[Rarebooks] FS: 27 Letters from the man who helped to shape THE GREAT GATSBY

[Charles Agvent]

 From our latest Internet Catalogue which contains a truly amazing array 
of TWENTIETH CENTURY LITERARY MANUSCRIPTS, LETTERS, AND PHOTOGRAPHS, a 
total of 90 items, many quite scarce and remarkable as well as revealing 
of the creative process and personal lives of the subjects.  It includes 
a number of archives, some rather substantial, including Sherwood 
Anderson, W. H. Auden, Robert Lowell, Norman Mailer, John Masefield, 
John O'Hara, Clifford Odets, Maxwell Perkins, E. H. Shepard, and Philip 
Whalen, among others.  We have sold about 25% of the items in less than 
24 hours, so if you are interested in anything, please contact us soon.
http://www.erols.com/agvent

PERKINS,  Maxwell. ARCHIVE consisting of 27 TYPED  LETTERS  SIGNED
(TLSs)  to novelist Alan Kapelner. A sizable group of 27 TYPED LETTERS
SIGNED  (TLSs) dating from 1942 to 1946 to novelist Alan Kapelner, one
of  the  last discoveries of famous Scribner's editor Maxwell  Perkins
who  worked  on  the  first  novels  of  Ernest  Hemingway,  F.  Scott
Fitzgerald,  and  Thomas  Wolfe,  and   who  died  in  1947.  Kapelner
published  two novels, LONELY BOY BLUES in 1944, on several  neglected
books  lists,  and  ALL THE NAKED HEROES in 1960. Nearly  all  of  the
letters  here  are single page on Charles Scribner's  Sons  stationery
and  SIGNED  in full. The correspondence begins with requests  to  see
Kapelner's   manuscript  [LONELY  BOY  BLUES]   as  well  as  politely
declining  the  author's  requests  for  a  job  at  Scribner's.  Some
selections:  "I  should never think of making a decision on a book  of
such  ability  without  reading it carefully,- and what's more,  I  am
certain  that I shall personally enjoy it greatly." "Thomas Wolfe used
to  want  me to go out and beat up critics--who often were bigger  men
than  I-- but I never could see that any particular good could come of
it."  Several  of the letters deal with specific advice  about  LONELY
BOY  BLUES, tentatively titled IN AT THE KILL. Wonderful archive  from
arguably  the  most  important editor of the twentieth  century  whose
advice  resulted  in  often  substantial  changes  and  in  the  final
versions  of THE GREAT GATSBY, LOOK HOMEWARD ANGEL, THE YEARLING,  and
FROM  HERE TO ETERNITY, among others. Hemingway dedicated THE OLD  MAN
AND THE SEA to Perkins. Near Fine                             $7500.00

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CHARLES AGVENT
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