JOHN MARSH - TYPED LETTER SIGNED 06/09/1942 - HFSID 55639
Sale Price $375.00
Reg. $440.00
JOHN MARSH
John Marsh, husband of author Margaret Mitchell, signed this long
typed letter to critic and longtime correspondent Edwin Granberry from Atlanta
in 1942.
Typed letter signed "John" in black ink, with numerous
corrections and additions in pencil.3 pages, 8½x10¾, single-sided, with
three file holes at left edge. Atlanta, Georgia, June 9, 1942. In full:
"Dear Mabel and Edwin: Peggy is out of town but before she left she gave me
a job to do and I finally got it attended to yesterday. It was the mailing of
two books to the young gentlemen of the Granberry Family. Perhaps because Peggy
is the Grand Old Lady of Southern Literature, books are always being sent to her
- and often the strangest kind of books for G.O.L of S.L. We have never
figured the reason for some of them, unless certain publishers have her name on
a list to receive books which they consider 'something special', whether
they might be expected to interest her or not. Sometimes they come
direct from the publishers, sometimes the local bookstores send them out, and
then we have the job of getting rid of them. That is often a problem, not so
much because of the quantity of them but because Peggy tries to show more
discrimination than the donors by putting them into the hands of folks who can
really enjoy them. When these two arrived, just before Peggy left last
Wednesday, it did not take her long to decide that they should go to Edwin Jr.,
Julian and Hal. We hope you won't object to their (their books, not the
boys) warlike character and we off in rebuttal the fact that knowing how to spot
airplanes is useful knowledge these days when all patriotic citizens are being
urged to join up with the Civilian Defense. (That might be the reason
these books were sent to Peggy. She and I are both Air Raid Wardens). And we
hope especially that sending two books to three boys may not cause discord.
Peggy will be away for two or three weeks if her Father's condition does not
compel her to come home sooner. He has been in the hospital for more than a
year now, with kidney trouble, and probably will never get out again. But he
has a lot of stamina and he was doing reasonably well recently, so Peggy went
ahead on this trip which she had planned a long time ago. I am expecting to go
up on June 20 to bring her home after spending a week or thereabouts with her in
New York and with my Mother in Delaware. What is the news with you all these
days? What ever happened about the play? And did you ever get the new house you
were negotiating for last year? It was a great disappointment to us that we
could not get down to Florida to see you this past winter. We have talked about
you often but that is a mighty poor substitute for talking with you. As a
matter of fact, you came mighty near to having a talk with me, by long distance
telephone, just now. After I had started writing this letter, I have the impulse
to throw it away and call you on the phone instead. I think we have told you
how our dealing with Hollywood taught us the long dis-tance telephone habit. It
left a mark on me that will never be erased, so that now I seldom write a
personal letter in person, if there is a telephone nearby. At first, we
thought the movie folks were foolish with their endless telephoning but after we
tried it a few times, we were as bad as they were. It gets into your blood, I
suppose. About the only think that restrained me this time was the thought that,
with schools closing, the Granberrys (or is it berries?) were probably off of to
Whitney Beach or some other inaccessible spot. So I have surrendered the
pleasure of hearing your voices again, and that is no small sacrifice for me,
with Peggy out of town, and me lonesome as hell, and you all two of my favorite
folks whom I haven't seen or talked to in a might long time. It would be fun
to talk with you and I can't think of a pleasanter surprise than picking up the
phone some day and finding you at the other end of the line. [autograph
addition] I really mean it - in fact, I would even be willing to pay the
charge just for the pleasure f talking with you. [end autograph
addition] But that is too much to hope for, I suppose. (Maybe I ought to be
working for the A T & T instead of the Georgia Power Company,the way I go
around trying to impregnate innocent people with my vices). Seriously we do hop
we can get together with you all again some day. The best thing that Peggy got
out of 'Gone' was some valued new friends for both of us and you two are right
at the top of our list. Our little visits with you in Florida are happy
memories and we have always hoped we might have the opportunity to return
the hospitality in Georgia. Please put your minds on it and if you have any
suggestions as to how me [sic] might arrange another get together, they would be
very welcome. We always enjoy being with you and I am sure we would have lots of
things to talk about. Our very best to the both of you, John R. Marsh". "Edwin"
is probably EDWIN GRANBERRY (1897-1988). Granberry, a freelance
book reviewer and critic, had reviewed Gone With the Wind in a
glowing and unprecedented 1,200-word piece in the New York Evening Sun on
June 30, 1936, the day of the book's publication. