The growing maturity of Thomas Wolfe's final novels

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Authors Adams, DeAnne Dorny, 1938-

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Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/319002 THE GROWING MATURITY OF THOMAS WOLFE°S FINAL NOVELS

by

DeAnne 0@ray Adams

A Biesis Submitted to.the Faculty of the

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

In the Graduate College

THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA

1963 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR

This thesis has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an advanced degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited in The University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library.

Brief quotations from this thesis are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the head of the major department or the Dean of the Graduate College when in their judgment the proposed use of the material is in the interests of scholarship. In all other instances, however, permission must be obtained from the author.

SIGNED; r f k ' « c. /. X.

APPROVAL BY THESIS DIRECTOR

This thesis has been approved on the date shown below:

ALBERTALBERT F.; GEGENHEIMER f I Date Professot/of English TABIE OF CONTENTS

Chapter

INTRODUCTION ©o © © © © © © © © © © © ©

ONE O O O O O O O O © O © O O O'© © ©

TWO O © OO O © O O O OO ©OO o o o

THREE o o do o © © © © © o o © © © o

FOUR O © © © O O o © © OO o o o o ©

BIBLIOGRAPHY © © © © © © © © © © © © © © INTRODUCTION

Ttmmas M® l£e 0 s ©reative Imaglmatiam, lyrieal styles aad

intense emotional perception make him one of Americans finest authors«

He lived in the violent atmosphere created by his m m emoti©as«==-doubt $, despair$ hope, pride, disillus.ionmeat=«=and his writings reveal these emot ions„ He traveled extensively, and as he visited each new place he carried with him his voracious appetite for life, his hunger to experience, to taste, :t© know, to feel,• He accumulated in his creative mind the histories and characteristics of numerous people, the nuances and subtleties of numerous incidents.

In 1926 this vast treasure began t® pour forth as Wolfe.began writing his first novel. He never lacked for purpose or material, what he may have lacked was the knowledge of how to confine and direct the outpourings of mood, color, impression, and incident that flowed from his literary memory. He wrote of himself, of the joys and £ail= ures that had come to him, and of his hopes and defeats. He also put into his pages the stories of the people he had known in his youth.

When he finally felt that his material had been shaped into a semblance of organisation, he had a manuscript which he estimated to be

350,000 words long. 1 Two publishers turned it down, saying it was

1 Thomas Wolfe, The Story of a Hovel (Mew York, 1936), p, 9, 2 m s k i l l e d 9 amateurish, t©@ aut©b 1 ©graphleal, and t©© long, before at

reaehed the hands ©f a man ®h© recognised the superb prose, the depth 9

and the undeveloped power of vJ©lfe°s talento This man perceived

literary genius in the work, but realised that it was not yet in pub~

lishable form, due to its length and to the lack of experience of the

author in the selection of detail and incident«

This editor was Maxwell Evarts.Perkins, an intuitive and far®

sighted man who was associated with the. House of Scribner for thirty-

seven years, "a man with a passion for good writing, a passion for the

true, for the intensely- felt, the completely realised— in other words,

for talento Perkins wrote to Wolfe to discuss publication of his

first novelo His letter initiated one of the most famous associations

in American belles-lettres^ For eight years the friendship flourished

as the two men worked together to shape Wolfe°s superb prose into pub­

lishable form, Perkins became not only a strong literary influence

upon Wolfe, but an enduring friend as wello

His gifts of temperament and equipment made him the ideal father confessor, the listener, wise and sympathetic, whose understanding, often conveyed without words, acted as a catalyst, precipitating in many a writer the definite self-discovery which fill then had been vast but formless aspiration .A

2 Ibido., Po 10p .

3 Maxwell E 0 Perkins* Editor to Authors The Letters of Maxwell Eo Perkins (New York, 1950), po 1, The editorial %ork ea Wolfe's first manuscript (later pub=

lished as Look Homeward„ Amgel) marked the beginning of a fruitful

and affectionate friendship between. Wolfe and- Perk ins = 6,They spent

many hours togethers wonderful hours of endless talk, .so- free and full

that it combed the universe and bound the two of them together in

bonds of closest .friendship* If was a friendship founded on many

common tastes and interests 9 on mutual liking and admiration of each

for what the other was, and on an attitude of respect whieh allowed

■ 5 unhampered expression of .opinion*" Yet only eight years later Thomas

Wife- terminated his publishing relationship with Scribner®8 and found

another editor*

The reasons for this break in publishing relations were many,

and the relative'importance of each reason in the mind of Wife is

difficult to determine * It is generally thought that the primary

reason was Wife°s desire to prove to his detractors that he could

write without the help of Perkins, this desire had been given impetus

by an article entitled. ^Genius is Not EnoughM by Bernard DeVot© in

which DeVoto had sarcastically criticised Wlfe*s style and method,

accusing him of being unable to write without the help of "Mr* Perkins A and the assembly line at Scribner"s*” An examination of Wlfe°s

5 Thomas W i f e * You Gaagt Go Home Again (New York, 1940), p*. 437*

^Bernard DeVoto, "Genius is t Enough 5 XIII (April 25, 1936), 3=4, 14=15*

ill e@nespondenee. with Perkims ■ Imdieates' that a' difSerenee im ph3,lo=’ aopbieal attitudes toward life and the treatment of life In. literature, toward idealism, conservatism, and truth was also of great importance in the split insofar., as it affected the edit@r=author relatl©nshlp 0

Another factor dealt with the businesslike attitude that Scribner°s assumed toward their financial Involvement with Wolfe, who felt that they were taking undue advantage of his financial'naivetes . A. final factor of some importance was', the plethora of lawsuits which were plaguing Wolfe during these critical years, and the attitude off

Scribner°s toward the settlement of these - suits 0

. The years shen the break occurred were years" of.extreme diffi­ culty for. Wolfe, and the strain of their frustrations,■particularly the lawsuits, is revealed in a letter Wolfe wrote to.Perkins in 1937s

». ». o and as for that powerful and magnificent talent I had two years, ago— in the name' of God, Is that to be lost entirely, destroyed under the repeated assaults and criminalities of this blackmail society under which we live? How I know what happens to the artist in.Amer^

• ' 4 - icaeM The record of how Thomas Wolfe reached; this point.' of. dis­ illusionment is contained In his letters„ Chapter One of this thesis will trace the development of the friendship and literary kinship of

^Thomas W i f e , The fetters of Thomas Wolfe (Hew York, 1946), p. 573»

iv £erkirns and Wolfe, using their correspondence as a major source of

inf©rmation0’ It will then disewss the various fasters in the publish­

ing break and evaluate their relative importance.

Chapter Two will outline the. development and career of Wolfe8s

autobiographical protagonists throughout the;.four major novels,' .The

first two, look Homeward 0 A&ge1 (lf29) and Of Time and the River (1935),

were published under Perkins 0 tutelage, while the second two. The Web

and the Rock (1939) and You Can0t Go Home Again (1940), were published

posthumously from the manuscript Wolfe wrote during and after the break with Scribner 0 s. Uppermost in the mind of Wolfe as he was writing the

final two novels was his desire to prove he could write without the' help of Perkins| rankling him was DeV©t©ss implication that he, could not do so* He also felt the pressure of those critics who had been dismayed with the extreme autobiographical qualify of his two earlier novels, and he tried to eliminate that quality from his.final manu­ script , Over and over again in his letters he stated that this was the most objective thing he had ever written, however, the success of his new objectivity is still a moot question,' , To a certain 'degree, a definite objectivity can be seen; other changes as well distinguish the novels of this last manuscript from the first two novels. Chapter

Two will also discuss these changes and evaluate Wolfe's success in his attempts to write without Perkins and to write objectively. The distressing period When the break occurred began in April

1936 xahea Wolf® 9s first serious quarrel with his publisher was incurred by a reduction in the royalty rate of The Story of a Move 1o For nearly two years Wolfe was in a turmoil of conflict and indecision. By late summer of 1937 he was making tentative advances to other publishers, and in December 1937, by which time- the split was irrevocable, he 'made the final choice of Harper 8 s 0 The period of writing the manuscript which later became The Web and the Rock and You Can°t Go Home Again is this same period of frustration and disillusionment which led to and accompanied the split with Perkins and Scribner8So Wolfe wrote the first chapter in March 1936 and completed the manuscript early in 1938, just a few months after selecting Harper8s as his new publisher, Thus the dates of the two periods coincide very closely.

Because of this .coincidence.of dates and because of the known autobiographical quality of Wolfe’s work, it may be supposed that the distress of the 1936=1938 period and the disillusionment over the necessity of the break may have appeared in some form of the manuscript.

Indeed they did appear, not only in the outward manifestations of a change in name, not only in the avowed attempt at objectivity, but in satire, in a lessening of idealism, and in an underlying bitterness.

These indications of distress and disillusion will.be discussed in detail in Chapter Three,

' vi " The last tw© novels' show distinct signs of a maturity not

apparent in the earlier moveIs« "While a part of this maturity perhaps

cam be attributed to the natural agihg process of the author, it is nevertheless possible to indicate the primary factors behind the maturing of Thomas Wolfe. The novels indicate that he matured more

in the period from 1936 to his death in 1938 than he had from 1926

(when he began to write Look Homeward. Angel) to the publication of

Of Time and the River in 1935, which would make it untenable to main=>

tain that his maturity was entirely a natural one. Instead there were distinct and traceable causes.

The changes in the last two novels, which show the maturity

Wolfe was achieving (a maturity he did not completely reach before his premature death), are largely the result of the frustration Wife was suffering during the period he wrote them. For example, his attempts to be objective were the results of criticism over the autobiography contained in the first two novels. His satire of the literary society of New York was the result of his disappointment in the lack of per= clpiemee, idealism, and sincerity, of this society. The major element

in bringing out the changes apparent In The Web and the Rock and You

Cam*t Go Home Again was disillusionwdisillusioa with New York, the golden city, with richness and society and soeiety6s use of riches, with the publishing and literary world of New York of which Perkins was a part, and with the spiritual^father image himself, his editor,

vii Maxwell Perkins, I do mot intend to do Perkins the injustiee ©£ lmply=

ing a flaw in his loyalty to Wolfe, The same wild emotions that are

so magnificent on the pages of Wolfe9s novels prevented him from ever

being satisfied with even as endtaring a friend as Perkins, The same

wild exaggeration that is so well-known, in his novels made Wolfe

resent any slight, real or imagined, far beyond its true importance.

Chapter Four, the final chapter of this thesis, will shew how

Maxwell Perkins was, in a sense, a catalyst in the maturing of Thomas

Wolfe, The emotional Wolfe idolised Perkins $ he also - idealized him.

When he discovered that Perkins had all the attributes of human beings,

including human faults and shortcomings, he felt the bitterness of.

seeing an idol crumble. His disappointment was two=>folds Perkins,

he felt, had failed him not only as a friend but also as a symbol of

the cultured literary society of New York which was so distasteful to

him. Since it was Wolfe9s disillusionment that forced a certain

maturity into his novels, Perkins, being a major factor in that dis­

illusionment, became a major factor in the process of maturing. Thus

Perkin^ influence upon Wolfe did not cease when their formal publishing

relationship ended.

The increased maturity and objectivity of The Web and the Rock

and You Can9f Go Home Again do not necessarily make them better novels

than Wolfe9s two earlier novels. The struggle for objectivity was too conscious| the new maturity of social thought had to find its■expression

viii in spite of bitterness and satire. But they are an indication ©f what kind ©£ work Wolfe could do as a mature man. If Tom Wolfe had lived

longer, the Perkins episode and the writing of the two later novels would have acted as a cathartic on him, and he would have been able to realise his potential as an artist. CHAPTER ONE >

.After, two years ©£ freasted writing, Thomas Wolfe finished the manuseript for his first novel in Maroh 1928 and began to eiremiate it among the publishing houses of New York, Discouraged by their reject tion and the accompanying criticism that it was too autobiographical and too long, he fled to Europe 9 leaving the precious manuscript in the hands of a literary agent named Madeleine Boyd 0 While Wolfe was trying to devour ail of Europe, Mrs,, Boyd gave the bulky manuscript to Maxwell Perkins, an. intuitive editor of Charles Scribner’'s Sonso

M r 0 Perkins immediately became excited, seeing beyond the structural difficulties and the superfluity of words into the genius of the writer, 6 a October 22, 1928, he wrote to Wolfe in Vienna, expressing his admiration for the novel and asking Wolfe to contact him on his return to the United States,

Wolfe"s first letter to Perklas was written the following month from Austria, His enthusiastic letter is long and hopeful, and rather uninhibited for such a business=like occasion, for his eagerness to like and be liked is evident. He wrote, MX can't tell you how good your letter has made me feel. Your words of praise have filled me with hope, and are worth more than their weight In diamonds- to me, Sometimes, I suppose, praise.does more harm than 1L g©@d 9 but this tin® it eas badly needed, tiiether deserved or n©toM

Elisabeth N o w 11 9 Wolfe0® biographer, commentss "It was altogether a strange letter to write to an unknown editor 0 o 0 but it was a good one to write to Haxwe11 Perkins, who always meditated deeply and with fascination on his authors 8 characters 9 and who reacted to their wildest escapades with-a mixture of. fatherly anxiety and vicarious 2 excitement0M

Perkins 0 recollection of the first meeting between Wolfe and the staff at Scribner°s is recorded, in an article he wrote the year of

Wolfe0® deaths

When I first saw Tom with his wild black hair and bright countenance as he stood in my doorway hesitating to enter<== in those days Tom had more respect for edit©rs=<=X thought of Shelley (who was so different in most ways) because of that brightness of his face and the relative smallness of his head and the unruly hair<,3

The letter that revealed the excitement that Wolfe felt over this auspicious meeting was written shortly thereafter to Margaret

Roberts, his former teacher whom he had revered since she first taught him in 1912o After describing the anticipated introduction to Perkins and the tentative introductory comments they made to.each other,

Wolfe wrote 8 -

* Wolfe, Letters, p.„ 158<, 2 Elizabeth Nowell, Thomas Wolfe $ A Biography (New York, 1960), p. 128o 3 Maxwell Perkins, "Scribner|s and Thomas Wolfe,” Carolina Magazine, XLVXIX (Oct. 1938), 17. I saw a@w tha£ Perkins had a great batch of notes in his hand and that on the desk was a great stack of hand= written paper=~a complete summary of my whole enormous book* I was so moved and touched to think that someone.at length.had thought enough of my work t© sweat over it in this way that I almost wept* ttiem I spoke to him of this,, he smiled and said that everyone in the place had read it, '

After the two men had discussed the artistic (and commercial) possibilities of Wolfe°s hovel, which he had entitled 0 Losts Perkins set Wolfe to work revising, cutting, and rearranging the gigantic manuscripto They worked together night after night at this dis­ heartening task, struggling to eliminate the superfluous or ineffec­ tive details of W©lfe°s writing,,' 'The genius was Wolfe 9 s— the genius for detail, lyrical phraseology, artistic expression, and architecture of ideaso Yet Perkins possessed a type of genius too— his was the genius ,of inspiration. He provided the steady, encouraging motiva­ tion for this toil which seemed so endless and futile to the sensitive author. He provided the strength Wolfe needed in moments of despair,

Wolfe himself later wrote of Perkins that he was eea man of immense and patient wisdom and a gentle but unyielding fortitude,** and continued,

111 think that if I was not destroyed at this time by the sense of hopelessness which these gigantic labors had awakened in me, it was largely because of the patience and courage of this man, I did not g give in because he would not let me give in ,, ,,*’

^Wolfe, letters, p, 169, fhe editorial work ©a the manuscript of 0 Lest (later entitled

Look Homewards Angel) required many, long and strenuous hours» Because

Wife was so emotionally involved in his writing, he was unable to be

ruthless with his overabundance of words, so Perkins, with his

editorial acuteness and polish, helped him cut and rearrange 0 Their

method of revising was routine.. After Perkins had carefully read a

section of the novel, the two men would meet after office hours, and

Perkins would give Wolfe his advice 0 "The nearest he ever came to

writing on a Wolfe manuscript was I® drawing a line in a margin by

some passage, sometimes he would merely bend down the corner of a page.,

Then Wolfe and Perkins would discuss the ideas held by the editor, and

Wolfe would take the manuscript home for rewriting or revision,," 6

Because the part Perkins played in making the manuscript pub~

lishable was called into question by Bernard BeVoto and other critics,

Perkins was very explicit in describing his role.® He stated In

emphatic terms that he never made any change in words or style, nor 7 did he rewrite a single sentence of Wolfe® His description of their method of working clarifies his role® He said:

After I had read the manuscript and marked it up, 'we began a year of nights of work® The book was in great fragments, and they were not in order ® ® ® ® But Tom°s whole impulse was to express, not compress or organize.

