The Editor, 1908-2000

“Perhaps a body of work isn't necessary for a short story writer. If you do one story that survives in an anthology, that's enough.”
William Maxwell,

It was Dad's step-father, John O'Hara, who set up the meeting with the legendary William Maxwell. For 40 years Bill Maxwell edited fiction writing at The New Yorker. He made other writers (Nabokov, O'Hara, Salinger etc.) better at the expense, perhaps, of his own fame. John Updike said Maxwell's writing voice was "one of the wisest and kindest in American fiction".

Dad had already written a few short stories but none of them were right for The New Yorker. ( Nor were they right for Gent or Dude who sent him nothing but rejection slips.)
Maxwell said Dad had talent. He asked him what had happened in the past that really turned him around. It couldn't be anything in the last six months. But it must be something that made him so angry, so sad , so happy, so embarrassed or humiliated.
Dad said getting kicked out of school in Virginia for cheating.
And Maxwell said "Write it."
Dad wrote 17 typewritten pages. About 5,000 words.
Maxwell said "Not even God could have written that story in so few pages. Do it again, and this time put down everything you can remember about what happened".
And Dad did.
The next draft was 52 pages, about 16,000 words. The New Yorker cut maybe 500 words and bought it. "So Much Unfairness of Things" was, at that time, one of the longest short stories to ever appear in The New Yorker. In effect what Maxwell taught Dad was to write fat.




On his desk, Maxwell kept a framed quote from William Butler Yeats. Dad would frame the very same quote above his writing desk:

"Only that which does not teach, which does not cry out, which does not condescend, which does not explain, is irresistible."

Dad though the part about condescending was important.
As he told a writing class at St. Paul's School, where my step brother Derek went, "Too often the young writer adopts a sneering tone toward his characters. He patronizes them, he is condescending.He writes about the 'typical' prep school kid, the LL Bean costume, the Patagonia jacket, etc. Cut it out! Instead of impressing the reader with how perceptive you are, you make him loathe you on the spot."

The New Yorker link
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1962/06/02/1962_06_02_031_TNY_CARDS_000272048

So Much Unfairness Of Things, June 2 1962

Dad's room on the second floor of Memorial Hall at Episcopal High School


The New Yorker published my dad's short story "So Much Unfairness Of Things" while he was still stationed at Fort Lewis. It's about a student in a private school who is faced with the problem of whether or not to cheat on a Latin exam.
It's been on required reading lists for high school students for decades.
As David A Sohn writes in his introduction for the book Ten Top Stories ( which also featured Flowers for Algernon):
"The atmosphere of the private school and the tension of the examination are created with great power and skill by the author. An extremely vivid reading experience, reflecting an unusual writing talent."
As stated in an earlier entry, my grandfather felt the story shamed him publicly by making him seem distant and out of touch.


"P.S. was the fifteenth of his family to attend the Virginia Preparatory School...When P.S. was packing to begin his first year at the school his father had sad "Son, when your great-grandfather went off to V.P.S., his father gave him a dozen silk handkerchiefs and a pair of warm gloves. When I went off to V.P.S., your grandfather gave me a dozen silk handkerchiefs and a pair of warm gloves. And now here are a dozen silk handkerchiefs and a pair of warm gloves for you."
Grandpa Joe and my father in a photo that Dad thought symbolized their relationship

P.S. looked at the brightly patterned Liberty-silk handkerchiefs and the fuzzy red mittens. No thirteen-year old ever wore red mittens, except girls, and particularly not fuzzy red mittens. And P.S. knew he wouldn't dare to wear the silk handkerchiefs.
"Well, thank you very much Dad," he said.
"That's all right, son."

When the novel P.S. Wilkinson came out my Dad told reporter Nora Ephron that the short story was based on a real life incident. He was kicked out of Episcopal High School for cheating on a Latin Test.

If you're interested in reading "So Much Unfairness Of Things", here is a link in PDF form.

http://www.syvuhsd.org/cms/lib4/CA01001173/Centricity/Domain/126/So-Much-Unfairness-of-Things4.pdf

The New Yorker link
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1962/06/02/1962_06_02_031_TNY_CARDS_000272048

Aiken Preparatory School 1948-1949

Box #1

Dad is a very young looking 12 years old in this staff photo of the Aiken Preparatory School News 1948-1949.

He recounts some of the school's customs in his best known short story "So Much Unfairness of Things" published in The New Yorker June 2, 1962.

"For example, new boys, or "toads," still must obey the Toad Code. They must be courteous to old boys and faculty. They must know the school song and cheers by the end of the second week. They must know the names of all members of the faculty and the varsity football team. They must hold doors open for old boys, and see that old boys are served first in the dining room. And they must "run relay"--meaning that they have to wake up the old boys in the morning when they wish to be wakened and see that they are not disturbed when they wish to sleep."