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the stories I hear about myself. I have mistresses I have never met. When I hear that I am a sodomist and a zoophalist then I shall know that I have reached the high point of fame, but I suppose I can hardly expect such exaltation for many years.
    And that’s all. Write to me soon.
    jawn

To A. Grove Day
    San Francisco
[December 5] 1929
    Dear Grove:
    It is a very long time since I have started a letter with any anticipation of enjoying the writing of it.
    Long ago I determined that any one who appraised The Cup of Gold for what it was should be entitled to a big kiss. The book was an immature experiment written for the purpose of getting all the wise cracks (known by sophomores as epigrams) and all the autobiographical material (which hounds us until we get it said) out of my system. And I really did not intend to publish it. The book accomplished its purgative purpose. I am no more concerned with myself very much. I can write about other people. I have not the slightest desire to step into Donn Byrne’s shoes. I may not have his ability with the vernacular but I have twice his head. I think I have swept all the Cabellyo-Byrneish preciousness out for good. The new book is a straightforward and simple attempt to set down some characters in a situation and nothing else. If there is any beauty in it, it is a beauty of idea. I seem to have outgrown Cabell. The new method is far the more difficult of the two. It reduces a single idea to a single sentence and does not allow one to write a whole chapter with it as Cabell does. I think I shall write some very good books indeed. The next one won’t be good nor the next one, but about the fifth, I think will be above the average.
    I don’t care any more what people think of me. I’ll tell you how it happened. You will remember at Stanford that I went about being different characters. I even developed a theory that one had no personality in essence, that one was a reflection of a mood plus the moods of other persons present. I wasn’t pretending to be something I wasn’t. For the moment I was truly the person I thought I was.
    Well, I went into the mountains and stayed two years. I was snowed in eight months of the year and saw no one except my two Airedales. There were millions of fir trees and the snow was deep and it was very quiet. And there was no one to pose for any more. You can’t have a show with no audience. Gradually all the poses slipped off and when I came out of the hills I didn’t have any poses any more. It was rather sad, but it was far less trouble. I am happier than I have ever been in my life.
    My sister [Mary] is married to Bill Dekker and has two very beautiful children. They are the only children whom I have ever liked at all. They live in Los Angeles and enjoy themselves.
    I don’t think I write very interesting letters any more. I have this pelican of a novel hanging about my neck and it is decomposing and bothering me about every hour of the day. I dream about it. I can’t enjoy a party because it is not done. I write two pages and destroy three. It is over-ambitious I think.
    I am engaged to a girl of whom I will say nothing at all because you will eventually meet her and I think you will like her because she has a mind as sharp and penetrating as your own.
    I think that is all. I hope you will not let a great time pass before answering, though I realize that there is nothing to answer.
    Sincerely,
John

To A. Grove Day
    2441 Fillmore Street
San Francisco
[December] 1929
    Â 
    I am answering your letter immediately.
    I want to speak particularly of your theory of clean manuscripts, and spelling as correct as a collegiate stenographer, and every nasty little comma in its place and preening of itself. “Manners,” you say it is, and knowing the “trade” and the “Printed Word.” But I have no interest in the printed word. I would continue to write if there were no writing and no print. I put my