MARGARET MITCHELL Mitchell, always shy about the spotlight on her following Gone With the Wind, confides to friend and fellow author Edwin Granberry that "it is tempting fate to ever write a book or a play. If you do, everything except a plague of grasshoppers arrives." Typed Letter signed: "Margaret", 2 pages (front and verso), 7¼x10½. Atlanta, Georgia, 1941 November 11. On personal letterhead to "Dear Mabel and Edwin" [Granberry], in full: "We were very distressed to learn of your illness, Mabel, and I was glad to see Fred Hanna at a party Sunday night and learn that you really were up and about. Don't you think you Granberrys have managed all the plagues of Egypt now? I never knew any family, except us, to have as much trouble. (And, as Michael Arlen remarked in 'The Green Hat,' 'the Marches are never let off of anything.') Things are well with us now but I remember, with no pleasure, the first five years we were married when everyone in our family seemed to have something happen to them. Perhaps it is something all couples must go through with, but I hope the Granberrys are really through now. Edwin, you know it is tempting fate to ever try to write a book or a play.

MARGARET MITCHELL Typed letter from Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and author of Gone With the Wind, to Edwin Granberry (and wife), who wrote one of the first good reviews of her book. She discusses how sorry she is for not writing them sooner describing herself as "oafish of oafs", explaining how busy she has become and will send a lengthier letter when the time is allowed Autograph Letter Signed: "M. M. M", 4p, 7x11. No place, 1936 July 27. To "Mabel and Edwin" [Granberry, an early reviewer of Gone With the Wind]. In full: "You two have every right to think me the most oafish of oafs for not having written you sooner to thank you for sanctuary, good food and best of all, marvelous company. Each morning I've risen, bent on writing to you and, as Hell began to pop before I even got my coffee down, I'd think 'No, I'll wait till I get time for a long letter.' And the time hasn't come. I don't know when it will come as John and my brother Steve, after a five hour conference about this so-and-so contract, sprung on me tonight a plan to go to N.Y. tomorrow and settle the thing in person. I have no clothes, no hats, not a change of underwear or an extra pair of stockings, but it seems that I'm going to N.Y.

TWO RARE ORIGINAL AUTOGRAPH MANUSCRIPT PAGES FROM THE GILDED AGE, ONE IN THE HAND OF MARK TWAIN, THE OTHER IN THE HAND OF HIS COLLABORATOR, CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER (WITH A SUGGESTION BY MARK TWAIN) THE GILDED AGE: SAMUEL L. CLEMENS and CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER. Comprises: (1) SAMUEL L. CLEMENS (MARK TWAIN). Autograph Manuscript, unsigned, 1p, 5x8. From Part 2, Chapter XI of The Gilded Age.Clemens has penned: "396" at upper margin (it has been crossed out and renumbered "307" by Warner). Clemens writes, in full: "he saw the pathetic sorrow in their faces when they asked for more & there was no more to give them, he hated himself for his stupidity and pitied the hunger famishing young things with all his heart. The other matter that disturbed him was the dire inflation that had begun in his stomach. It grew & grew, it became more & more supportable. Evidently the apples turnips were swelling fermenting. He forced himself to sit still as long as he could, but the distress steadily augmented till his anguish conquered him at last." From the actual published text of The Gilded Age:

MARGARET MITCHELL Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Margaret Mitchell, author of Gone With the Wind, sends a letter to Edwin Granberry, who wrote one of the first good reviews of her book. In it, she discusses life as a celebrated author "has been such a hell". Typed Letter signed: "Margaret", 1p, 7¼x10¾. Atlanta, Georgia, 1936 October 29. On personal letterhead to Edwin (Granberry). In full: "I forgot to say in my last letter that I admired very much your tricky side stepping in that article you wrote. How neatly you evaded the fact that you not only stood in the station of a North Carolina hamlet and waited for me but you stood and stood and waited and waited. Dearie, till I die I'll get a laugh at the memory of that day with me getting madder and madder as I waited and you three loafing with your backs against the station while I charged in and out, addressing strangers, asking questions, bargaining with taxi drivers for the trip. Edwin, all the while I was up there with you all, I let you talk about my work. Make up your mind that when next I see you, it will be your work that will be talked about.

