index
 
timeline
life
chapter 1 2 3
    kings_college
    the_love_affair
    the_calico_bag
    ebury_street
    roy_and_ulysses
    pepe_mamblas
    a_funeral
    a_dandy
    travels_in_the_usa
    london_declares_war
    a_noble_publisher
    awaiting_commission
chapter 4 5 6
essay
titles
excerpts
opinions
 
back  
Travels_in_the_usa

spud_Johnson


Spud Johnson
 
 

 

White arrived in New York in April 1939. His first attempts at finding a US publisher for Happy Valley were unsuccessful and he decided to tour. He travelled by train to California and from there to New Mexico.

patrick_wrote to Jean Scott Rogers

'I spent ten of the most satisfactory days of my life in New Mexico. So satisfactory that I am thinking of dispersing All my worldly possessions and settling there in an adobe hovel [...] Desert is hardly the right word[...] New Mexico is all pink earth, grey sage-brush, blue mountains, some of them still streaked with snow[...] So I went up to Taos[...] on a magnificent plateau surrounded by the Sangre de Christos. Here I lapsed into a pair of blue jeans[...] and spent about a week riding the mesa on a hired horse, and talking to local celebrities[...] Dorothy Brett, who went out to Taos with the D.H.Lawrences[...] took me up to see Frieda'. [Letters 17]

Frieda [Lawrence] was 'not at all the turgid earth mother he imagined he would find guarding the shrine but a witty and amusing woman'. [Marr 184]

While in New Mexico, White met Walter Willard (Spud) Johnson. Spud ran a small newspaper, wrote poetry, and did 'literary odd jobs'. 'White and Spud [...] became lovers, but despite this turn of events White left Taos in late June after three exhilarating weeks. As usual in his life the schedule triumphed over happy accidents...' [Marr 185] He still had to find a publisher for Happy Valley and he wanted to start the next novel.

White's agent had been unsuccessful, so White used his letters of introduction from London. One letter, from George Plank, was to Jean Starr Untermeyer. She was a writer herself and agreed to pass Happy Valley on to her publisher if she liked the book herself. She did, and handed Happy Valley to Ben Huebsch, a partner in the Viking Press. [Marr 187] White then left New York to find a quiet place to write. He chose Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

patrick_wrote

'Happy Valley may have shown a certain number of critics and readers that I was an author; now I had to show myself by keeping it up. I imagine this is how most second novels get written.' [Flaws 77]

 

 
 
go_to_top next
 

 

© 2001 ABC | Privacy Policy