John Skally Terry, ”E® Route to a Legend," Saturday Review® XXXI (Nov® 27, 1948), 7=9®

7 ^ , ' '■ and even though he realized that s©methia>g had to be cut* . he could not easily bear to have it done 0 o o o In truth, the extent of cutting in that book has come to be greatly g exaggeratedo Really, it w s more a matter of reorganization,,

Wolfe credited his success with the revision of the first novel

to Perkins 8 patient wisdom, saying, "At.this time there was little

that this man could do except observe, and in one way or another keep,

me at my task, and in many quiet and marvelous ways he succeeded in

doing this."^

Look Homeward, Angel was published in October 1929, Finding

it difficult to write in. the furor aroused by this notable first novel,

Wolfe returned to Europe| he loved the traveler°s life and always

gathered ideas and characters wherever he went. He considered New

York his writing workshop and when he found himself "written out" with a manuscript or disheartened over the struggle to express himself, he went abroad to renew his energies and determination, and to relax.

It is because of this enjoyment of travel that so much of the relation™ ship between Wolfe and Perkins.is recorded, because they always kept in touch with each other through lettersa The correspondence unfolds a fascinating tale.

In October 1930 Wolfe included the following passage in one of his letters to Perkinss

®Perkins, "Seribner°s and Thomas Wolfe," 15=16, 9 Wolfe, The Story of a Move 1, p, 56, I g© through periods of the most horrible depressioa 9 wariness of spirit„ loneliness and despair » o = I must tell you now very plainly that you ©eeupy an immense place in my belief and affections please do not think I am exaggerating;, and please do not be at all embarrassed by this stafement=<= I think it is very unfair to you for me to feel this way, I have no right to place the burden of this feeling'On any mamp but I think you have become for me a symbol of that outer strengtha 0. 0 o^1®

Often in these .periods of w a r i n e s s and discouragement W i f e

would resolve to give up writing and turn to something that would not

cause him such wretchedness and se!£=• criticising distress* He was.

very sensitive to adverse criticism, and a single slur against M s

style or his originality among a 'dozen favorable reviews would make

him very despondent* Whenever he threatened to quit writing, Perkins

would quietly but insistently praise him into a renewed vigor and

hopefulness* ©m June 30, 1930, Perkins wrote, ’’You are a born writer

if there ever was one and have no need to worry about whether this

book will be as good as the 6 Angel 0 and that sort of thing* If you

11 simply can get yourself into it, as you can,, it will be good*”

In between novels, Wolfe wrote short stories and was in eon<=

tact with Serlbner°s constantly sfeen he was in the United States* By

1934 there was great warmth and appreciation in his friendship with

Perkins, as indicated in this letter Wolfe wrote to a friend,

Robert Reynoldst

16 Wolfe, Letters, p* 269= 11 Perkins, Editor to Author, p* 69* 7

God knows what I would do without him VPerkius? « « « I think he has pulled me right out of the swamp °just by main strength and serene determinationo I am everlastingly grate­ ful for what he has done„ He is a grand man and a great editors and from the bottom of my heart I know that he is hoping and praying far more for my own success and develop­ ment than for any profit which may come to Scribner°s as a result of It o o . <>*2

l®lfe0s letters to his mother in North Carolina are revelatory in that they seem more relaxed, undoubtedly because of their filial nature, and often have a "little boy" quality about theme The fol­ lowing excerpt from one of these letters shows the faith that Wolfe had in Perkins s "He certainly has been the best friend I ever had and has worked for my success and stood by me in the most wonderful and unselfish way 0 1 am convinced that his first and strongest wish has been to see me do a fine piece of work0"13

I think it is apparent that Wolfe was profuse with his words and praiseo But his grateful and affectionate references to Maxwell

Perkins are so frequent and so generous that I also think it apparent that his feeling for this friend was strong and sincere« In another letter to Robert Reynolds, dated July 1, 1934, Wolfe wrote:

During these four years /the tine spent working on the second novel. Of time and the River/ 1 have had the unfailing faith, the unshaken belief and friendship of one man « « <> Mr,, Perkins has stuck to me all this time. He has never once faltered in his belief that everything would yet turn out well—

^Wolfe, Letters * p. 405.

1 3 , Thomas Wolfe, Thomas^Wolfe°s Letters to His Mother (New York, 1951), p. 283. even when I had almost given up hope myself» He has stood for all the rage and desperation and the crazy fits, and, with firm and gentle fortitude, has kept after me all the time , 0 0 6 No success that this book could possibly have could ever begin to repay that man for the prodigies of patience, labor, editing and care he has lavished on its

The immense gratitude that Wolfe felt for Perkins’ is mow

obviousc He realised his dependency upon the editor and he respected

his literary acumen« Up to this point there are few passages in the

letters which indicate any severe breach between the two men, only a

few vague allusions, usually in the form of apologies, to brief anger

or bitter words on the part of Wolfe. And yet as early as 1933

o «- * the-seeds'of discontent had started growing in him 8 he was becoming vaguely conscious that publishing was a business instead of a philanthropic institution designed exclusively for him, he was harboring suppressed resent­ ment at Perkins® pressure for the cutting and completion of his book /Of Time and the River/s and he was beginning to j" chafe at the too close restriction of his.benevolent paternalism.15

The bitter and angry moments do not seem very significant, except as

intimations of trouble to come, when it is remembered, that Wolfe was very emotional and was subject to violent moods and depressions. Thus

it appears that for seven years (1929°1936) the friendship encountered no serious difficulties, but was deepened by mutual admiration and love.

The first serious quarrel between Wolfe and Perkins flared in the spring of 1936. Wolfe had always considered his relationship with

^Wolfe, letters, p. 415. 15 Nowell, Thomas Wolfe, p. 2.34= 'Scribner°s to be ©f more than a business and commercial nature 9 and,

admitting his lack of. business sense, he relied upon their loyalty

to him not to take advantage of him. Ihen Scribner°s reduced Molfe0s

usual royalty rate of 15 percent to 1® percent on The Story of a Move1,

Wife wrote, "'Just because you have been generous and devoted friends, and because my. feeling toward you has been one of devotion and loyalty,

I do not want to see you do this thing now which may be legally and 16 technically all right, but is to my mind a sharp business practice,"

Wife wanted security in his relations with Scribner"s, and wanted to feel that he had their love as they had his. He had been approached with advantageous financial offers from other publishers, and had turned them down with no hesitation* he expected similar concessions from his own company and was disappointed when they began to be business-like. In this same letter ©f April 21, 1936, he wrote to Perkins, "I d©n°C expect my relations with my publishers to be a perpetual love feast, into which the vile question of money never enters, but I do say that you cannot command the loyalty and devotion Vj.? of a man on one hand and then take a business advantage on the other,"*

This first disagreement of moment caused Wolfe some embitter- meat, but its effect was not permanent, for a few days later Perkins received the following apology from Holies

^Wolfe, letters, p, 505,

17lbid,, p, 507, I waafced to tell you and I am afraid I didn't sueeeed o o o very well that all the damn eontraets in the.world don't mean as much to me as your friendship means, and it suddenly occurred to me yesterday that life is too short to quarrel this way with a friend over something that matters so little

A second problem arose %&en Wolfe described certain editors at Scribner's in one of his short stories, "No More Riverso" Perkins objected to such personal references., saying that "if Wolfe 'wrote up® certain things which he. £Perkims/ had told him in confidence about his associates, -he felt it would be his duty to resign from the firmo" 19

In deference to Perkins' wishes, Wolfe deleted certain parts of

'&© Mere Rivers "5 he previously had refrained, at Perkins® urging, 20 from expressing certain Marxian beliefs in Of Time and the Rivero

He began to feel that his force and power had diminished and blamed this on Perkins® influence. He could not allow any stupefaeient forces to work on. the fabric of his production or on his manuscripts 5 he began to.be restless under Perkins® expurgating eye,

Wolfe again went to Europe in July 1936, and when he returned in October he avoided going to Scribner's almost entirely. He even arranged to have his mail sent to him elsewhere, a significant step toward independence because it eliminated his daily visits with Perkins,

18 Ibid,, p, 508, 19 Ibid,, p, 537, 20 Thomas C, Pollack and Oscar Cargill, Thomas Wolfe at Washington Square (New York, 1954), p. 50, 11

The difficulty which was probably the basic concern of Wolfe

at this time, which was ondotibtedly aggravating the other detrimental

incidents„ was the insult implied in a bitterly critical article by

Bernard DeVot© which appeared on April 25, 1936, ostensibly reviewing

of a Move 1 0 The article, entitled “Genius is Hot Enough,1"

discussed Wolfe's lack of craftsmanship in offensive terms and sug=

gested that he was unable to write his books without “Mr 0 Perkins and

This implication became an

intolerable irritation to Thomas Wolfe 0 It is surprising that an

author would have taken this fantastic charge seriously;

More urbane writers would have ignored this charge or laughed at it. » '» <> <, But Wolfe was not am urbane writer* He was a child in the face of this kind of society* He was a stranger t© Hew York and to the “literary world*“ * * * The complexities of “cultured, well-fed malice frightened him and filled him with suspicions of its vague but for­

midable power < > 2 2

Wolfe regarded such derogatory criticism as a personal chal­

lenge to the integrity of his writing and felt a fierce desire to

disprove it* The effort to combat DeVoto's slur created a conflict

in his loyalties, but it was vitally important to him to make that 23 effort— “* * * in that tormented moment it was a crusade * “ In

spite of the dedicated loyalty Wolfe desired to maintain toward his

2 lDe?oto, 3-4, 14-15*

2 2 Roger Burlingame, Of Making Many Books (Hew York, 1946) p* 170 23 Ibid*, p* 171* 12.

associates at Scribner 9 ss he began at this time to consider severing

his business relations with them. This decision was being made even

more difficult by his moods of discouragement and doubt when another

disagreeable incident strengthened his resolution. ■

A number of lawsuits had been brought against Wolfe« Ones the

most costly 9 was the Dorman libel case, which Scribner's and Perkins

urged him to settle out of court. Wolfe was violently opposed to

settlement, but finally consented unwillingly. He thought that an

out=>of= court settlement was an admission that he had been wrong, and

he detested this blemish on his personal honor, Although he was al­

ready exhausted with his literary efforts, his irritation was further

intensified by the harrassment of the libel case lawyers„ He wrotes

” 1 have been hounded by this shameful business for a year and a half

now— and it has got to stop* I am an honorable man and an artist--

and the cursed thing now is that my work and talent are being des­

troyed,”^

In this state of desperate outrage, Wolfe lashed out at the

one man whose friendship he had always trusted, and who he felt was

now joining the foe.

Max, I have begun to lose faith in your power to stick or to help when a man is in danger, I know now that I must fight this whole horrible business out alone , , , , You are going to get out from under when you see me threatened

^Sfolfe, letterso p, 570, 13

wish calamity®rbot, la the name, of God, in she name of all She faith and devotion and -ttoqoestlotting belief. I have had in y@ue<=if yon cannot help me, for Christ0s sake .do nos add your © m influence to. those who are now trying t© destroy me025

Wolfe's disappointment and frustration are evidento The reasons he decided to formally terminate relations with Scribner's are complex 9 and I have attempted not to simplify them any more than necessary. The problem grew; the separate incidents acted as eata= lysts to one another in reaffirming his conviction that he must break with his publishers. Finally, on November 12» 1936 9 he wrote the first formal letter leading up to the severance as he poured forth from the bitterness and loneliness he felt the following harsh words to Perkins s

I think you should now write me a letter in which you explicitly state the nature of my relations with Charles Scribner's Sons , , , , I think it is unfair to put a man in a position where he is forced to deny an obligation that

does not exist 9 to refuse an agreement that was never offered and never made, I think it is also unfair to try to exert 9 at no expense to oneself, such control of a man's future and his future work as will bring one profit if that man succeeds, and that absolves one from any commitments of any kind should he fail , 2 6

Maxwell Perkins immediately answered 9 in a short note promising a more complete reply the following day, MX never knew a soul withwhom 27 I felt I was in such fundamentally complete agreement as you,"

25 Ibid,

2 6 IbidA, p, 559, 27 Perkins, Editor to Author, p, 115, 14

Oa November 1? Perkins answered Holfe9s aeeusafcions more com= plately, concludings...

I ean°t express certain kinds of feelings very comfortably, but you must realise what my feelings are toward you. Ever since Look Homeward, Angel your work has been the foremost interest of my life, , , , It all seems very confusing to me but, whatever the result, I hope you don°t mean it to keep us from seeing each o t h e r , 28

In this letter Perkins explained that since there never was a formal contract, Wolfe had no unfulfilled obligations to Scribner0®, but that

"our relations are simply those of a publisher who profoundly admires the work of an author and takes great pride in publishing whatever he may of that author°s writings,M2 9 He then offered to draw up any eon= tract within legal limits which would suit Wolfe, if that was what he desired,

Perkins was bewildered and angered by Wolfe0® harsh aeeusa= tions, but had the understanding to realise that they were caused largely by Wolfe0® agony of indecision. The sel£=doubt and despair ' that Wolfe often felt crept, into. the matter, and at that point he was not positive that he had not received-help from Perkins, in the actual writing of look Homeward, Ange i. He felt finally that he musty write, a novel without Perkins, He still felt an abiding respect and fide1= ity for-his editor, but he t?as term and divided.

3>Q Ibid,., p, 116,

Ibid,, p. 117, Ob December 15, 1936, Wolfe wrote a letter of twenty=eight

pages, ia which he revealed his extreme unhappiness about the situa=

tion and yet blamed Perkins for the marvelous help Perkins had given him in shaping and organising his material. He interspersed his sar=

castic insinuations with praise, however, as. he said in reference to his acknowledgment of his debt to Perkins in The Story of a Novels

I would not retract a word of it, except to wish the words ware written better. I would not withdraw a line of it, except to hope that I might write another line that would more ad@= quately express the whole meaning and implieation of what X feel and want to say.

o oooooo oooooooo o ooooo What you gave me . . . was so much more, than technical assistanee==an aid of spiritual sustenance, of personal faith, of high purpose, of profound and sensitive understanding, of utter loyalty and staunch support, at a time when many people had no belief at all in me .... All of this was a help of such priceless and incalculable value, of such spiritual magnitude, that it made any other kind of help seem paltry by comparison.30

Wolfe writes that his difficulty ,ehas never been one of pur=- pose or direction,M but that he knows that he is. trying to do, and then explains, MX have been faced with the problem of discovering for myself my^own language, my own pattern . . ... my own universe and creation.**. While acknowledging his debt to Perkins 0 help, he says,

"•But if the worst came to the worst . .. . all this X could and will - and do learn for myself, as all hard things are learned, with bl©od«= 31 sweat, anguish, and despair.'*

30W©lfe, letters, p. 577. He 6 hen becomes angry and accuses Perkins of impeding the natural impulse of creation within him, mentioning a new story he has finished and saying, MI dare not bring it to you, I dare not show it to you, for fear that this, thing which I cannot trifle with, which may come to a man but once in his whole life, may be killed at its inception by cold caution, by indifference, by the growing apprehen= 32 siwaess and dogmatism of your own conservatism,w

In this same letter Wolfe deplores the stifling situation’in*

America which hampers the free expression of ideas, and asserts .that he will write' what he."feels and that he fears no consequences, • He turns sarcastically vindictive as he says he fears only the ■ suff@ea<= tion of his emotions and of the words heis driven to put on papers he does not fear exile, he says, and

What is there longer for me to fear? I have been through it all now, I can see , „ , how even those people who swear they are your sinterest and most enduring friends, who say they value your talent and your work, can sink to the final dishonor of silence and of caution when you are attacked, will not even lift their voices in a word of protest or of indignation when they hear you lied about by scoundrels or maligned by rascals,33

The pendulum swings back, toward the end of the twenty=eight page letter, as Sfolfe relents with softer phrases 8 17

I knew yon are my friend, I walue yeur friendship more than anything else in the worlds the belief that you o e o. found happiness in .being able tt©'help, me « ». . has been the greatest spiritual support and comfort I have ever kaowao^A

Perkins answers this letter with his characteristic patience and understanding,, - telling Wolfe he would concur in nearly everything he had said, but defending himself with regard to the changes he had suggested for Wolfe°s writing, "It is my impression," he wrote,

"that changes were not forced upon you (you8re not very foreeable, 35 Tom, nor I very forceful), but were argued over, often for hours," tie discussed many of Wolfe°s charges and pleas, insisting that his empathy with Wolfe did not exclude a realization and sympathy for

Wolfe's "fiercely lacerated spirit,He also said that although there were portions of Wolfe's long letter that had made him angry, 37 he was still in fundamental agreement with most of it.

