Saturday, May 8, 2010
8:30 AM. Okay, Papa, here we go again if you’re so inclined.
Coffee in hand, eh? What would you have done if you’d lived before coffee?
I have never known the difference, I presume. Yesterday we set out to talk about your state after the war, but didn’t get that far. So —
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Papa, I know you liked Max Perkins, and I know that you nonetheless struggled with him. Tell us about your relationship.
The thing about Max was that he listened. He knew what worked and didn’t work. Didn’t always know how to fix a problem, but he could hear, loud and clear, that the problem was there. That’s the only thing he could hear loud and clear!
And of course, the fact that he could hear the manuscript meant that he could hear the author (as author). I mean, simply, that he knew when to pay attention to somebody because he had something.
When Perkins believed in you, he believed in you. Now, that’s a nice trait in anybody, but in this case it
I wandered a bit, sorry.