stuff in this week. “This is our busy week.” But I had an experience with the managing editor of the “Times” and “News” that I thought might interest you, so I’ll take time to tell you. It is W. A. Magee [she probably means Christopher L. Magee], you know, the man who “owns” Pittsburgh. I have known his sister in law but had not met him. He is the political “boss” here, President and Chief stock-holder of the Consolidated Street Car Company that owns 8000 miles of track, is a multimillionair and is managing editor of two papers. Of course he dont do much editing. Well, I have been thinking for a good while that it would be a good thing to be working into some solid newspaper in case the Monthly should collapse. So last Friday with merely a note of introduction from my actress friend Miss [Maida] Craigen I went to his office. There were more people there than I ever saw in an office; poor women who wanted work for their husbands on the car line; men who had been fired for drunkenness and wanted to “try again”, men who wanted to sweep the streets, and seedy looking newspaper men in last summer’s tan shoes and red neckties whose appearance told plainly why they were there. Well, we waited two hours and at last Magee came in. He was a little ugly man carelessly almost shabbily dressed with an intensely nervous manner. When all those people began at him I thought it was simply no use to try and was about to go away, for here were all these hungry looking people “wanting jobs.” But I stayed just for the pleasure of seeing this millionair’s manner with the poor devils. He had a kind word for every one of them and it was’nt unctious patronizing kindness, just the simple sort that a man whose heart was good might let drop to his less fortunate fellows as he hurried through the thousand gigantic plans of his busy life. He knew most of the women by name, gave them letters to the engineers, encouraged the men, & gave them letters. At last it was my turn. Well, I had never asked a stranger for a “job” before, so I did’nt say I knew his family; I wanted to talk business only. Like a fool I had’nt thought just what I wanted to ask for or what I would say I could do. But I told him what I had done and that I had only a limited amount of time for newspaper work & that I was on the magazine. He was as nice to me as to the rest, helped me to say what I wanted and got my whole history out of me in five minutes by the clock. Then he said he’d look up my case and asked me to come again today. I went back this afternoon not expecting anything but to see and wonder at this queer nervous little fellow again. Why there were ten experienced newspaper men in his office begging for a job. I just went because the fellow was a wonder to me. He asked me into his library—both of his offices were literally full of people—His library is a palace, though he says he seldom reads. He got to the point right away, remembered my name and said he “took to me.” Told me to go ahead and do some special articles as things struck me and he’d take them. Said there was a vacancy on the evening paper and he would see that my chance was good there. Then he said, “Now there is one thing I should have asked you the other day, but I was really very much exhausted then. Some times when people strike a new town they are laid up. I’ve been that way myself. If you’re fixed that way I’d be glad to tide you over.” I cant tell you how nicely he said it, Mr. Jones, it did’nt hurt my pride a bit. Of course I told him I did’nt need anything, but I added “You’re a white man sure.” He goes to New York tomorrow, gets back Monday, made an engagement with me for Wednesday and Friday goes to Chicago. I’d work for the fellow just to study him, this queer fellow who controlls the politics of Pennsylvania, “owns Pittsburgh”, edits two papers, rides in a carriage, lives in a palace, wears dirty collars and shoes run down at the heel, talks to street car conductor’s wives like they were his friends and picks up poor lone maidens he has never seen before and does the big generous by them. How can he do it all? I should think he’d just drop from exhaustion. He left me to meet with the architects to examine plans for an immense new bank he is president of.

  Well I did’nt mean to write you a volume, and of course nothing may come of it. But my admiration for W. A. Magee will be just the same. I thought it might interest you to hear about such a giant, we dont see much of that sort of thing in the west. Say, Mr. Jones, if you’d drop me a line about your New York adventures I’d greatly appreciate it.

  Sincerely

  Willa Cather

  TO MARIEL GERE

  April 25, 1897

  My Dear Mariel;

  If you dont want to write to me I’ll say no more about it. What your reasons are I can’t guess but I suppose you have them. I guess though you won’t mind me talking to you a little while tonight? You have so often taken pity on my loneliness long ago. Dorothy Canfield has been spending a week with me you know and she is gone now and the reaction has set in. I cant tell you what a charming girl she is growing to be. Her visit was a joy and a comfort to me. All my friends rose nobly to the occasion and gave her a downright jolly time. Theatres, parties, excursions, drives in the park until we were thoroughly exhausted. The child said it “was the first time she had ever really been treated like a young lady” and the haughty offhand manner in which she received the attentions of the men was very funny and so sweetly young. It’s tough to come back from the office now and find no one cuddled up on the divan waiting for me. Dorothy approves of the young Doctor who wants me to marry him. I have not as yet decided whether I will or not. It would be a very excellent match in every way, but I dont care for him. I suppose though that really does’nt matter much. He was very nice to Dorothy and I’m glad she carried away pleasant impressions of every one.