On January 9, 1937, Tom Wolfe wrote another letter, one in which he vacillated between denunciation and apology. Although

Perkins had disappointed bim»°and although he knew he had disappointed

Perkinsin this letter Wolfe was yearning to revive and safeguard the faith and friendship of his editor.

Ibid,, p. 589. 35 Perkins, Editor to Author, p. 122.

36 . ■ > ■ Wolfe, letters, p. 589, , 37 Perkins, Editor to Author, pp. 124=26, 18

Are you==£he man I trusted and revered above all else in the world==trying for some mad reason 1 cannot ever guess 9 to destroy me?

O O o o o O O O O O o 0-0 Q O o o o o You are in.very many ways the best person I have ever known, a person for whom I have had the greatest reverence

and devotion » » o Forgive

o o o for God0s sake let us try to save our belief and faith in each other==a belief and faith that I still have==• that I

hope you have not lost = o <> = ^ 8

Meanwhile Wolfe had a new manuscript to be read (it was later published as The Web and the Reek and You Can°t Go Home Again) and sought a new publisher» This manuscript had been written entirely within the period of disillusion and anxiety created by discontentment with Perkins and Seribner°s, within a period when Wolfe was still receiving encouragement from Perkins„ Now another editor would have the chance to publish it. After sow tentative advances toward various publishing houses, Wolfe aset Edward Co Aswe 11 of Harper &

Brothers, who viewed the opportunity of publishing Wolfe with the same enthusiasm^that had so encouraged Wolfe in 1928, The manuscript was finally given to Harper°s early in 1938,

Although a few more letters passed between Wolfe and Perkins, none contained new accusations or new defense. Both felt that Wolfe6s severance from Scribner’s had been inevitable. But Strong feelings were aroused in literary circles § many felt that Wolfe had been dis­ loyal, abandoning the publisher who had "madeM him. The effort to

38 Wolfe, letters, p, 513, ”abaad©aM Barkis® had bees paimfal, .for 'Wife was deeply - loyal by

aatgre. He had .elwg t© seme of. the harsh letters he seat to Perkins

for weeks before mailiag them, torturing himself over their cruel

3 9 wordiago Shortly after his first encounter with Harper°s Wolfe

wrote to the editors there s

I can only fell you straight from the heart that I have not had anything affect 'me as deeply as this in tea years, , o o I have eaten my heart out thinking of the full and tragic consequence of this severance with people for whom I felt such personal devotion,40

Thomas Wolfe and Perkins have each made their explanation for

the inevitability of the split between them, Perkins knew Wolfe well? h e .understood Wolfe°s compulsion to be true to himself and to his art, which, was the same thing. He said, "I think it was that dedication

/to Perkins, in Of Time and the Elver/ that threw him off his stride

and broke his magnificent scheme. It gave shallow people the

impression that Wolfe could not function as a writer without e©1labora= 41 fion , , , „n He continued by saying that Wolfe.could not tolerate

the implication that he was dependent as a writer upon someone else,

and that "this was.the fundamental reason that he turned to another

publisher ,

39 Nowell, Thomas Wolfe, p, 364,

^®W©lfe, letters, p, 675,

^Maxwell Perkins, "Thomas Wolfe," Harvard Library Bulletin, I (Autumn, 1947), 273, Molfe preseated various explanations for the split, even

ineluding a lengthy one at the end of You Can°f Go Home Again* He never„ hoeever, admitted to the necessity of proving that he could wite without the help of wMr 0 Perkins and the assembly line at

Scribner"So" He undoubtedly felt the pressure of this necessity

and even realized that It was intensifying his other problems, but he did net want to admit to himself that he needed to prove to M m =

self that he could write without Perkins* The violence of his defense (in letters to Perkins) against DeVot©es insinuations

indicates that a doubt had. sprung into his own mind as to his ability to manage without his editor*

The explanation "Wolfe gave in a letter to Perkins in 1937 did not try to specify a particular cause but rather presented a general

Interpretation of the problems between them* He said, "I am puzzled and bewildered by what has happened* * * * maybe for me the editor and the friend got too close together and perhaps I got the two rela­ tions mixed*M^ He apparently felt that he was wrong to base his publishing relationship so much on feelings of personal loyalty.

In order to understand these feelings of personal loyalty it

is necessary to understand the personalities of the editor and the author* Both were kind, loyal, warm-hearted men. They had numerous

Interests in common, centered around their interest in creative

42 Wolfea letters* p* 676, taleato Hie. differences between them$ however» were stronger and mere pertinent than the similaritieSo Tom's impatience distracted him from his writings, made him cruel when he would not have wished to be so, and prevented him from enjoying the fame he longed for and finally achieved*, Perkins, on the other hand, was known to all for the great patience with which he handled Wife's writing problems (and also his personal problems ) 0 Wolfe was extremely informal, wild and unkempt in appearance, whereas Perkins was reserved, very correct, and always gentlemanly. Wolfe was an avid talker while Perkins was a listener, a wise, sympathetic and attentive listener. While Wolfe suffered agonies of doubt and indecision, Perkins had a quiet strength that grew out of his seIf~confidence. Perkins was an unselfish, devoted friend, whereas Wolfe, although always devoted to his friends, was completely egoistical.^

Wolfe found himself in profound conflictwith Perkins over certain ideas of political and economic ideology, and they had many passionate arguments over their opposing ideas. These ideas arose from a difference in personality, for Wolfe was essentially a revolu­ tionary while Perkins was very conservative (the terms are used with­ out political connotation). Wolfe, very intense about his growing

43 Although the interpretation of the personalities of Wolfe and Perkins is my own, X have used general impressions from Nowell's biography of Wolfe and from John Hall Wheelock's introduction to Perkins' Editor to Author. awareness of society, accused Perkins of exercising an ’’unyielding inflexibility and obstinate resolve to try to maintain the status quo at any cost» In You Can’t Go Home Again Wolfe discusses at length an editoroauthor relationship; the editor, Foxhall Edwards, is, of course. Perk ins, The only reason discussed in the novel for the break between editor and author is the conflict over the stubborn conservatism of Foxhall Edwards„

A fundamental difference in personal characteristics was that

Perkins was intelligent while Wolfe was brilliant, Perkins was wise and perceptive* his intelligence served him well. But Wolfe did not have the common sense that accompanies intelligence^instead he had the traits that often accompany genius, traits which make a person interesting and productive but do not make him happy or stable. Wolfe was very impulsive, quick to take offense; this is seen in his letters to Perkins (’’Are you . . . trying, for some mad reason I cannot even 45 ' guess, to destroy me?”). Wolfe"s superb imagination is clearly seen in his novels, in the splendid way he interpreted and vitalized his childhood in Look Homeward, Angel, a childhood which was probably little different from everyone else°s childhood. He was very em©= tional; the same emotion which lends excitement to his novels is the

^Wolfe, letters, p. 581. 23 key t© the instability which made s© many of his personal relations with people difficult an^ unhappyo

Wolfe °s extreme emotion and impulsiveness made him very a£fe@=> tionatteo He adored Perkins with a time-consuming and idolizing adora=> tion. Perkinss, on the other hand, was temperamentally incapable of such a strong emotional attachment. Although Perkins was vitally concerned with Wolfe, his main concern was Wolfe°s talent (and, of course, Wolfe's main concern was also his own writing). As I read

Perkins' letters to Wolfe, I often have the feeling that Perkins was humoring him, using whatever method might be most effective in dis­ pelling the bad mood so that he could start producing again. Perkins had other temperamenta1 authors too 5 his letters to Wolfe are seldom more affectionate than his letters to Fitzgerald or Hemingway. I feel that Wolfe sensed this, realizing that Perkins treated all hisauthors in the same devoted manner. Wolfe wanted to be someone "special

Because of the complexity of his emotional attachment to Perkins, he was jealous. He knew he had Perkins' admiration and affection, but he wanted his complete devotion, and he wanted it all to himself. I feel that it may have been this frustrated desire that made him lash out so unfairly at Perkins. One letter to Elizabeth N o w 11 illustrates the imaginative bitterness of an unwarranted attack on his editors

For six years he was my friend . . . and then he turned against me. Everything I have done since was bad, he has no "good word for it or for me, it's almost as if he were 24

praying for my failure . „ » Max still tells people that he is my friend „ „ „ The people who say they love you are often the ones who do the most to injure you»46

To understand fully Thomas 'Wolfe'srelationship with Perkins, one must be familiar with a .recurrent pattern in Wolfe's life. He described the controlling theme of all his novels as "the search for a father,M or a search for "an image of strength and wisdom external to his need and superior to his hungerThis might also be des= eribed as the controlling theme of his life. His mother's influence on him dominated his childhood, and his attempt to escape this domi=- aaaee occupied his whole life. The conflict betwein his mother's and father's worlds is embodied in later conflicts between South and North, and in his concept of "the City," The object of his one enduring love affair, Mrs, Aline Bernstein, was significantly "old enough to be his mother," and his parting from her was similar in ways to his attempts to escape his mother's dominance, .Other friends had had their turn in this psychological pattern of Wolfe's life, in his "sonships" and friendships: "About all of these relationships there is a recurrent patterns the new person is approached with eagerness § am intense rela= tiomship is established; then a failure of communication and under­ standing occurs; and Gant-Wabber /Wolfe/ rejects the friendship,

4 6 Ibid,, p, 771, 47 C, Hugh Holman, Thomas Wolfe, University of Minnesota Pam­ phlets on American Writers, No, 6 (Minneapolis), 1960, p, 32. 25

About 1930 Max Perkins succeeded Mrs. Bernstein as the main figure in Wolfe°s life. Although they were so different in, many w y s 9 their personalities complemented each other and they grew very close in affection and mutual admiration. Perkins "undoubtedly treated

Wolfe as a son9ee says Mrs. Nowell. "However, his attitude toward him was by no means patronizing; he looked upon him as an equal and a friend, and even, because he felt that creative genius was the 49 rarest thing on earth, as a superior." The steps in the recurrent pattern presented above can be followed clearly: Wolfe approached

Perkins with eagerness, as seen in the first exchange of letters and his description of their first meeting. An intense relationship was indeed established, as seen in Wolfe°s letters. The failure of commun= ication and understanding is complex, and has been traced earlier in th this chapter. Finally, Wolfe rejects the friendship.*~"unrealizing, he could only follow his blind compulsion to be free.

Wolfe's rejection of the friendship stirred.up a controversy within literary circles, as has been mentioned. An interesting foot= note was added to the controversy in 1951, when there appeared an article by Strothers Burt with the arresting accusation that Wolfe had killed Perkins: "There is not the slightest question in the minds of the few who knew Maxwell Perkins intimately that the Tom Wolfe

Nowell, Thomas Wolfe, p. 197.

5 0 Ibid.. p. 316. episode killed him. Exactly from the date ©f fem°s betrayal he -began

t© dieo" 5 1 A - lively debate was carried ©n in the letters to the

Editor c©Irate in the fallowing months„ including a few letters from ,

Burt defending his article» Finally, with the bold title ’’Thomas Wolfe did net Kill Maxwell Perkins,” Edward C 0 As we 11, administrator of the

Wolfe estate after the death of Perkins in 1947, refuted all the accusations in Burt0s article point for point, concluding:

I knew both Max Perkins and Tom Wolfe well and was privileged to call each friend. From each I heard the story of the break between -.them, #m the bas is of this dual know= \c4 ledge I can say with measured judgment that there was no betrayal in it. Beep feelings were aroused in both men, . yes==but there was no betrayal. Max talked about it a , great deal , , , and he always came up with the e©nclu=» sion that what happened had been inevitable, Mr, Burt says that "’Max forgave Tom Wolfe,” What nonsense, really. There was a© forgiveness because there was no need of it

The conclusion invariably seems to be that the break was

”Inevitable,” The causes of the break have been she#to be complex and numerous, I should nevertheless like to attempt to isolate the three major causes and indicate their relative importance,

The primary reason was the necessity of disproving BeWot©0s accusation that Wolfe could not write without col labor at i©n== -’’the accusation that he was dependent upon 8 Mr, Perkins and the assembly

line at Scribner 8 s 8 would rankle deep inside him till it poisoned his

51 Struthers Burt, ’’Catalyst for Genius: Maxwell Perkins,” Saturday Review, XXXI? (June 9, 1951), 6 ,

. § 2 Edward C© Aswe 119 ^Thomas Molfe did met Kill Maxwell Perkins Saturday Review^ XXXI? (©@t© 6% 1951)9 17© , 27 53 entire relationship with themof The sensitive Wolfe was simply

unable to ignore the aceusation«==he had to disprove it.

The second reason for the break was the passionate conflict

between Wolfe and Perkins over political and economic ideology. This

irreconcilable difference of opinion was the only reason Wolfe thought

of sufficient importance to discuss at the end of You Can°t Go Home

Again, Perkins stated that the letter at the end of the novel was

fictitious and that their political divergence was not of great

importance,^ However, if was of great importance to Wo 1 fe<==perhaps

Perkins did not realise this. Letters which are not fictitious reveal

this fact, ,

The third reason was Wolfe°s compulsion to reject a man whom he had selected for a temporary father. The psychological pattern with its inevitable disillusion and final rejection has been discussed,

"Perkins had come nearer to fulfilling Wolfe°s ideal than anyone"g he

had helped him develop his talent and he had guided him In every facet

of his life, "But Wolfe at last had found a flaw in him~=to© great

caution and eenservatism~~and, as always, he felt an exaggerated sense 55 of having been Betrayed,"

53 Howell, Thomas Wolfe, p, 307, 54 ' Perkins, Editor to Author, p, 279, 55 Howell, Thomas Wolfe * p, 316, 28

As soon, as the break had been made $ a great pressure was li£fe<= ed from Tom WeIfe 0 The compulsion to reject Perkins had been, satisfied and Wolfe felt free. He felt a surge of remorse and of renewed affee=. tion. That his friendship with Perkins did net end with the break is obvious from many facts. The testimony of mutual friends attests to their friendship;, as does the fact that Perkins was named executor of the Wolfe estate after Wolfe°s death. They had a congenial reeoncili= ation meeting in 1938=~neither knew that it would be the last time they would ever see each other, Wolfe died suddenly in September 19389 but before he died he disobeyed doctor8s orders to write one final letter to his beloved editor. It is a beautiful and moving letter which implies more than it actually expresses of the relationship with

Perkins, Bridging years of disillusionment 9 it nobly expresses the devotion Wolfe maintained for his friends

I've made the long voyage and been to a strange country, and I've seen the dark man very close, but I don't think I was too much afraid of him, but so much of mortality still clings to me==>I wanted most desperately to live and still do, and I thought about you all a 1006 times, and wanted to see you all again, , , , If I some through this I hope to God X am a better man, and in some strange way I can't explain I know I am a deeper and a wiser one— if I get on my feet and out of here , , , I'll come back. Whatever happens, I had this whunchM and wanted to write you and tell you, no matter what happens or has happened, I shall always think of you and feel about you the way it was that 4th of July day 3 yrs, ago when you met me at the boat, and we went out on the cafe on the river and had a drink and later went on top of the tall building and all the strangeness and the glory and the power of life and of the city was below.