DASHIELL HAMMETT Signed and notarized 1930 contract selling Paramount the rights to one of his stories Typed Contract signed: "Dashiell Hammett", 4 pages, 8½x11, separate sheets. No place, but County of Los Angeles, 1930 November 26. Contract between Hammett and Paramount Publix Corporation regarding the sale of the rights "to an original story entitled AFTER SCHOOL written by the seller [Hammett]." Hammett was paid "the sum of Five Thousand ($5000.00) Dollars, receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged." Countersigned by the Executive Manager of Paramount Publix Corporation. Lightly creased. Nicked at upper right blank corner of first page, file holes at blank left margins. Fine condition. Accompanied by typed notarized statement signed: "Alfred A. Grosser" as Notary Public, 1 page, 8½x11. Attesting that "personally appeared DASHIELL HAMMETT, personally known to me to be the person whose name is subscribed to the foregoing instrument...." Lightly creased, chipped at upper right blank corner. File holes at blank left margin. Fine condition. After School became City Streets, released in 1931 and starring Gary Cooper.

MARGARET MITCHELL Letter to fellow author and literary booster Edwin Granberry, accepting congratulations for her Pulitzer Prize but expressing a desire to preserve at least a little personal privacy. Typed Letter signed: "Margaret", 1 page, 7¼x10½. Atlanta, Georgia, 1937 May 12. On personal letterhead to ""Dear Edwin", [Granberry], in full: "That was certainly a grand, long letter and John and I appreciated it immediately. Thanks again for the congratulations about the Award. I am just beginning to come up for air and realizing that it is really true. Since the news came so much has happened - flashlights going off, reporters slithering out of the cracks in the floor and the house full of people - that I have had no chance to really think. One of the nice features of the affair was that Harold Latham, who dug up the book, just happened to be in Atlanta on the day the Award was announced. He gave me a party complete with newspaper friends, as many orchids as a Kentucky Derby winner and barrels of Champaigne. While you and Herschel kept telling me last summer that it would undoubtedly work out this way, I just couldn't believe it.

ERNEST HEMINGWAY and PAULINE HEMINGWAY The author and his second wife sign a 1930 Trust Agreement, consigning bonds and preferred stocks to the trust. Typed Document signed: "Ernest Hemingway" and "Pauline Pfeiffer Hemingway" on page 7, 10 pages, 8¾x11¼. New York, 1930 February 18.Trust Agreement with City Bank Farmers Trust Company. The Hemingways, who were living in Paris, France at this time, donate property described on Schedule A for "Trust Estate": "$10,000 Kingdom of Belgium External Sinking Fund 6% bonds due January 1, 1955; 100 Shares Electric Bond and Share Company 6.00 Cumulative Preferred Stock; 300 Shares William H. Warner & Co. Inc. Preferred Stock Par Value $100".Also signed by a Trust Officer. Struggling writer Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) met Pauline Pfeiffer, an editor with the Paris edition of "Vogue" at a party in Paris in 1925. Hemingway, who was married to his first wife, Hadley Richardson, at the time, divorced Hadley, the mother of his first son, and married Pauline on May 10, 1927, the year after his novel, The Sun Also Rises, had been published. The Hemingways, who had two sons, Patrick and Gregory, traveled extensively.

MARGARET MITCHELL Pleased that friend and fellow author Edwin Granberry is writing again, she shares with him her relief that the frenzy over the movie version of her book has abated with the outbreak of war: "The world has far more important things to think about these days than me." Several other literary notables are mentioned in this letter. Typed Letter signed: "Margaret", 3 pages, 7¼x10½. Atlanta, Georgia, 1940 September 23. To "My dear Mabel and Edwin [Granberry], you varmint". In part: "Here I've gone around feeling blue ever since I had the last news of you (Edwin) that you had given up any notion of writing any more. I had thought about what a waste of talent it was and had heroically restrined myself from writing and telling you so. Then, a month ago, vague rumors began trickling into my ears at parties that you were writing again. Don't ask me who told me because I don't know. I go places and meet two hundred strangers in thirteen and a half minutes, and some of them say, 'Oh, do you know Edwin Granberry who is doing some writing?' and before I could catch them they would disappear and twelve more strange faces would stand before me.

MARGARET MITCHELL Writing to friend and fellow author Edwin Granberry, she complains of the constant invasions of her privacy following publication of Gone With the Wind; Typed Letter signed: "Margaret", 1 page, 7¼x10½. No place, no date, but undoubtedly written from her home in Atlanta in the late in the late 1930s, before the appearance of the film. On personal letterhead to Edwin and Mabel Granberry in full: "I've been intending to write to you for a long time - but you see how far my wants have gotten me. The reason was that when I went to N. Y. to see about the movie contract, my over strained eyes practically gave up the ghost. Herschel B [Brickell, a friendly literary critic], loaded me on the train in a bad way and since that time (up until a week ago) I've been lying in a dark room with a black bandage over my eyes. No, there's nothing seriously wrong and I'm writing you all to tell you so far already the rumor is out that I've gone blind. I wouldn't like for you to hear that and not know the truth. My eyes just needed a rest and so did I. Now I have new glasses and can see very well. It may be some time before I can do any reading or writing but I'm glad enough at being out of the dark.