  Business affairs are going much better than they were this winter and I am doing my work better. That is I am learning to keep still and do just what I’m told. Of course the magazine is the worst trash in the world, but it is trash they want and trash they pay me for and they shall have it.

  Socially my life here is more pleasant than it ever has been or than I ever thought it could be anywhere. I want you to come like Dorothy and see how pleasant. You see here I have neither short hair nor Dr. [Julius] Tyndale nor dramatic propensities nor any other old thing to queer me. It’s like beginning a new life in broad daylight away from the old mistakes. As Charles Lamb says “Gad: how we like to be liked.” It’s a novel experience for me and it’s rather gone to my head. I tell you all this because you stood by me in the day when my friends were not many and when I owed much more to your friendship than I then knew. And by the Lord I’m going to make
you glad you did it all some day Mariel! I am that! I’d rather make you and Roscoe proud of me than anything else in the world.

  And now “Good night, good night Beloved!” as Nellie Griggs used to sing to Max two miles off the key.

  Yours as Ever

  Willa

  Did you see my Brownville tale [“A Resurrection,” published in the Home Monthly in April]? I sent you a paper.

  Cather had met Dorothy Canfield while at the University of Nebraska, where Dorothy’s father, James Canfield, was then chancellor. Dorothy Canfield was six years younger than Cather, so only in her early teens when they met, but her precocious intelligence and maturity made her an excellent companion. Their friendship—with some bumps along the way—lasted until Cather’s death.

  After the Home Monthly was sold, in 1897, Cather left the magazine. She made a visit to Nebraska before returning to Pittsburgh to work for the Pittsburg Leader.

  TO WILL OWEN JONES

  Tuesday [September 7, 1897]

  Red Cloud

  My Dear Mr. Jones;

  The Pittsburgh Leader wired me this morning to come at once to fill a position at $75.00 a month. I must get there next week. Please send me transportation to Lincoln at once so that I can tarry there a few days before going east, and get me fixed for Chicago as soon as you can.

  I almost hate to go just now. Have been writing stories and getting on at it better than I have ever been able to do before. But I don’t dare let this chance slip. Somehow though I can do better work in stories down here than anywhere. I do the society act too much in Pittsburgh. They don’t often “take a stranger in” down there and I am as vain as all the rest of my sex and can’t do the hermit act one bit. But dear me there is next summer and a lot of summers ahead, and in Pittsburgh there will be Calve [Emma Calvé] and [Sarah] Bernhardt and all the rest of “the great[”], so I guess I’ll go. Then I think it was awfully white of The Leader to send for me when Pittsburgh is full of unemployed reporters.

  Yours Faithfully

  Willa Cather

  TO MARIEL GERE

  Sunday [probably September 19, 1897]

  Pittsburgh

  My Dear Mariel;

  It was just a week ago that I watched you all get further and further away from me, and that I had to overcome a mighty impulse to jump off the train and run back to Lincoln.

  I am fairly settled in my work now and like it very much. My duties are those of day telegraph editor besides doing the dramatic work for which latter I receive extra pay. I edit and write the headlines for all the telegraph matter that comes in from 8 a.m. till 3. p.m. After 3 oclock I am entirely free and have all my evenings to myself except Saturday when I work until midnight.

  Five gentlemen met me at the train and every one seems really glad to see me back. But Mariel, I will not be away from Nebraska another year. Of what use are money and success if one is not happy? And I can not be happy so far away from home. O Mariel, I am so tired of it, their gay Bohemia! I have seen enough of it. It is not so black as it’s painted, but it’s such a lone and loveless land and it’s so many leagues from home. Sometimes I wonder if I am the same girl who looked at all these gilded lies so eagerly two years ago. I think my heart was asleep in those days, but ah it is awake now, awake and aching for one little lad [Jack Cather] who is asleep in his bed a thousand miles away. No one but God will ever know what that baby has done for me. I think he has killed every unworthy ambition in me forever. I don’t want money or fame at all any more, but just my three boys always. You believe this, don’t you? You see here I get a good deal of—well, of admiration, people here think I am cleverer than I am and of course that is pleasant in a way. But I’d rather have Roscoe’s good opinion and Douglass’ laugh than all of it. I guess Mariel, that you were the only person who ever really understood me, for you always said that I never was and never could be a “Bohemian” at heart—even when I tried to be one.

  Mrs. [Elia] Peattie entertained me delightfully in Chicago, and there are a lot of nice things to tell you, but I’m not in the mood for that tonight. When I see you in mine own land I’ll tell you all, or when you come Christmas. My window is open and a west wind blows in and that never makes me merry.

  “The winds out of the west land blow,

  My friends have breathed them there;

  Warm with the breath of the lads I know

  Comes east the sighing air.

  Life is too short for love anyway, one is a fool to be an exile. My best love to you and yours.