56 Wolfe, Letters, p, 774, CHAPTER TWO

Thomas ¥olfe°s b o w I s all tell the autobiographies! story of a single protagonist; whether he is gigantic and called Eugene Gant, or simian and called George Webber, he is always Tom Wolfeo In order to evaluate the extent of the autobiographical quality of Wolfe®s novels, a brief review of his life is required<,

Thomas Wolfe was bora in Asheville, Worth Carolina, which he called Altamont or Libya Hill in his novels, on October 3, 1900, His mother was Julia Elizabeth Westall Wolfe, a member of a family of some prominence in the region. His father was William Oliver Wolfe, a native of Pennsylvania and a stonecutter by profession, Thomas was the youngest of eight children born to the Wolfes, the baby of the family and kept a baby by his mother for many years, When he was a child his mother split up the family by buying a boarding house and taking Tom and his elder brother Ben to live with her, W, 0, Wolfe and daughter Mabel remained in the old house, Family relationships thereafter were marred by dissension and by competition for the love and loyalty of Tom,

Until Tom was eleven years old he attended public Ss&ool? he then entered a small, private school operated by Mr, and Mrs, J, M,

Roberts, He was a perceptive student, and spent four years of very absorbed learning under their tutelage. He became particularly

29 ■ attached to Mrs0 Roberts9 who inspired him with her love of learning amd literature and who remained his life-long friend, to be retnem= bered as Margaret Leonard of Look Homeward, Angelo

Tom Wolfe entered the University of lorth Carolina at Chapel

Hi 1 l=.=,PiiIpit 1 i 11 in the new 2 sis=><=afc the early age of fifteen* There he was a very good student as well as a popular one, active in public cations, ffrafernitles, and drama. After graduation from North Car©= lina> he went to Harvard, paying his way by borrowing upon his share of his father°s estate„ His family felt that he had had enough education and should go to work, but coupled with his desire to eon® tinue studying was his childhood dream of seeing more of the world . than his southern hillse He received the Master of A r | s degree in

English literature in 1923 from Harvard= His central interest while he was at that school was the famous ”47 Workshop,M the playwriting course of Professor Baker, For several years after his graduation he was engaged in writing plays.

In order to support himself he accepted a post teaching at . the Washington Square College of New York University, lampooned as the School of Utility Cultures in Qf Time and the River, He was a conscientious instructor of Freshman English and composition, but he lamented the .time his teaching took away from his writings fije' ■ taught at Washington Square intermittently until 1930, During these six years he.traveled to Europe several times; it was in London in

1926 that he began writing Look Homeward, Aage1, 31

In 1925 Wolfe met. Mrs, Aline Bernstein, a noted stage designer who was seventeen years older than he and had two grown children,

They had a tempestuous affair that lasted half a dozen years, although they broke off with each other a number of times in that period,

Mrs, BernsteiB°s version of the affair is recorded in her novel.

The Journey Down, Wolfe, of course, created the memorable character of Esther Jack out of Mrs, Bernstein and portrayed their affair in

The Web and the Rock and You Can't Go Home Again,

Look Homeward, Angel was published in 1929, Wolfe immediately was recognized for his lyric power and emotional intensity# Sinclair.

Lewis, in accepting the Nobel Prize in 1930, praised him extravagantly,

Wolfe later encountered lewis on one of his European tours, and this experience he brought to tragic life ih the episode of Lloyd MeHarg in You Gan 111 Go Home Again, Wolfe launched himself on a great career with the publication of his first novel=-=fame was within grasp. But suddenly he discovered he did not want fame, for his first taste of glory was marred by the indignant reaction in Asheville to the publica­ tion of Look Homeward, Angel, He resigned from his teaching-position, ended the affair with Mrs, Bernstein, and went to Europe on a Guggen­ heim fellowship. When he returned, he buried himself in an apartment in Brooklyn and began to work feverishly on his second novel.

He had meanwhile met Maxwell Perkins and become friends with him. Aside from his writing, his association with Perkins was prob­ ably the leading interest of his life. From 1930 until the end of his 32

life 9 Wolfe devoted himself to his writing,, In 1935 Of Time and the

River was published, a gigantic book. In 1936 DeVetoes article appeared, bringing added frustrations to Wolfe's harried life. In

1937 Wolfe made arrangements to have Harper's publish his next novel, on which he was then working. In May 1938, after delivering the pro­ mised manuscript to Harper's, he left on a tour of the West. In

Seattle he was found to have pneumonia and was sent to Johns Hopkins

Hospital in Baltimore, where it was discovered that tuberculosis bacteria in his lungs had gone to his brain. He died on September 15,

1938, shortly before his thirty-eighth birthday.

The first twenty years of the story of Eugene-George-Tom is told in Look Homeward, Angel. The novel opens with the arrival of

Oliver Gant, a Pennsylvania stonecutter, at the southern town of Alta- mont, in the mountains of western Catawba. Gant is a dreamer, a rhetorician, and a drinking man, temperamentally opposite to Miss

Eliza Pentland, the sharp-tongued and miserly woman from the Carolina hills who becomes his second wife. Eugene is the seventh and youngest child born of this ill-matched pair. The main characters of look Home­ ward, Ange1 are the members of the dissension-racked household, Eugene and his six brothers and sisters, who are alternately united and torn apart by fierce loyalties, a lusty vitality, and a common heritage of loneliness. Eugene perhaps more than the others is the victim of the conflict of ideals of his parents. He is pampered by his mother and is resented and .mocked and babied by the entire family, but is never ,

understood by any. of them,, except, perhaps by his brother Ben, whom he

loves fiercely* •

. All.the standard agonies of youth are suffered by Eugene* .His

hair is kept long until Elisa-is shamed into letting it be cut* He is

humiliated by being sent out to sell newspapers, to look for servants

in the negro quarters, and to drum up business for his mother9s board™

"lag house, ' He escapes from such detested tasks by retreating into

day=dreams vividly peopled with monsters and Eugeae^herees*

An important Influence on Eugene °s youth is Margaret Leonard,

who becomes the first substitute mother.of Eugene9s life. She intr©=

duces him to the fascinating world of books 9 alid he, glorying in the

new discovery 5, memorizes the great lyric poetry of England, Mrs,

Xeonard also instills in him the dream of escape into a larger$

freer world| it,is at this early.time that Eugene begins to feel the

desire.to know the land of his father and the "golden city" of the

Morth, . ’

Eugene discovers the opposite sex. At first he is terrified"

by the evil attraction sex has for him, but soon he subdues his terror

and has his first sexual experience■at.the age of fifteen. Shortly

afterward he stumbles through an idyllic love affair with Laura James,

for which he is teased mercilessly by his family and which leaves him

wretched and disillusioned at its conclusion. 34

Eugene goes to the State University 9 where he is further humiliated by his: youth and size, his shyness, and his naive ignor= aneee Suddenly he is called home to the deathbed of Ben 0 The nervous strain and the grief, which cause the family to quarrel around the bed of the boy dying of pneumonia, are almost unbearable to Eugene, who feels he is losing his only spiritual kin* Ben6s death is the climax . of look Homeward, Angela Eugene returns to the university to graduate and decides he wants to go to Harvard, Before he leaves he has a conversation with Ben0s Spirit, who lovingly but bitterly tells him that when he leaves for the city, he will never come back, Eugene says goodbye to his mother and boards the train for the golden city of the North,

0f Time and the River continues Eugene6s story. It is Ma legend of man°s hunger in his youth,” which tells of the struggle of

Eugene to gain all knowledge and experience. This second novel opens with the symbolic train journey from the southern hills to the northern city. In Boston Eugene discovers a new world and begins his feverish study of it by prowling the library stacks at night.

He studies playwriting with the famous Professor Hatcher and later sends a play off to a publisher; its rejection sends him into abject despair. He falls under the spell of Professor Hateher°S assistant, the elegant Enamels Starwick, who represents for him all that is beau= tiful.in the life of an artist. 35

Again Eugene is called home to witness a death 9 this time that of his father„ who dies of cancer with characteristic grandeur and terror. The awful scenes are softened by the reconciliation of

Gant and Eliza,

Returning north 9 Eugene begins to teach at the School of

Utility Cultures, still trying to find time to write. Still ob= sessed with his hunger to experience and know all things, he is driven madly through the streets of New York, trying to devour the immensity of the city. At times he wildly catalogs the number of towns he has visited, of meals he has eaten, of women he has known, etc,, despair* ing at the amount of life still to-experience. Meanwhile he works as an instructor at the university, trembling in fear of his own students as he tries to fill their stubborn heads with a love of literature.

In New York he renews the acquaintance of a wealthy friend from Harvard, Joel Pierce, and is invited to visit his family at their n mansion on the Hudson River, It is Eugene°s first contact with the magic world of the rich. He is dismayed at the smug contentment of

Joel°s wealthy family who are living off the exploitation of the poor and who have no conception of human suffering. Abruptly his friend* ship with Joel ends, and he returns to the harsh reality of his work in lew York City,

The final sections of Of Time and the River record Eugene°s pilgrimage through Europe, First he goes to England, then to Paris, where he encounters Starwiek traveling through Europe with two women. 36

He joins them in their Paris life ©£ dissipation and falls in love with one of the women, Ann, only to discover that she loves Starwiek, who loves no woman. Repelled, he flees from them and wanders through

France, writing plays and assimilating life. The memory of America begins to make him feel his rootlessness and, as the book,ends, he sails for home. On ship he sees a woman named Esther, and 'his spirit

£ls/ impaled upon the knife of love."

The third novel. The Web and the Rock, continues the story of

Eugene=George»Tom with the love affair with Esther Jack. However, because Wolfe is attempting to be objective, he has renamed his pro­ tagonist George Webber and has given him a new set of physical characteristics. In the first chapters Wolfe goes back to fill in

George's ancestry and childhood in what is now called Libya Hill.

George as a child lies on the grass and meditates. He thinks of his mother's mountain kin; from his Aunt Maw he has gotten a picture of them "that was constantly dark with the terrors of misery and sudden death." They have bequeathed him a dismal childhood. With excitement and wonder he thinks of the lost beauties of his father's world and people, of their "sinful warmth and radiance," and of the discrepancy between the worlds of his parents. ,

George also goes to the State thiiversity. He makes friends there, and, although he has altercations with them, his university

life is filled with the normal college enthusiasms (George does not suffer as did Eugene). He and some college friends then go to New 37

York City; as southern men they plan to take the North by storm* The

leader of the group is Jim Randolph, a college football hero living

on past glory* Finally in a sudden drunken wave of mutual boredom

and disgust, the group falls apart* They have loved New York, but

were engulfed by it*

George begins to live alone after the happy eemraderie of

southern men has disintegrated, solacing himself with fantasies of a

liason with a rich and beautiful woman* This fantasy proves to be

portentous* George suddenly flings himself through Europe, and then

begins a voyage home* Just as Eugene discovered "Esther* at the end

of Of Time and the River* George meets Esther Jack on this ocean

voyage to America*

Mrs* Jack has a wealthy husband and a grown daughter, neither

of whom absorb much of her time or interest* She has a brilliant

career as a stage designer and has found a fascinating existence for

herself away from her home* GeorgeSs entrance into her life adds to

its fascination* She is considerably older than he is* Their affair

is marked by passionate love, arguments even more passionate, and

George°s obsession with Estherffs good Jewish cooking* Esther is

deeply loyal to George and suffers great abuse from him without eeas=

ing to give him her love and encouragement* George is writing a novel

and makes Esther the Scapegoat for all his frustrations. In his saner moments he realizes her sincerity and love, but some perversity in his nature causes him to resent his attachment to her. He taunts her 38 about her race, her talent, her friends, her wealth. She symbolizes for him the false sophistication of the artistic life of New York as well as the corruption of the social system. Cruelly and violently he throws her out of their flat again and again, and finally flees to

Europe t© be rid of her.

He.cannot forget her no matter how far away he runs. He broods over her constantly while in Europe, as well as over the rejec­ tion of his novel. Finally his flight leads him to a fight in a beer hall in Munich and a stay in a hospital with head wounds. There, as

The Web and the lock, ends, he finally pauses to evaluate his life, musing over how nice it would be to return to the happy memories of his childhood,

Wolfe °s final novel. You Can8t Go Home Again, answers the ques­ tion implicit in George's desire to return to his childhood, George is forced to realize that he cannot return to anything, least of all to the home of his youth, A series of episodes in this fourth novel clearly points out how Wolfe reached the conclusion that You Can't Go

Home Again,.

George Webber returns from Europe, For a while he returns to

Esther and they are as happy as they had been earlier. His happiness is increased when Rodney and Company tells him they wish to publish his novel, which had been rejected by other publishers. An editor from Rodney and Company, Foxhall Edwards, works with George in making revisions on his novel, entitled Home to our Mountains, They work 39

together often and become close friends $ “and so it was that Fox

became a second father to him<==the father of his spirito”

George has to retorn to Libya Hill for the ftmeral of Aunt

Maw. There he is excited about the rapid growth of his old hometown 9

although he senses the evil of speculation fever behind the boom,

personified by the evil usurer. Judge Rumford Bland. George realizes

his homecoming is a final one and says goodbye to his native hills.

Upon his return to New York, Mrs. Jack invites him to a party.

In this superb episode, one of Wolfe's most brilliant, George realizes

that he can't go home to love either. At the party are members of the

dilettante, decadent society he abhors, and their need to resort to

Piggy Logan's circus for grotesque amusement is sufficient comment ©n

their intellectual ruin. Finally they find better amusement when the .

apartment house where the Jacks live begins to burn and they can have

the pleasure of running outside to watch the flames. While they are

gleefully waiting for the building to fall, an elevator boy dies by

suffocation. George is horrified by their attitude toward disaster,

and finally realizes how far apart are his world and Esther's. He

bids her a final farewell.

George's novel. Home to Oar Mountains, is published almost

simultaneously with the stock market crash of 1929 (Wolfe's Look Home~

ward, Angel was published in October, 1929). Because of the fury and

resentment .in his hometown ever the-portrayal of the people of Libya

Hill, George realizes how final his farewell was. He also begins to 4© realize, hewever, that there is a kinship between his personal crisis and the national crisis* Both he and America had come to a cross­ roads* Just as he could not go home again, America could not return to the amoral, blind, selfish materialism which had led up to the stock market crash, .

George buries himself in a room in a poor section of Brooklyn in order to write. From this location he could see and experience the full impact of the depression* During the four years he spends in Brooklyn he is sustained and encouraged by Fox Edwards, who has taken over the substitute parent role which Esther was forced to re­ linquish, Wolfe’s portrait of Fox is teasing and affectionate, although sometimes awkward in its utter sincerity.

In rejecting Esther, George decided love was insufficient in itself $ he was soon forced to reject his childhood dream of fame also.

He again goes to Europe and in England encounters Lloyd McHarg, a famous novelist who has already captured the illusive fame. After

George travels hurriedly and pointlessly through the English country­ side with McHarg, he begins to realize how empty and unsatisfying fame can be.

Seeking any home that he can return to for solace or reassurance,

George goes to Germany, which he has learned to love very much. His fame is at a high point there, and at first he finds the people re­ freshing, But gradually he realizes the evil and corruption that have come into the world with Hitler, and he recognizes that Germany’s evil 41 is similar to Americans<, ’’Wherever ruthless men conspire together for their own ends $ wherever the rule of dog=eat=dog is dominants M there litlerism breeds, George-sees such forces in America, but feels that many of them have been done away with by the depression and that

America8s future is still ahead of her.

The final four chapters of You Can8t Go Home Again consist of

George8s letter to Fox explaining his new philosophy which has begun to crystallize, He also explains why he feels it necessary to break away from Fox8s literary tutelage, saying, "You can8t go home again

, , , back home to the father you have lost and have been looking for, back home to someone who can help you, save you, ease the burden for you , , , ,H He has found himself, he explains, just as America will find herselfs 8tI think the true discovery of our own democracy is still before us,"

George closes his letter with a remarkable prophecy, that of his own death. The implications are remarkable because Wolfe died only a few months after he finished this manuscript.

Dear Fox, old friend, thus we have come to the end of the road that we were to go together, My tale is finish@do=and so farewell. But before I go, I have just one more thing to tell you: Something has spoken to me in the night, burning the tapers of the waning year; something has spoken in the night, and told me I shall die, I know not where. Sayings "To lose the earth you know, for greater knowing; to lose the life you have, for greater life; to leave the friends you loved, for greater loving; to find a land more kind than home, more large than earth*-#-. "--Whereon the pillars of this earth are founded, toward which the conscience of the world is tending-- a wind is rising, and the rivers flow," ' 42

Look Homewardg Ange1 and Q£ Time amd the River were published

in 1929 and 19359 respectively, both under the editorial guidance of

Maxwell Perkins„ . The Web and the Rock and You Can°t Go Home Again

were both published posthumously, in 1939 and 194©, and were edited

and organized for publication by Edward C 0 Aswell, the editor of

Harper9s to whom Wolfe had gone after he left Scribner 9 se I believe

that a comparison ©f the novels Wolfe published under Perkins with

those he published after separating from Perkins will reveal many

important points relating to the effect of the break on the authore

In making this comparison, it.cannot be assumed that the first

two novels are alike in all respects or that they are unlike the

second two novels in the same ways 0 For example, the growing social

consciousness which is so marked in You Can9t Go Home Again has its

roots in ideas Eugene Gant acquired in Of Time and the Rivere However,

certain generalizations can be made which divide the four novels into

the two categories of the "earlier novels" and:the "later novels,,

, . A very pertinent fact to be remembered as this comparison Is" made is that the manuscript W©lfe left with As wall from which The % b and the Rock and You Can9t Go Home Again were published included all his unpublished writing, not a finished manuscript with any orgarniza«

■ ■ 1 ' ■ ti©n. "Wolfe considered all his writing of a piece, he usually

I Edward C» Aswell, WA Note on Thomas Wolfe," The Hills Beyond (Mew York, 1941), pe 360o 43 referred to 6,the book," not to this novel or that novel. When he departed for his western journey in Hay 1938„ the journey that ended with his death the following September a he gave As we 11 a ehest<=high stack of typed and hand»written sheets. Much of the writing was frag= mentary or experimental, or did not fit into any sequence. Wolfe wished Aswe11 to be familiar with the book, or in other words the entire story in Wolfe's mind, and so had given him nearly everything he had written. Included were pieces written in the early 19306s, pieces written in the first person, and pieces continuing the Eugene

Gant story. One of the latter was the love story between the pro™ tagonist and Esther Jack— it had been written before Of Time and the

River was published? Wolfe fully intended to rewrite it before using it in George ifebber's story in The Web and the Rock. Sections of it which had already been revised showed a distinct difference in the 2 attitude of the author toward his hero. It is a measure of "Wolfe's artistic honesty that he made Esther a more sympathetic character than George.

The first part of The Web and the Rock, which shows a great deal of objectivity and which was written with George Webber as pr©=> tagonist, was written long after the second part, the love story.

Herbert Muller has commented that in the middle of this novel George 3 "Webber "boils over with hunger and fury and turns into Eugene Gant."

2 ' Ibid.. p. 375, 3 Herbert J. Muller, Thomas Wolfe (Norfolk, Conn., 1947), p. 97. 44

The fcrath is feha£ Uolfe had m©t yet had the ©pp©rfcunity,t© turn Eugene

Gamt int® George Webbere He inteaded t© d© so® Aswll states very emphatically that Wolfe never had been pleased with the l©ve story and intended t© rewrite it® He says Wolfe 9s final.books wonId have turned out different from what they are had Wolfe lived® Hamilton Basse, wh@ corresponded faithfully with Wolfe until his death, also states that Wolfe did not consider his manuscript finished when he gave it to Aswell®^ - ; .

The first characteristi@ t© be discussed in the comparison between Look Homeward® Angel and Of Time and the River® and The Web and the Rock and You Can^t Go Home Again® is the autobiographical nature of Wolfe 0 s writing® Wolfe resented the charge that his writing was autobiegraphIeal» He said that Ma man must use the,material and @x=> perienee of his own life if he is to create anything that has substan® tiai valueIt is nevertheless felt.that his first two novels are completely autobiographical® When, Wolfe changed the name of his .pro™ tagoaist to George Webber and began putting together his final newels, he was trying to turn away from the novels he had written in the past and make a 68genuine artistic and spiritual changean He said, ,?it is

A Aswe11, p® 376® 5 Hamilton Basso, ’’Thomas. Wolfe s A Summing Hp,” Hi CII1 (Sept. 23, 194©), 422®

6 Wolfe, The Story of a Hovel, p® 21® . . Pages 20=24 present Wolfe °s views on autobiographical writing® 45 7 the most objective novel that I have written*" The critics have not found it so objective * In fact, it is generally concluded that all four of Wolfe°s novels fell the story of Tom Wolfe, no matter what his protagonist is named* The biographical facts of Wolfe’s life bear this out*

Two important points need to be mentioned* The first point, brought out in am article by T* L* Collins, is that autobiography hurts an author only when he cannot objectify his sentiments and pre«= seat them clearly; he then states, "Wolfe has objectified his own character with commendable vividness and clarity.*

The second point is that Wolfe realised he was still writing of his own experiences* Early in 1938 he wrote to Aswell describing the protagonist of his new book, calling him "* * * really the most autobiographical character I have ever written because I want to put

9 - everything I have or know into him*" Wolfe’s justification tm eali~ ing his book objective was that he had learned some things about life and had constructed a fable out of them, creating his characters not out of memory but out of the whole amalgam of life* He was no longer working with the raving, egocentric Eugene Gant but with a wiser

George Webber* He was no longer singing only of himself but of

7 Wolfe, Preface to The Web and the Rock*. s' ' 1 Thomas Lyle Collins, "Thomas Wolfe," Sewanee Review, L (0 eto=Bec* 1942), 494* 9 ■ Wolfe, letters, p* 713* 46

America and of the experiences of every young man. His proposed objectivity was the further objectifying of his own character and experience,

Wolfe’s proposed objectivity cannot be seen consistently throughout The Web and the Rock merely because the main portion of that novel was written before he proposed being objective, Aswell 10 had no choice but to publish what Wolfe had left as he left it. Bet in the first half of the novel, where Wolfe provides a childhood for

George, the objectivity can clearly be seen. Of course parallels can be seen in Eugene’s history and George’s history, but the autobiograph= ical qualities in the Aunt~Maw= Unele Mark Joyner ancestry of George would scarcely be noticed had not Wolfe’s autobiography already been called into question,

George Webber as a child is not Eugene Gant as a child, George meditated as he gaged at the blades of grass, thinking as all children do that his thoughts were new and previously unthought, George had norma 1 childhood experiences such as being tormented by older or big™ ger boys, being drawn to and terrified by the everyday tragedies of death and pain, or being patronized by and learning to worship an older friend. Also in college and in Mew York George had a more typi-

10 See pages 360=380 of Aswell’s MA Note ©a Thomas Wolfe” for his interesting story of how he selected the sequence of incidents found in The Web and the Rock and You Can’t Go Heme Again, ■ 1 47 cal career than Eugene $ xs*io never would have had so much fun attend-

ing a football game 0 Many incidents in the youth of George are not

to be found in Wolfe’s life.

Also not found in Wolfe’s life are many of the characters

found in The Web and the Rock and You Can’t Go Home Again» Wolfe

felt that he was being objective because he created some characters $

and indeed he was* There is no real life counterpart to Nebraska

Crane, the Cherokee ball player who was George’s childhood idol,

delineated admirably in both the latter novels. The exciting episode

of Dick Prosser, the religious Negro who went berserk, is only loosely

patterned after a true incident. There are also other meaningful

characters who are largely fictionals Randy Shepperton, Jim Randolph,

and Judge Rumford Bland,

George’s dual personality in The Web and the Rock has often •

been termed one of the major defects of the novel, the other being the

childish and bombastic style with which Wolfe depicted.the love story.

The main reason for this childish style, representative of a more

childish period of life, has, I think, been shown, Muller , in dis<=

cussing, this point, says that although a Eugene Gant is hard to kill,

Wolfe would have killed him for good had he lived, ’’for he rewrote

enough to make it plain that , , , he was no longer in bondage to his 11 youthful passions,” Wolfe revised enough of even the love story to

^Muller, p, 110, 48 make Esther Jack a memorable creation— ■“He pays her the highest com-= 12 pliment of making her radiantly alive and thoroughly convincing^"

It is a further tribute to Wolfe's objectivity that although he has

George treat Esther abominably, he lets the reader know he thinks

George is wrong. Esther herself analyzes George's faults in the novel, this, obviously, is Wolfe seeing the faults, not Esther,

In summary, it is seen that Wolfe's attempt at objectivity was not so successful as might have been hoped, but that he had finally found the road away from autobiography and was learning to pursue it. He was unable to pursue it completely for a number of reasons, One was that he wished to pay tribute to his editor; perhaps the most recognizable figure in You Can't Go Home Again is Foxhall

Edwards, Wolfe's beloved Max Perkins, Wolfe did not want to ob~ jectify the Fox too much because he wanted his affectionate and admiring portrait of the man to be recognized as his final pane­ gyric to him.

Another reason, the main one, that the objectivity of the final two novels is not consistent is that Wolfe's attempt to be ob­ jective was too conscious. The "artistic and spiritual maturity" that he said he felt was not a natural growth. It was forced upon him without his being sure he needed or wanted it. He was so disturbed by the criticism that his novels were autobiographical that he felt

12Ibid, 49 he had to prove he could be objectives Although his aovels indicate that he was sarcastic or belligerent in the face of criticism, he was actually very vulnerable. He suffered from a lack of confidence, and each time he set out to prove something to his audience, he was also trying -to prove it to himself. Just as he had to prove he could write without the help of Perkins, so he had to prove he could be objective.

He definitely was approaching objectivity, for he was losing seme of the fiery impetuosity of youth that made him want to lash out at the experiences that had hurt him. But he was not ready to abandon

Eugene Gant,

Because Wolfe knew he was being pushed into an objectivity he was unconvinced of, his final novels are filled with his bitterness toward the people who pushed him there, George Webber has hates and frustrations never seen in Eugene Gant, Wolfe's satires on the literary aesthetes and failures who pose as critics and writers in the influential New York literary circles prevent certain parts of his novels from being objective, because often it was when he was venting his bewildered anger on the people who harassed him that he was most subjective.

The English critic, Pamela Johnson, wrote that Wolfe's

Achilles heel was ’’the passion for being liked, and conversely, the 13 dread of being hated,” The wound Wolfe received in this heel gave

^Pamela Hansford Johnson, Hungry Gulliver: A Critical Appraisal of Thomas Wolfe (London, 1947), p, 12, 50 him the motivation to strive for objectivity* Miss Johnson also says that Wolfe's two earlier novels have "an honesty of youth that sub­ sequently became obscured by the writer's unrealised desire to appear 14 more mature than he really was*"

In spite of the bitterness behind some of the satire of The

Web and the Rock and You Can't Go Home Again* it must be noted that . this satire is also evidence of a more mature power Wolfe was achieving in these two novels. Maxwell Geismar says, "The satiric note grows steadily stronger /in Wolfe/ until his last novel contains 15 ■ such devastating critiques , * , Another critic recognizes the new power of Wolfe's satire as he refers to the satiric diatribes scattered throughout The Web and the Rock and You Can't Go Home Agains

", o , diatribes on all the literary, artistic, and social movements and crazes that have agitated the surface of our cultural life , » ,

But even more significant are the chapters in You Can't Go Home Again devoted to painting the madness of the twenties,if^

Wolfe's attempted objectivity, then, was a conscious effort marred by an underlying bitterness. Because he had not fully developed his new maturity, he had to devote his energies to removing the sub-

1 4 Ibid,, p, 1 2 0 , 15 Maxwell Geismar, "Thomas Wolfe % The Unfound Door," Writers in Crisis (Boston, 1942), p, 226, 16 Edgar Johnson, "Thomas Wolfe and the American Dream," A Treasury of Satire (New Y©rk, 1945), p. 744, 51 jeetive outbursts from his witing. Many times he had aothing with which to replace them 0 Many Wife readers, devotees and detractors alike, have commented that what his later novels gain in objectivity and restraint, they lose in interest and lyrlcality* A comparison of the lyrieality of W i f e ’s first two novels and of his later novels is also of value,

Joseph Warren Beach lists as one of Wolfe’s best features ’’the lyrical splendor of feeling with which he records a poet’s reaction to 17 human life and destiny,M Others have found the lyrical qualities of

Wolfe’s writing so excellent that two separate volumes of poetical passages have been published, A great deal of the appeal of Look

Homeward, Ange1 lies in the rhetorical vitality of Wolfe’s youthful and untamed exuberance® In the later novels the exuberance is tamed®

In trying to be objective, many times Wolfe merely stripped his sen= fences of their magnificent life. The childhood of George Webber, depicted in a relatively mature manner, does not have the excitement and appeal that the raging childhood of Eugene has,

Wolfe’s early manner of writing was not merely a literary tool, but an expression of his entire way of feeling and thinking. It was an.extension of his life, poured on to paper by the momentum of his joie de vivre. When he was forced to renounce that joie de vivre be­ cause of the frustrating pressure of the artistic world, and forced to

1 ? Joseph Warren Beach, ’’Thomas Wolfes Search for a Father,” American Fiction, 1920-1940 (New York, 1941), p, 206, 52 renounce his exuberance of his manner of subjective writing* sometimes little remained» Objectivity per se is of little valuee "It is hard­ ly accurate to say that he 0found himself 6 by obtaining objectivity 18 at the expense of all that had been himself,"

This is not to say that the lyricality was lost fromWolfe°s later novels. The lyrical passages are more abundant in Look Homeward,

Angel and Of Time and the River, and also more unrestrained. They often, appear to have little logical connection with the passages pre­ ceding or following them and therefore can be lifted easily for inclusion in a volume of poetical passages. The genius of "Wolfees writing is in his lyricism* and it is never entirely lost. In The Web and the Rock it is found in such passages ass

The stardust of those million lights* , , , flung there against the robe of night like jewe ls spangled on the gown . „ of the dark Helen that is burning'in man°s blood forevermore.

Another passage* one which in a sense expresses the theme of all

Wolfe's work* is the followings

We are small grope-things crying for the light and love by which we might be saved, and which* like us, is dying in the darkness a hand's breadth off from us , , , the eyeless crawls that grope along the forest of the sea's great floor*

18 Bella Kussy, "The Vitalist Trend and Thomas Wolfe," Sewanee Review, L (July-Sept, 1942), 323, 19 Wolfe, The Web and the Rock, p, 510, 53

and x-?e die alone in the darkness, a second away from hope, a moment from ecstasy and fulfillment, a little half an hour from love,20

Numerous passages from You Can*t Go Home Again could also be cited. But the lyricism of the latter two novels is more restrained and is more an integrated part of thenovel. Lyrical passages are harder to lift out of context, Wolfe had learned to apply his gift of lyricism to the expression of more mature ideas and had learned to weave these ideas more closely into the story.

One Wolfe critic expresses this maturer method by saying,

68The rhetoric /of You Can't Go Home Again/ appears in panoramic des­ criptions of the landscape of America and in passages where a lyrical style is appropriate

Another, Maxwell Geismar, explains that although the lyrical passages of his early writing are very eloquent, Wolfe had other gifts than the lyric. Quoting George Webber°s letter to Fox:

Man was born to live, to suffer, and to die, and what befalls him is a tragic lot. There is no denying this in the final end. But we must, dear Fox, deny it all along the way , 2 2

Geismar indicates that rhetoric is missing from these moving lines, but that the eloquence is inherent in their simplicity and in the

20 Wolfe, The Web and the Rock, p, 667, 21 Floyd C, Watkins, "Rhetoric in Southern Writing: Thomas Wolfe," Georgia Review, XII (1958), 82, 22 Wolfe, You Can°t Go Home Again, p, 666, 23 power of their meaning* Thus it is with both the later novels== although their lines have lost some fanciful lyricism, they still possess an eloquence moving because of the sincerity with which it is expressed.

