November 13 Thursday – Sam had promised Edward W. Ordway he would be at the Anti-Imperialist League meeting at 4p.m. [Nov. 2 to Ordway].
In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote to William Dean Howells.
I am glad you sent me the short story from Texas. I wonder if you have much of this luck. That little story is a meal for a male; a male who has been living on Huyler’s Candy for a week, and wants something with bones and blood and gristle in it.
They are all there. This man knows his ground and his people, as well as I know the boxes of a printer’s case and he picks up no a when he is after an r. And I believe that he is as accurate with the inside of his people as he is with their exteriors.
I am always grateful to the artist who forces me to stop and examine his details with a glass as I go along. This one puts that coercion upon me in this story, and I was reminded of the girl behind the counter, and the piles of uncut diamonds in South Africa, who said “Don’t look at them merely in the pile; hold them up to the light one by one, they’ll bear it.”
You think it can’t be printed. Possibly not, set out and exposed all by itself, but it stands all ready to be dovetailed into the middle of a long tale, and there the public will give it hospitality, just as they did with Bill Sykes and his hectic domestic affairs [MTP; not in MTHL]. Note: see Nov.11 from Howells.
In N.Y.C. William Dean Howells replied to Sam’s above letter.
I felt sure you would like that story [“The Burning Shame,” by Dennison; See Nov. 11 from Howells]. All the people seemed alive, even the dead man. As for that boy watching with him, and that horrible old, fat jolly harlot, they were artistically perfect. But it is hopelessly beyond all editors.—I would like to encourage the author, and when you send me back his MS.—which you forgot to do—give me your leave to enclose your letter [above], swearing him to make no public use of it.
I do hope I shall see you at the dinner [Nov. 15], for it will be a consolation in itself, and it will mean that Mrs. Clemens is better [MTHL 2: 749].
James S. Kirtley wrote from Kansas City, Mo. to Sam, enclosing a slip with inscription and signature for his book, The Young Man and Himself; His Tasks, His Dreams, His Purposes…His Complete Life (1902), which he’d asked his publisher to send. He asked after Livy’s health [MTP]. Note: the slip is still with the letter; either Sam did not receive the book or neglected to insert it.
A.L. Punton and E.G. Linn of the First Methodist Church, Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, wrote to Sam. They asked for an autograph edition of HF or TS or others, to raise money for the purchase of a piano [MTP].
Carl Thalbitzer wrote to Sam from Copenhagen, Denmark, “meditating” after reading his Hadleyburg story. His practice was to ascertain the beliefs of authors he read, and he “took the liberty” to write, being a young author himself. Did Sam put his personal belief in such stories? He encouraged Sam to write a book comparing the old world with the new, and felt that “especially the modern youth, are longing for such a work.”[MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the letter “Appreciation,” and “Letter answered / Nov. 26, 1902”