  Faithfully

  Willa

  The poem Cather quotes is the first stanza of “The winds out of the west land blow” by A. E. Housman, from A Shropshire Lad (1896).

  TO LOUISE POUND

  October 13, 1897

  Pittsburgh

  My Dear Louise.

  I don’t quite deserve that ironical thrust about not sending my address, and if you’ll pardon an autobiographical paragraph I’ll tell you why.

  You see I came to the Leader expecting to do their dramatic work only. A few days after my arrival the day telegraph editor left for New York and I went on to help do his work until a man could be got to take his place. I liked the work and a wild idea took hold of me to demand the place for myself. I did so. Of course there were objections to my age and sex and inexperience, but I hung on, and they said I might try it for a few weeks just as an experiment. The work is not quite so thrilling as dramatic work, but it is a much more responsible and remunerative position. There is no hack work about it, simply editing and expanding or “padding” foreign telegrams. For instance, when a cable comes announcing the birth of a prospective Duke of Marlborough, to add a short history of the house etc. Then one has to judge what of all the avalanche of matter that descends upon the desk is really important. The chief requisites are discretion, some general knowledge of foreign affairs and history, and the trick of writing headlines. The latter was, and is still, hard for me. It all has to be done so quickly and a dozen telegraph boys at one’s elbow rattle one somewhat. Then it’s so absolutely irrevocable, when a thing once shoots up that pneumatic tube it’s beyond the power of man to get it back or change it. Well, you know I am naturally slouchy and uncertain, so you will appreciate that I have been on the race track since my return. Saturday night the directors met and gave me the editorship and the boys gave me a supper and the other papers had a few headlines about me and there’s an end of it. The work is stiff while you are at it, but no end exciting and the hours are only from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. and after that I am absolutely free. It is so funny to have to hold a form half an hour because the King of Belgium is on a spree or to be almost wild because somebody in Paris shot herself just five minutes too late to get in on the dramatic page where she ought to be and maybe have to put her right next to a W. C. T. U. [Woman’s Christian Temperance Union] Convention in Ohio. And it’s so perplexing to think up different headlines for twelve suicides all at once. People show such a poverty of imagination in the way they kill themselves. But the political news is the stiff tangle. When you get one cable from Berlin saying this about the Emperor William’s speech, and another from Vienna saying exactly the opposite, what are you going to do? Those Continental folks have such different points of view. But this is decidedly too autobiographical.

  As to the Portrait of a Lady [probably the 1881 novel by Henry James], I will let her tell me the message I want to hear, may I do that?

  I see you have resorted to designating me by my sex. Do you remember how Tucker used to wail “Alack,

  That I have worn so many winters out,

  And know not now what name to call myself”!

  I had just settled down to tell you a lot of things, but the maid has just brought up Mr. [Preston] Farrar’s card and I recall now that I promised to go to a reception with him this evening, so I’ll just have to thank you for the picture and say good night. Let me hear from you.

  Faithfully yours

  Willa Cather.

  309 S
. Highland Ave.

  East End

  Pittsburgh

  The quoted passage beginning “That I have” is from Shakespeare’s Richard II.

  TO MARIEL GERE

  January 10 [1898]

  Pittsburgh

  My Dear Mariel;

  It is with considerable fear and trepidation that I address my spidery scrawl to the proud possessor of the library hand. The reasons that I have’nt done it before are many, chiefly because I am doing more work than I ever did in my life before and just the kind of work that everyone always said I’d never be able to do—work requiring care and judgment. I don’t do it perfectly by any means, but it seems to suit the publisher.

  I don’t need to tell you how much care and anxiety and grief Roscoe’s illness has caused me. It seemed at times that I must go to him, but if ever the lad needed money he did then and my duty seemed to be to stay here and edit telegraph. I can never thank you for your kindness to him, Mariel. How strange it seems that you should be going to comfort him as you once did me. I look back upon those years now with a sort of wonder and doubt if it were really I. Golden days, Mariel, we won’t see their like again. I am so deeply sorry for Allie. Poor little Allie! she was the gentlest and most easily hurt of us all and it seems as if she were having the toughest time.

  I scarcely know how to tell you about my life here. It is a queer one, cut up between rather rigorous work and the craziest possible diversions. The theatre is about the only part of the old life that merges into this. Mr. Farrar broke his leg in a foot ball game several months ago, so I only see him in plaster, but now that he does’nt really suffer any more it is rather fun. Unfortunately I don’t seem to be able to feel very deeply about him. His friendship is so warm and comforting and near to me that I don’t want to change it for the other article in which the personal equation would be sure to make trouble. O I have grown enamoured of liberty! To be wholly free, to really be of some use somewhere, to do with one’s money what one likes, to help those who have helped me, to pay the debts of one’s loves and of one’s hates!