The “maturity" of Wolfe 0 s' later novels has often been men= tioned, along with references to his "growing social consciousness

To what does this maturity refer? Wolfe°s early novels were utterly egocentric. He was singing of himself and of the effect on him of the people and events that surrounded him. Even the third novel.

The Web and the Rock, was largely egoistical. But gradually he began to feel the ties that united him with his fellow man. In Of Time and the River he rejected the seIf=>centered world of the rich and re= turned to the teeming humanity of the city. In The Web and the Rock he learned that his "only deformity had been in the madness and bitterness of his heart" and that he loved life and "hated the death- 26 in-life, and that it was better to live than die," In You Can't Go

Home Again he discovered America and came to realize that the old sys­ tems were no -longer adequate to fulfill the ideal of American demo­ cracy, He had passed from "the cloudy, sentimental cravings of the 25 ego to the clear dictates, of the super-ego," At last he heard the

23 Geismar, Writers in Crisis, p, 231, 24 Wolfe, The Web and the Rock, p, 733, 734, 25 Beach, p, 202, voice of social eoRseieaeeo wThe bridge between the personal and the social was Wolfe ?s discovery that his own personality was a microcosm 26 of the state of society.*

The social consciousness Wolfe had acquired is summed up in the letter to Fox contained in the last pages of You Can't Go Home

Again. George Webber had just undergone a disillusioning experience in Germanys but Wolfe explains, "For years his conception of the world had been gradually changing, and the German adventure merely brought this process to its climax.

The letter to Fox first explains how George had fallen in with a group of precious literary aesthetes who continually portrayed the artist as "a sensitive man of talent, the young genius, crucified by life, misunderstood and scorned of men, pilloried and driven out by

. . o mean provincialism" (much as Wolfe had earlier portrayed him=> self). George explains that he later realized that this oddly- conceived artist was in perpetual conflict with life— "Instead of belonging to the world he lived in, he was constantly in a state of ... flight from it."^

Other milestones are explained in the letters George5s wean­ ing from his childhood desires for love and fame, his awareness of the

26 Edwin Berry Burgum. The Novel and the World's Dilemma (New York, 1947), p. 302. 27 Wolfe, You Can°t Go Home Again, p. 636. 28,, . , eorruptien and spiritual disease that were poisoning the mighty German nation, and his sudden realisation that America was suffering Ma dread world~siekness of the soul," 2 9 that was akin to Germany"s.

George then sums up his friendship with Fox and his debt to him. He says that the end of their friendship is as inevitable as was the beginnings "You are the North Pole, I the S©uth<=~s© much in balance, in agreement, and yet. Dear Fox, the whole world lies betweeno" 30 George describes the crucial difference between their points of view, saying that Fox accepts with hopeful fatalism the irremediable ills of mankind=»="the stern fatality of resignation 0 „ » is the granite essence of your nature 0 George, on the other hand, believes that fear, hatred, poverty, cruelty, and need can be des= troyed, and that if new evils rise up in their places, they also must be conquered. Mam, to be alive, cannot accept the world-sickness of the soul but must fight its

Man was born to live; to suffer, and to die, and what befalls him is a tragic lot. There is no denying this in the final end. But we must, dear Fox, deny it all along 57

The final section of the letter to Fox contains the credo,

George 8 s==arid Wolfe °s=<=statement of the destiny of the American dream.

It is also the statement of Wolfe8s coming of age.

I believe that we are lost here in America, but I believe we shall be found .... I know that America and the people in it are deathless, undiscovered, and immortal, and must live o I think the true.discovery of America is before us. I think the true fulfillment of our spirit, of our people, of our mighty and immortal land, is yet to come. I think the true discovery of our own democracy is still before us. And I think that all these things are certain as the morning, as inevitable as neon. I think I speak for most men living when I say that our America is Here, is Now, and beckons on before us, and that this glorious assurance is not only our living hope, but our dream to be accomplished. 33

Frederic I. Carpenter explains that he is not bothered by the apparent lack of form in Wolfe8s novels because it is compensated for by the single idea dominant in Wolfe8s life and writing. The culmina­ tion of that idea— .the American ideal of freedom and democracy'— was expressed in the letter So Fox. Calmly optimistic (MI think the true discovery of America is before us . . . as inevitable as noon"), this hope for America expresses the natural maturation of Wolfe8s early desire to escape the confining hills and find America. . . his whole life was dedicated to the living and describing of that idea.

And when he finally had realized that idea both in his life and in his writing, he died.M^ Carpenter views the difference in the

3 3 Ibid0, p. 669. 34 Frederic I. Carpenter, "The Autobiography of an Idea," of Kansas City Review, XII (Spring 1946), 179. 58 character of the first two novels and the second two as a definite turning point in 'Holfe0s maturity* In The Web and the Rock he was slowly discovering that his ideal "could only be realized on the rock of American actuality , 99 You Cam9t Go Home Again describes the real­ ization of the ideal "by one American within the very framework of 36 American materialism , 99

Wolfe's major contact with American materialism, of course 9 was in New York City, His literary treatment of New York is very revela­ tory because it not only shows the realization of the ideal in the midst of American materialism, but offers a contrast in maturity,

Eugene's introduction to the city is rhapsodic? New York is the shining, golden city that endures forever, George's arrival at the city offers a more sober view, as well as a more objective one,

George can pause to muse over the city's impression on him: "There is no truer legend in the world than the one about the country boy,

3 7 the provincial innocent, in his first contact with the city," How­ ever, George is rhapsodic too. Through his experiences is seen the cycle of desire and frustration, hope and disillusionment, that

3 5 Ibid, , 0 , 180,

3 6 Ibid, 37 Wolfe, The Web and the Rock, p, 251, 59 initiates George into the world of New Yorks "To youth and to the 38 artist, the city promises all but offers nothings"

The discovery George makes of the spiritual poverty of New

York City also becomes a process of sel£=diseoveryc His personal in­ volvements in the life of the city make his reactions convincing

(although "his denunciation of every aspect of the city's culture o o o reveals not his emancipation but his enslavement /to provincial

«a=» 3 9 prejudices/8’ )„ Mrs* Gelfant thinks The Web and the Rock and You

Can't Go Home Again show "maturer attitudes" toward New Yorks "The city symbol reflects Nolfe's orientation towards a more objective view of lifeo The jungle image of the city /in You Can't Go Home Again/ !

». o « is far removed from the. golden vision of the dreaming young

Southern boy,

In "The Vitalist Trend and Thomas 'Wolfe," Bella Kussy treats at length the social and political aspects of Wolfe's transformation first seen in The Web and the Rock* She says the basis of his earlier books is vitalism, and that only in You Can't Go Home Again, "the book 41 in which the transition to objectivity is fully accomplished," are

38 Blanche I, Gelfant, "The City as Symbols Thomas Wolfe," The American City Novel (Norman, Okla,, 1954), p» 130, 39 Geistnar, Writers in Crisis, p, 218, 40 Gelfant, p, 127,

^Kussy, p, 306, 60 s@©iai and .political Ideas introduced 0 Wolfe has by then recognized the atavistic, primitive urges behind the sou 1=.sickness of Germany, and therefore rejects the individualism in himself which had been rooted in primitivism,,

What this rejection means in Wolfe's development is incalculableo It means a renunciation not of opinions, which are comparatively easy to change, but of instincts, of temperamenta 1 attitudes and reactions, virtually of his entire personality,, Because this change leaves Wolfe in so complete a vacuum „ o o he is compelled for the first time, in You Can't Go Home Again, t© use his brain, to analyze the society in which he lives and to try to under= stand it through the exercise of critical intelligence

Unfortunately, Wolfe's critical intelligence was not always as powerful a force as his earlier subjectivity had been 0 Beach thinks the final chapters of You Can't Go Home Again % r e among the thinnest and least satisfying of all his writing, Wolfe had no gift for intellectual abstraction,'^^ The point has been made that no one, least of all Wolfe himself, considered the huge final manuscript fin= ished. Very clearly the evidence of a growing social consciousness can be seems "There is in his work a clearly observable movement toward spiritual adulthood,"^ Had Wolfe been able to revise his last two novels, his spiritual adulthood could be seen much more clearly.

As the novels stand, two factors prevent it from being clear, . One is

4 2 3Mdo, pp, 320=21, 43 Beach, P, 204,

44Harold C, Gardiner, "Thomas Wolfe," Fifty Years of the American Novel, 1900=1950, A Christian Appraisal (New York, 1951), 61 the early date at whieh Wolfe wrote parts of The Web and the Rock and

You Can't Go Home Again and the spged with whleh he hurried to finish his manuscript prior to leaving on his trip West* The second factor is the fact that he was under the pressure of an angry frustration, wanting desperately to prove his ability to write objectively and to write without Perkins, His new maturity was often at war with his old impulse to lash out in his books at those who had hurt him. The many circumstances which led up to his break with Perkins involved hurts inflicted by many people other than Perkins $ the way in which Wolfe retaliated for these hurts in his last two novels will be discussed in Chapter Three,

Very clear also is the evidence of self^criticism and maturity in Wolfe's writing methods. Restraint and objectivity are seen, al=> though not perfected, "Wolfe now has a firm grasp of the wealth of material that had always been at his fingertips , , , , There is evidence that when he reached the close of his writing career, he no longer relied on sheer quantity as a measure of force and power=-=Wolfe was beginning to seek solutions "not in the piling up of experience but in sorting it out, An example of this "sorting out" is seen in the lonely monologue of Esther Jack near the end of The Web and the Rocks

^Muller, p, 125,

^ B e a c h , p, 189, 62

’’The horror of eight million faces 1 ” Remember eight— Imbw m e * "The horror of two million boobs8" Write one that has two thousand words of wisdom in it» "Each window is a light* each light a room* each room a cell, each cell a person1" All rooms, all windows* and all persons for your hunger? No0 Return to ones fill all that room with light and glory, make it shine as no other room ever Shone before, and all life living on this earth will share it with youo^l

With regard to DeV 0 to°s criticism that Wolfe could not write without the help of Perkins and the assembly line at Scribner’s* I think it is now clear that he could and did* Wolfe needed an editor to help him to organize and to insist that he cut, not because he could not do these things for himself but because he hated to cut (he classed himself among the "putter®inners") and because as he organized he added details and chapters 0 The only quality that the first novels have that the later ones do hot is a greater degree of lyricism* the one quality that no editor could have added to a single line of Wolfeo

If Wolfe had lived to write more, I think he would have writ=> ten novels which showed all the glorious lyrical power promised by

Look Homeward * Ange1 coupled with the maturity promised by You Can’t

Go Home Again. Had he been free from the harassments of law suits and literary critics and from the disillusionment he felt over his compulsion to separate from Scribner’s, he would have been free to realize his potential as an artist.

^Wolfe, The Web and the Rock, p. 727. CHAPTER THREE

Thomas Wolfe wrote a rueful letter to his German publisher in

June 1936, saying, 8,X am learning many things about the world, some

of them not very pretty ones, but I have not lost faith in people 0 I

have met many fine and honorable people as well as all those other

ones==someday 1 shall put it all in a book* I am beginning to do so

1 • new0M He was beginning to put it into a huge manuscript which was

published a few years later in two books. The Web and the Rock and

You Cam8t Go Home Again, Chapter Two evaluated the increased maturity

of-these two novels. This chapter will demonstrate how the dlsiXlu<=

sionment of the period when Wolfe was writing them is revealed in the novels, and how this disillusionment contributed to the maturity dis<=

cussed in Chapter Two,

Wolfe°s letter continued by saying that his new book would be

the most objective thing he had ever written, although it naturally

came out of his own experience 0 "The general idea is the story of a

good man abroad in the world , , , the naturally innocent man, the man who sets out in life with his own vision of what life is going to be

like, what men and women are going to be like 0 o » and then the story of what he really finds,

* Wolfe, Letters, p, 525, It is immediately apparent that Wolfe was writing out of his own experienee, for he was the epitome of the naturally innocent man©

He himself had set out in life with his own vision«=~he went to New

York intending to brighten her skyline with his magnificent talent<»=- and he himself found life to be different from his vision© He wrote 9

’’’There is something a little tragic and grotesque in the fact that the success I wanted and looked forward to having as a child should have

3 brought me so much trouble, worry 9 bewilderment, and disillusion©"

Indeed it is ironical that it was the very success he sought that brought Wolfe so much worry and disillusion© In the midst of the critical voices praising Look Homeward© Angel in the early 19306s arose dissenting voices which said that Wolfe could write only subjectively and autobiographieally, and that he would soon write himself out©

Wolfe reacted more strongly to the dissenting critics than to the others© In 1935 appeared DeVoto’s criticism that he could not write without Perkins and the assembly line at Scribner’s, which caused his sensitive soul to smart even more© He swore .he would disprove them©

He would portray the struggle of an artist against the attempts of the literary circles to cheapen him©

The success of Wolfi’s attempt to disprove the critics has already been discussed© He demonstrated a degree of objectivity, in= vented some remarkable characters, and showed how immense his memory and literary imagination were® But more than anything else he showed that his talents were best suited to continuing the life story of his earlier hero, Eugene Gant®T

The Web and the Roek and You Can 111 Go Home Again, the two novels which portray the struggle of an artist against the literary world, also reveal the struggle within Tom Wolfe during the period when he wrote them® He wrote the main part of the manuscript from which these two novels were published between the first months of 1936 and May 1938® During these years he was suffering the complex and many-faceted conflict with his editor. Maxwell Perkins, and Scribner"s®

As was explained in the preceding chapter, one result of this conflict with.Perkins and of the conscious attempt to disprove the critics was to prevent The Web and the Rock and You €an°t Go Home Again from dis­ playing their author°s true ability, because he could not resist the compulsion to portray hatefully and satirically the members of the literary world who had hurt him® The two novels in which he gave in to this impulse will fee discussed separately®

The multiple conflicts of the 1936-1938 period, as wall as of the preceding half-dozen years, are seen in The Web and the Rock in a number of ways® The most obvious is the change of name and physical appearance of the hero 5 George Webber also has a new childhood® These changes are merely concessions to the critics, the outward signs of

Wolfe°s attempt to prove he could write objectively® Two other external manifestations of Wolfe's conflict are the decrease in youthful idealism and the lessening of lyrical abundance«

George is still the provincial innocent when he arrives in New York, but Wolfe by the. time he wrote of George had lost his own provincial innocence to the point of haying George analyze his own reactions to the golden city. The previous chapter discusses the city symbol$ as it does the lessening lyricism 0

A major factor in Wolfe's conflict with Perkins was his dis= illusionment with New York, both with the city itself and with the peo= pie he found there» Perkins was a symbol of New York to Wolfe just as

Esther Jack was a symbol of New York to George in The Web and the Rocko

George said it was through his association with her that he began to

’’know” the citys "She was the city's daughter » * „ to him she was the city he had longed to kn©w0 For months Esther symbolized a golden world of pleasure and success s "This night world in which she moved and lived as a familiar and acknowledged denizen was a privileged world of high distinction,, ItN included illustrious names and eele= 5 - hr ate d personalities <, 0 o But gradually the luster wore off „

Esther told George many stories about the people of New York with whom she had grown up*

Sdolfe,' The Web and the Rock 0 p« 424» 5,, . , 67

The effect of these stories was to evoke a picture of a world of wealth that was at .first fabulous and fascinating in its Bagdadlike enchantments„ but that quickly took on a more sinister hue as Monk read the meaning of its social implications* It shone there, written on the face of night, like a lurid and corrupted sneer * It was a world that seemed to have gone insane with its own excess, a world of criminal privilege that flouted itself with an inhuman arrogance in the very face of a great city where half the population lived in filth and squalor, and where two-thirds were still, so bitterly uncertain of their daily living that they had to thrust, to snarl, to curse, to cheat, contrive and get the better of their fellows like a race of mongrel dogs * 6

George became dissatisfied with Esther's world long before he stopped loving her* He detested her friendss "The fleshly vanity and boastings, the cheap personal egotism of the people of the theatre, and their constant desire to exhibit themselves stank foully in his nostrils*" The first night he went to one of her plays he felt the first intimation that something was wrong in their relationship? he felt something magic and invisible "encircling him, making him against 8 his will a part of this world to which she belonged*"

