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Fw: Yagoda on VN & New Yorker
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Mary Bellino" <iambe@javanet.com>
>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (39
lines) ------------------
> Ben Yagoda's new book _About Town: The New Yorker and the World it Made_
> has some material on VN culled from the magazine's files, now held at
> the New York Public Library:
>
> Pp 205-6: Ross's well-known "one-nutcracker" query (discussed by VN in
> the intro to SM).
> Pp 223-28: a summary of VN's dealings with the magazine, including the
> rejection of "A Forgotten Poet" and "Time and Ebb," with quotes from the
> correspondence with Katharine White; the acceptance of "Signs and
> Symbols," which Katharine White thought was "a parody or satire of the
> gloomy new school of psychiatric fiction" (she suggested adding the
> subtitle "After a Holiday Excursion into the Gloomy Precincts of the
> Modern Psychiatric Novel"); the acceptance of the first installment of
> SM (rejected by three editors, overruled by Ross), "Lance," and the
> first installment of _Pnin_; the rejection of "The Vane Sisters;" and an
> evaluation of the magazine's effect on VN's reputation and vice-versa.
> There is one good quote at the end of one of Ross's query sheets, on the
> "Garden and Parks" chapter: "Astonished at the vehemence of the Freud
> reference; probably a wholesome thing." (If anyone could ever have
> benefited from Freud's attention, it was Ross.)
> P. 240: VN is mentioned as an author Ross particularly enjoyed, along
> with Jean Stafford.
> P. 329: Publication of the first of VN's Russian stories, translated by
> VN & DN (amusing wrangle over the exact punctuation of the byline).
>
> Much of this material has been covered directly or indirectly (for
> example, in NWL we get some letters to Wilson complaining about various
> of the New Yorker's editorial sins) in SL, NWL, and other places, but
> there is a little more here on the New Yorker's side of things. On the
> whole, Yagoda's book is somewhat disappointing; he aims to cover both
> the New Yorker's cultural impact and its internal workings, but there
> isn't much on the former and not enough on the latter. But it's a good
> read for New Yorker fans, if you skip the interminable quotes from loyal
> New Yorker readers who responded to a survey sent out by Yagoda. He
> covers mainly the Ross and Shawn years, with an epilogue taking us
> through the Gottlieb-Brown-Remnick period.
>
> Mary Bellino
> iambe@javanet.com
From: "Mary Bellino" <iambe@javanet.com>
>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (39
lines) ------------------
> Ben Yagoda's new book _About Town: The New Yorker and the World it Made_
> has some material on VN culled from the magazine's files, now held at
> the New York Public Library:
>
> Pp 205-6: Ross's well-known "one-nutcracker" query (discussed by VN in
> the intro to SM).
> Pp 223-28: a summary of VN's dealings with the magazine, including the
> rejection of "A Forgotten Poet" and "Time and Ebb," with quotes from the
> correspondence with Katharine White; the acceptance of "Signs and
> Symbols," which Katharine White thought was "a parody or satire of the
> gloomy new school of psychiatric fiction" (she suggested adding the
> subtitle "After a Holiday Excursion into the Gloomy Precincts of the
> Modern Psychiatric Novel"); the acceptance of the first installment of
> SM (rejected by three editors, overruled by Ross), "Lance," and the
> first installment of _Pnin_; the rejection of "The Vane Sisters;" and an
> evaluation of the magazine's effect on VN's reputation and vice-versa.
> There is one good quote at the end of one of Ross's query sheets, on the
> "Garden and Parks" chapter: "Astonished at the vehemence of the Freud
> reference; probably a wholesome thing." (If anyone could ever have
> benefited from Freud's attention, it was Ross.)
> P. 240: VN is mentioned as an author Ross particularly enjoyed, along
> with Jean Stafford.
> P. 329: Publication of the first of VN's Russian stories, translated by
> VN & DN (amusing wrangle over the exact punctuation of the byline).
>
> Much of this material has been covered directly or indirectly (for
> example, in NWL we get some letters to Wilson complaining about various
> of the New Yorker's editorial sins) in SL, NWL, and other places, but
> there is a little more here on the New Yorker's side of things. On the
> whole, Yagoda's book is somewhat disappointing; he aims to cover both
> the New Yorker's cultural impact and its internal workings, but there
> isn't much on the former and not enough on the latter. But it's a good
> read for New Yorker fans, if you skip the interminable quotes from loyal
> New Yorker readers who responded to a survey sent out by Yagoda. He
> covers mainly the Ross and Shawn years, with an epilogue taking us
> through the Gottlieb-Brown-Remnick period.
>
> Mary Bellino
> iambe@javanet.com