And when in the tortured struggle to produce his first novel

Georgs- felt waves of "desolating self=pity and despair," he felt that

Esther "had contrived this ruin against him* He saw her at the center of a corrupt and infamous world, inhabited by rich, powerful, and

^ Ibid** p* 436* 7 Ibid*, p* 500*

^Ibid*, p* 501* 68

cynical people» the so-called leaders of the arts themselves „ » <>

/whose only jo^/ was the castration of the spirit of a living man0w

This, then, was Esther°s world, the world Geofcge was forced to reject, Esther was only a symbol| George was really rejecting the so-called leaders of the arts, Thremgh George, Wolfe was rejecting the leaders of the arts in New York who had insulted his talent and was lampooning all presumptuous intellectuals in general, Esther's, world of the theatre received harsh words.s ,,0 * , the whole horrible world of the theatre, the livid, glittering, nighttime world of Broad­ way, a world of weariness, of death, hatred, and a sterile prostitu- lo­ tion, eager to slime all living things with its own filth,M

Itwas the failure of George's great love affair that precipi­ tated his bitterness with Esther's world; Wolfe, of course, had under­ gone a similar experience in his love affair with Mrs, Alina Bernstein, the prototype of Esther Jack, Wolfe's familiar exaggeration came into play herei With love's failure, says Maxwell Geismar, "came Wolfe's great crisis, the dark period of the novel /The Web and the Rock/, and the start of his bitterness: the venomous attacks not at all on the r|ghtful origin of his failure, his own limitations, but rather on the 11 urban society which is now forcing him to realize them,"

9 Ibid,, p. 577,

1 0 Ibid,o p, 588,

Geismar, Writers in Crisis, p, 213, 69

The harshest words ©£ all, and the most effective because they were phrased in biting satire, were reserved for the members ©f the publishing worldo By means of these satires Wolfe was repaying the real or imagined insults he had received from that alien worldo

A colleague of Wolfe at the New .York University says of him, nt can still feel his hot lusting for vengeanceo He never forgot what he 12 took to be a slight or a meanness and he never forgave itew

In the devastating chapter on the publishing company of Rawng and Wright, Wolfe repaid the publishers to whom he first submitted

Look Homeward, Angel, from whom he had to retrieve the manuscript in person. For Rawng and Wright, "the stodgy business of print was agreeably enlivened by long and frequent intervals of women, wine, and song. Their publishing judgments may have erred at times, but 13 their cuisine was always excellent," And as for reading an author*s manuscript when it was sent in for consideration.

It was Mr, Rawng himself who had conceived the famous mot s "I don’t read books, I publish ’em*"

O O' o o o o p o p O © O O O O O P o

"Read a manuscript ! 11 cried Mr, Rawng one time when questioned on the point— "Me read a manuscript!" he cried again, and tapped his bosom with fat fingers, and dilated fleshly nostrils with rich scorn, "Don’t make me leff$" cried Mr, Rawng, unmirthfully, "Vy the hell should I read a manuscript? I don’t have to read it* All I have to do is pick it up and feel itS ,!==here he wagged four fat fingers

12 Vardis Fisher, Thomas Wolfe at Washington Square, ed, by T, C, Pollack and Oscar Cargill (New York, 1954), p, 139,

^Welfe, The Web and the Rock, p, 526, 70

feelingly°=>”All I have £© do is hold it up and smell it’W here he dilated his fat nostrils with odorous appraisals wIf it feels g o o d s good 8 I publish it? If it smells

good==good 8 I publish it*

George speaks very cruelly to Esther about her artistic friends, referring at one time to "the malice and venom of these 15 million dollar apes and their erotic wives0W tihat he hates is the dilettantism of. the successful, their sleaziness, amateurism, lack of vitality* It is intolerable to him that they, "with one® hundredth of his genius, have arrived at their destination while he is still upon his long and sweating journey. He is not yet mature enough to solace himself with the thought that their destination may 16 merely have been Long Island, while his is Mars *"

The world of rich pseudo=lovers of the arts, of writers of popular fiction, of dilettantes of the theatre, and of ignorant pub= lishing houses yiich Wolfe portrays in The Web and the Rock is also

Max Perkins 0 world* By 1936, at which time Wolfe began writing these satires, he had completely broken off with Aline Bernstein and had put in her place as the symbolic idol of New York Max Perkins, his editor*

Even though Wolfe was writing of past experiences, the venom of his satire came from the immediacy of his disillusionment by the objects of his satire* In the earlier Mrs* Bernstein years, for example,

1 4 Ibid*

Ibid*, p* 642*

^ P a m e l a H* Johnson, p* 140* Ifelfe was not prominent enough to require defending, whereas later.m

Perkins many' times defended his time^emsumiag'preoccupation with

Wolfe on.the basis of Wolfe°s great talent® However, in this novel

Mrs® Jack seems to have been defending George® She writes to him,

MX love you, I believe in your genius, I always shall==n© matter what anyone says," whereupon.George says in frenzied monologue $ ■

Mo matter what anyone says, eh?

It would appear that Wolfe resented the need for anyone, probably

Perkins, to defend his talent®

You Can't Go Home Again continues most of the evidences of

VfoIfe0s disillusionment that were seen in The Web and the Rocks the change of name to George Webber, the lessening of lyrieality, and the encounter and altercation with the world of Mrs® Jack® George still felt ill at ease among Esther's wealthy friends; however, in You Can't

Go Home Again® he maturely recognizes that often his resentment against them is unjust® "The poise, assurance, and sophistication of all those sleek faces made him fancy a slight where none was offered 18 or intended®" Yet he still was unable to tolerate their sterile way of life® He saw®

Wolfe, The Web and the Rock® p® 657® 72

o o . repeated signs of decadence in a society which had once been the object of his envy and his highest ambio tion coco It was their attitude about acceptance „ 0 <> their complaisance about themselves and about their life, their loss of faith in anything better « „ « o Could he as a novelist, as an artist, belong to this high world of privilege without taking upon himself the stultifying burden of that privilege? <> « » Was not this world of fashion and of privilege the deadliest enemy of art and truth

The repeated signs of decadence were brought to a culmination at Mrs, Jack's party the night of Piggy Logan's circus, "The highest intelligences of the time--the very subtlest of the chosen few" were bored by nearly everything 8

They tilled the waste land, and erosion had grown fashionable. They were bored with love, and they were bored with hate. They were bored with people who created something, and with people who created nothing, , , , They were bored with chastity, and they were bored with adultery. They were bored with the great poets of the world, whose great poems they had never read , , , , They were bored with living, they were bored with dying, but =.=>they were not bored that year with Mr, Piggy Logan and his circus of wire d©lls , 2 0

The description of Piggy Logan's circus and of the pointless= ness of its vogue among Mew York's society is perhaps Wife's most brilliant satires

19 Ibid,, pp, 247=49,

26 • Ibid,, p„ 217, 73

M r 0 Logan was now ready for the grand climax, the pieee de resistance of the entire occasion* This was his celebrated sword«swallowing acto With one hand he picked up a small rag doll, stuffed with wadding and with crudely painted features, and with the other hand he took a long hairpin, bent it more or less straignt, forced one end through the fabric of the doll's mouth, and then began patiently and methodically to work it down the rag throat < > 2 1

George at last felt utterly unable to accept Esther's world.

He could not reconcile his vision with the inane pleasures that amused her and her friendsHe saw M==swiftly, finally, irrevocably^that he must break with her and turn his back upon this fabulous and enchant^ 22 ing world of hers=»=or lose his soul as an artist."

The fire that broke, out in the apartment building after the performance of the circus had ended and the inhumanity of the excited tenants strengthened George's resolution to leave Esther. The impli­ cations of the fire incident also apply to Perkins? M. . . for Wolfe this was the final lesson in human values and their proper relation­ ship to art| and it forced his reluctant final break with the man who 23 had been editor and foster-father to him."

Although Wolfe is at his most mature and most objective in You

Can't Go Home Again, he occasionally slips out of the role of George in order to explain something to his audience. He manages to do this

21IbidV, p. 265. 97 Ibid.. p. 250. 23 ■ 1 Edwin Berry Burgum, "Thomas Wolfe's Discovery of America," Virginia Quarterly Review, XXII (Summer 1946), 434. 74 without being too obvious==it is worked into the plott®»but its purpose is clear to those who understand the frustrations plaguing Wolfe as he was writing this manuscript» For example, George has a eonversa= tion with his friend Randy Shepperton in which he discusses the pub®

1i cat ion of Home to Our Mounta ins, in which Wolfe spells out the new literary policy he uses in writing The Web and the Rock and YouGan 111

Go Home Again.

"Well, it was aut©bi©graphiea1®®you caa0tt deny it." "But not °to© autobiographical,*" George went on earnestly. . . . fit wa£/ not autobiographical enough . . . . That's where I failed. "Then what's the remedy?" "To use everything I have . . . . And if I use myself as a character, to withhold nothing, to try to see and paint myself as I am»=>th@ bad along with the good, the shoddy along with the true®®just as I must try to see and draw every other character. No more false personal, no more false pride , . . . You hear about these fellows who write one book and then can't do another because they haven't got anything else to write aboutI" "You're not worried about that?" "Lord, no9 My trouble's all the other way around 8 I've get too much material. It keeps backing up on me . . = until sometimes I wonder what in the name of God I'm going to do with it all . . . ."

o o o o o o o.o.o O O O O O o o o o o "I'm looking, for a way . . . . A kind of legend, perhaps. Somethiag®=a story®®composed of all the knowledge I have, of all the living I've seen. Not the facts, you understand®® not just the record of my life®®but something truer than the faets®®S0 mething distilled out of my experience and . transmitted into a form of universal application. "24

2A Wolfe, You Can't Go Home Again, p. 354=56 The publishers did not eseap® Wolfe °s wrath ia You Gamct Go

Home AgaiUo The publishing firm of the pompous Mr 0 Stoat, explains

George 9 was devoted to the manufacture of religious tracts and text

books for primary grades 8

Its fiction list was pitifulo Mr 0 Stoat's literary and critical standards were derived from a pious devotion to the welfare of the jeune fllle, 8?IS IS a book,w he would whisper hoarsely to any aspiring hew author, at the same time rolling his eyebrows ab©ut~»niS it a book that you would be willing for your young daughter to read?" M r 0 Stoat had no young daughter, but in his publishing enterprises he always acted on the hypothesis that he did have, and that no book should be printed which he would be unwilling to place in her hands. The result, as may be imagined, was fudge and taffy, slop and goo,

George's experience with Esther taught him that love was not

enough. His experience with the publication of Home to Our Mountains

and with Lloyd MeHarg taught, him that fame was not enough. He then

learned that he could not return to the haven of those two childhood

dreams, love and fame, even through the memory. He could mot return

to Libya Hill, as he discovered when he visited there for Aunt law's

fu

up when the lesson was completed. But the process of learning was

hard, Wolfe himself found the process hard==he wrote 8 "My discovery

that 'you can't go home again® went , , , down to the very roots of my life and spirit , , , a terrifying discovery because it amounts te­ am entire revision almost of belief and of knowledge, it was like 76 26 death almost « » » o” "Like death almost" was Wolfe’s denunciation of the old dreams and solacementss one of which was Perkins= The title phrase of the novel had many implications for both Wolfe and for his protagonists

You eaa°t go back home to your familys back home to

your childhood, back home to romantic love 9 back home to a young man°s dreams of glory and of fame, back home to exile, to escape to Europe and some foreign land, back home to lyricism, to singing just for singing°s sake <,- , „ « back home to the father you have lost and have been look® ing for, back home to someone Who can help you, save you, ease the burden for you <> „ <, back home to the escapes of Time and Memory,^7

The phrase summed up everything Wolfe had learned, and all he had learned led inexorably to the decision to break with Perkins, George explains it in the following manner in the long letter to Fox Edwards at the end of You Can 111 Go Home Again s

The fact remains that, as an individual, I was lost. Perhaps that is one reason. Fox, why for soulong I needed you so desperately. For I was lost, and was looking for someone older and wiser to show me the way, and I found you, and you took the place of my father who had died. In our nine years together you did help me find the way * ©Vo*and the road now leads off in a direction contrary to your intent. For the fact is that now I no longer feel lost, and I want to tell you why,28

George °s explanation td Fox of the reasons for the break and of why he no longer felt lost were discussed in detail in Chapter Two,

^Wolfe, Letters, p, 730, 27 _ Wolfe, You Can't Go Home Again, p, 637,

Of} 'Ibid,, p, 646®47, 77

In coaclesion* Thomas Wolfe®s final novels. The Web and the ■

Rock and Yog Can8t Go Home Again, present the story ©f the artist in conflict with society much in the same way that Wolfe was in conflict with society =, They present the innocent man discovering life much in the same way that Wolfe discovered life. And just as George Webber discovered "you can't go home again," Wolfe discovered it too,

Wolfe was in conflict with the society of New York City, and especially with the literary circles, ever since Look Homeward, Angel was published in 1929, but by 1935 the conflict had become unbearable.

In that year he wrote, "It is simply astounding to discover how many people there are in this world, and particularly in this City, who 29 exist through some sort of parasitism," In that year his anger and disillusionment began to appear in the manuscript on which he was working. The various ways in which they appeared have just been dis= cussed. Those parts of the previous chapter which dealt with Wolfe°s more mature attitudes toward life are also pertinent here, for they demonstrate the way in which Wolfe profited from•the anger and dis« illusiomnent he felt,

■ Thomas Wolfe, like George Webber,;discovered "you.can6tt go home again," In You Can't Go Home Again George climaxed his dis= covery of this fact with the inevitable decision that he must break

29 Wolfe, Letters, p, 533, off with his editor 0 He called the decision inexorables and he apparently considered it the natural conclusion, of the relation^ ship 0 Was Wolfe merely inventing a natural end to the friendship of George and Fox Edwards, or was he using his new autobiographic cal method of % o more false personal, no more false pride??

Chapter Four, as it answers this question, will discuss the

importance of Perkins as a symbol of New York and of the literary circles in causing Wolfe to break with Scribner’s and to become a more mature artiste CHAPTER FOUR

In spite of his deep loyalty and affection towards Maxwell

Perkins, Thomas Wolfe found himself in profound conflict with him over their ideas on the suffering of humanity. Perkins felt that certain abuses were inherent in life, whereas Wolfe felt that the abuses must be fought, not accepted as life's natural dole. Perkins appeared to hope that the passing years would temper Wolfe to a greater eonserva=. tism, but instead Wolfe observed this effect in Perkins himself 5 in

1936 he wrote to Perkins, "On your own part, it seems to me, there has been . . . an increasing conservatism that has now, I fear, reached the point of dogged and unyielding inflexibility and obstinate re= solve to maintain the status quo at any cost."* Wolfe, on the other hand, became more and more sure of his resolve to fight the evils he*. found in America~=,,Wow truly I shall work with, all my strength for

■ 2 rev©lutione=for the abolition of this vile and rotten system. . » .* •

Then Wolfe recollected Perkins' attempts to persuade him into a more decorous moderation, commenting that there were many things he had wanted Perkins to publish that were never published. "I think 80 where I have been, most wrong, most unsure in these past seven years, has been where I have yielded to this benevolent pressure» It is just there that I have allowed myself to falter in my purpose, to be diverted from the direction towiard which the whole impulsion of my life and talent is now driving me = His letter then asserts that there has never been a time when he was so determined to write as he pleases, to say what he wants to say; "No matter what happens, I am going to write this beokoV1'

Wolfe had fust begun working on the manuscript of The Web and the Rock and You Can°t Go Home Again and was enthusiastic over his new ideaso Because of Perkins 0 stultifying effect on his new ideas (or because of what Wolfe considered to be Perkins® stultifying effect, which is really the same thing) and because of numerous other factors already discussed,- Wolfe was also beginning to think seriously about, getting a new publisher,, When in 1937 he sadly sought his way out of his dilemma by approaching Edward Co Aswell, "Perkins® associates and friends loudly condemned Wolfe for his ingratitude, without stopping to think that his very debt to Perkins might be threatening to suffer

5 ' cate his talentoM '

3 Xbido, p» 588o A Ibid., p. 587o 5 Nowell, Thomas Wolfe, p. 393. 81

Perkins s, though deeply hurt $ did nothing to try to dissuade

Wolfe from changing publishing companies except to assure him of his

faith in his talent and of his support in whatever Wolfe decided to

doo Had Perkins tried to Mhang on” to Wolfe, he would have done him

a great disserviceo He might have accomplished this by appealing to

Wolfe °s loyalty, for Wolfe recognised, Perkins as the father of his -

spirit as described in a passage in The Story of a Novels

The deepest search in life, it seemed to me, the thing that in one way or another was central to all living, was man°s search for a father, not merely the father of his flesh, not merely the lost father of his youth, but the image of a strength and wisdom external to his need and superior to his hunger, to which the belief and power of his own life could be unitedcA ,

• However, Wolfe, having found the father he had needed, had outgrown

his need for him. His greater need at that time was to be freed in

order that his talent might further develop and pursue its natural

course© He did free himself and his talent did develop© Wolfe6s

later novels are more mature because of it© Much of this maturity

they owe to disillusion with Perkins and the world Perkins repre=»

seated, and, paradoxically, much of it they owe to•Perkins 0 innate,

self-sacrificing understanding in letting Wolfe go©

The maturity of The Web and the Rock and You Can°t Go Home

Again has been discussed in Chapters Two and Three © The purpose of

this summary of that maturity will be to assess the importance of

& Wolfe, The Story of a Novel© p© 3.9© 82

Perkins 8 rote in either eausing or permitting that maturity to reveal itself* .

Maxwell Geismar says of Wolfe that "The change of his her®°s name from Eugene Gant to George Webber was more than a mere change of name* The mature Wolfe was no longer primarily concerned with one 7 young man, however gifted, but with all young men, 0 » 0M This was

indeed a change from the earlier egocentric Wolfe. Of all the novel®

isfcs ©f'the thirties, "it is even possible that this writer . . * changed most sharply and surely. At any rate the rebellious and

introverted hind becomes, one of the most acute and entertaining social commentators of the decade®®and a prime chronicler of the national 8 mind in the epoch of the bust and the hangover."

The following are the indications of a growing maturity in

The Web and the Rocks increased objectivity, more realistic optimism, the character inventions, George°s realisation of his need for maturity, and George8s recognition that he was a member of the human race and that he loved life. It is difficult to say in exactly what way Per® kins affected these developments. Those that came about through a conscious effort, such as objectivity, were the result of pressure

^Maxwell Geismar, "A Cycle of Fiction," The Literary History of the United States, ed. by Robert E. Spiller, et al. (New York, 1948), II, 1310.

^Maxwell Geismar, "Thomas Wolfes The Hillman and the Furies," The Yale Review. XXXI (Summer 1946), 652-53. from the literary circles of which Perkins was a symbol and a member<,

Those which came about through a natural aging process$ such as the

more realistic attitude toward life, had undoubtedly been developing

while Wolfe was working closely with Perkins0 But until Wolfe was

freed from Perkins® fatherly guidance, he.did not reveal many aspects

of his more mature thinkings He needed to stand alone to develop as

an individualo

Geismar says that George®s letter to Fox Edwards in You Can°t

_ Go Home Again, the full expression of Wolfe®s maturity, was an indi=

cation of how Wolfe became a leading novelist of the 1930°s; he had

escaped Hfhe neo^Menekeaism twaddle of the ®mob° and the 'aliens®.'?;

he escaped the Lost Generation, the melodramatic and moralistic tone

of the social novelists. He didn°t succumb.to the ideological

extremes of the thirties, "neither t© a complete and. blank personal ,

despair nor to a sweet and childlike trust in the revolutionary

utopia=»but held merely to a reasonable belief in the fortitude of

mans ®his ability to suffer and somehow to survive.®"

The following are the indications of maturity in You Can®t Go

Home Agains objectivity further increased, the excellent portrayal

of speculation fever in Libya Hill, character inventions, Webber®s

further recognition and achievement of his need for maturity, the use

of political-asocial ideas, the inanity of the "world that Jack built," 84 and the bouyant optimism for the future of Americao In this novel

Wolfe was Ma prophetic voice who brought the same shattering intensity to his studies of contemporary demoralisation, the climate of Fascism in Europe and America, the - confusion and tout of the masses, that he did /in Look Homeward, Angel and Of Time and the River/ to his self~ in torment and yearningo”

Perkins 0 influence in the development of this prophetic voice is here again largely conjecturalo Some of the most brilliant satire of You Can°t Go Home Again was merely the result of hurt feelings, feelings insulted by the publishing world of which Perkins was a parto

Again, the social maturity was something that WbIfe had been develop- ing for years prior to his death 0 One great factor in this maturity was the effect of the depression upon him (Kasin calls him "the most 11 alert and brilliant novelist of depression America" ) 0 But this social maturity did not develop freely and did not receive expression in Wolfe°s writing until he broke off with Perkins, for Perkins did not share Wolfe's social philosophy,, Indeed, it was Perkins' opposi=> tion and the fierce arguments the two men had on the subject which made Wolfe clarify his ideas in his own mind and which enableddhim to express them in sure and optimistic terms.

*^Alfred Kazin, "The Rhetoric and the Agony," On Native Grounds (New York, 1942), p, 478,

U IMd., p, 477, 85

Perkins himself saw the calm maturity the author had acquired after passing through a harrowing period and then emerging with a certain self-confident poise =. During an evening spent with Wolfe in early 1938, which turned out to be the last time they ever saw each other, Perkins was enabled to see "the greater philosophical detach-, memt and pervasive sense of humor which had come to M m /Wolfe/ with his new, less egotistic attitude toward life and his conviction that 12 you ean°t go home againo"

Geismar sums up Wolfe's final maturity, one which was seen not only in the novels but in the mans

Thus we realise the total expression of Wolfe's new achievement— his gain in objectivity, perspective, re­ straint; his movement from the eccentric to the normal; and from the unique individual to the communal good; his growing sense of historical and sociological patterns; culminating in these, his last deep conviction of social maladjustment

. Prior to reaching this maturity and a measure of calmness at the end of his life, Wolfe passed through some very difficult yearso

"Many physicians would say that in his last years he was a victim of manic-depressive psychosis,, He also developed paranoid symptoms

<,0 0 0M^ The symptoms of paranoia are suspiciousness, persecutory

• 12 Nowell, Thomas Wolfe, p„ 415„ 13 ' • - Geismar, Writers in Crisis,, p. 2250 14 Malcolm Cowley, "Thomas Wolfe," Atlantic Monthly, CC (Nov. 1957), 210o 86 feelings$ jealousy, and se 1£=importanee $, all of which can be seen in

Wolfe°s letters as well as in the lives @£ his autobiographical pro­ tagonist s 0 In Wolfes a feeling of being slighted grows into a sus­ picion of being slandered, plotted against, and attacked,, This feeling of being persecuted by the entire.literary world is seen in

The Web and the Rock and You Can't Go Home Again, It was during the writing of these novels that Wolfe suffered the worst of his dis~ illusionment, and, in fact, a certain amount of "persecution” can be seen In his life, in the form of needlessly cruel reviews and law- suits,. However, what would merely have been a bother to another man was persecution to Wolfe 0 .

Wolfe succeeded in turning these unhappy years to profits

During the writing of his last two novels <> „ „ Wolfe almost felt that he had lost everything,, „ „ = His para® noid visions assailed him constantly,, „ „ , and what Wolfe had gained during these years of lonely and tormented struggle was the experience and the perspective, the central view of life, which put his novels in the main stream of our literature

Joseph Warren Beach also mentions a "hint of paranoia” in the behavior of Wolfe6s protagonist but states that the appearance of You

Can, °t Go Home Again assured us that "sanity at length had gained the 16 upper hando”

15 Maxwell Geismar, "Faithfully Yours, Thomas Wolfe,” Hew York Times Book Review (October 7, 1956), 34,

16 Beach, p. 214, 87

Further support is given to the idea that Wolfe profited from breaking off with Perkins by Edwin Berry Burgum, who says that Wolfe's

'"breaking up of a relationship is always bound up with an obscure kind 17 of growth," This would apply to George's break with Esther Jack in the later novels as well as to his break with Foxhall Edwards, and would apply as.well to their counterparts in real lifeo ■ Wolfe "reacts from a friendship partly because he has discovered an imperfection in it he can no longer tolerate. He learns something from every new experience, , , , Each new friendship starts on a higher level than 18 the last, and has stimulated a superior sense of human values,"

The Obscure kind of growth" in the breaking up of this parti­ cular friendship was the unfettered development of Wolfe's social

Consciousness, A less obscure by-product, had Wolfe lived to write more, might have been the elimination of one of the shortcomings of

The Web and the Rock and You Can't Go Home Again, which is a tend­ ency toward bitter and obvious satire of recognizable characters.

For, as Burlingame suggests, the writing of the satire in the later 19 novels might have served Wolfe as a cathartic.

17 Burgum, p, 309,

18 Ibid, 19 Burlingame, pp, 173-74, 88

As Wolfe began t© work on his final manuscript„ he himself felt the threat to the development of his social ideas® He felt that the restraining influence of Perkins was preventing him from making artistic use of his ideas 5 this caused him such worry that he wrote,

6,o 0 0 if I remain I see no prospect before me but the utter enerva® tion of my work, my final bafflement and frustration as an artist®

Wolfe did finally make the break away from Perkins and Scribner°s, after over a year of troubled indecision® The break proved to be a help to him artistically, for, as has been shown, many of the factors that make The Web and the Rock and You Can0t Go Home Again more ma= ture novels are traceable to the natural development of his social

philosophy freed from Perkins 0 conservative influence® Other factors of Wolfe°s new maturity are traceable to the frustrations and dis­ illusionment the author felt with Perkins and with the literary world which Perkins symbolized®

In assessing the impact of Wolfe's final novel, Geismar says that Perkins was not only a vital factor in Wolfe's development, but 21 "perhaps even the factor of Wolfe's survival®" Perkins contributed

in every way to Wolfe's maturity 5 when he was not a direct influence upon him, he was the catalyst that hastened the effect of other peo­ ple or forces upon him®

2(5 Wolfe, Letters, p® 612® 21 Geismar, Writers in Crisis, p® 230® 89

Wolfe apparently realized fully, although at times uncon= seiously, Perkins 0 great influence-on him, an influence that con= tinued indirectly even after the direct relationship had been terminated, Wolfe°s nostalgic final letter to Perkins attests to his unending affection for him. If Wolfe had lived to write more, perhaps he would have demonstrated in a positive manner that develop™ ment which owed so much to Maxwell Perkins, By combining his early lyrical power with his later maturity and social awareness, Wolfe could have produced a novel which manifested his fully=developed potential as an artist. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary Sources

look Homeward 9 Angelg A Story of She Burled Lif®Q Mew York, 1929o

Of Time and the River„ New York, 1935„

Hie Story of a Novel, New York, 1936„

The Web and the Rock* New York, 1939o z The Face of a Nation: Poetical Passages from the Writlags of Thomas Wolfe» Selo by John Hall Wheeloeko New York, 1939»

You Can't Go Home Again 0 New York, 1940<,

Hie Hills Beyond, New York, 1941„

Hiomas Wolfe's Letters to His Mother 0 Edo by John S 0 Terry, New York, 19430

A Stone, A leaf, A Door, Sel, and arranged in verse by John S, Barnes, New York, 1945,

Hie Letters of Hiomas Wolfe, Coll,, ed,, and introduced by Elizabeth Nowell, New York, 1956, ■

90 Secondary Sources

A s w 11, Edward C» MA Note on Thomas Wolfe,8* The Hills Beyondo New York, 1943., pp0 349e>86,

o "Thomas Wolfe Did Not Kill Maxwell Perkins," Saturday Review, XXXIV (Oct. 6, 1951), 16-17, 44=46.

Basso, Hamilton. "Thomas Wolfes A Summing Up," New Republic, CHI (Sept. 23, 1940), 422-23. .

Beach, Joseph Warren. "Thomas Wolfes Discovery of Brotherhood" and "Thomas Wolfes Search for a Father," American Fiction, 1920-1940. New York, 1941, pp. 173-215.

Burgum, Edwin Berry. The Novel and the World8s Dilemma. New York, 19477""" ~ ...... ' :.... * ..

. . "Thomas Wolfe8s Discovery of America," Virginia Quarterly Review, XXII (Summer 1946), 421-37.

Burlingame, Roger. "Loyalties," Of Making Many Books. New York, 1946, pp. 40-42, 169=190, 324=26.

Burt, Struthers. "Catalyst for Geniuss Maxwell Perkins," Saturday Review, XXXIV (June 9, 1951), 6-8, 36-39.

Carpenter, Frederic I. "The Autobiography of an Idea," University of Kansas City Review. XII (Spring 1946), 179-87. Also found in Carpenter0 s American Literature and the Dream, pp. 155-66.

Collins, Thomas Lyle. "Thomas Wolfe," Sewanee Review, L (Oct.-Dee., 1942), 487-504.

Cowley, Malcolm. "Thomas Wolfe," Atlantic Monthly, GC (November, 1957), 202-212.

DeVoto, Bernard. "Genius is not Enough," Saturday Review, XIII (April 25, 1936), 3-4, 14-15, 92

Gardiners Harold Co ’’Thomas Wolfe,” Fifty Years of the Americas Novel, 1900°1950, A Christian Appraisal0 New York, 1951, pp» 127=2150

Geismar, Maxwe11c ”A Cycle of Fiction,” The Literary History of the United Stateso Ed, by Robert Eo Spiller, 'et alo New York, 1948»

o ’’Faithfully Yours, Thomas Wolfe,” New York Times Book Review (October 7, 1956), 1, 34,

, ’’Thomas Wolfes The Hillman and the Furies,” The Yale Review, XXXV (Summer 1946), 649=65,

o ’’Thomas Wolfes The Unfound Door,” Writers in Crisis0 Boston, 1942, pp, 185=236o

Gelfant, Blanche H, The American City Novel, Norman, Oklahoma, 1954, pp. 95=132,

Holman, C, Hugh, Thomas Wolfe." University of Minnesota Pamphlets on American Writers, No, 6. Minneapolis, 1960.

, ed. The World of Thomas Wolfe. Scribner’s Research Anthology. New York, 1962.

Johnson, Edgar. ’’Thomas Wolfe and the American Dream,” A Treasury of Satireo New York, 1945, pp. 741=54.

Johnson, Pamela Hansford. Hungry Gullivers A Critical Appraisal of Thomas Wolfe. London, 1947.

Kazin, Alfred. ’’The Rhetoric and the Agony,” ON Native Grounds: An Interpretation of Modern American Prose Literature. New York, 1942, pp. 466=84.

Kussy, Bella. ’’The Vitalist Trend and Thomas Wolfe,” Sewanee Review* L (July=Sept., 1942), 306=23.

Muller, Herbert J. Thomas Wolfe. Norfolk, Conn., 1947=

Nowell, Elizabeth. Thomas Wolfe, A Biography. Garden City, New York, 1960. 93

Perkins, Maxwell Evarts. Editor to Author» New York, 1950, pp. 99^102, 104, 110, 115-16, 119-25, 133, 140, 224-29.

. o "Scribner's and Thomas, Wolfe,” Carolina Magazine, XLVXII (Oct., 1938), 15-17.

. "Thomas i?ol£e, ” Harvard Library Bulletin, I (Autumn, 1947), 269-79.

Pollack, Thomas C. and Oscar Cargill. Thomas Wolfe at Washington Square. New York, 1954.

Terry, John Skally. ”En Route to a Legend,” Saturday Review, XXXI (Nov. 27, 1948), 7-9.

Walser, Richard G., ed. - The Enigma of Thomas Wolfe g Biographical and Critical Selections. Cambridge, Mass., 1953. An excellent selection of 26 articles, including re­ prints of some of the articles in this Bibliography, designed to present all facets of Wolfe's life and work.

Watkins, Floyd C. "Rhetoric in Southern Writing^ Thomas Wolfe,” Georgia Review. XII (1958), 79-82.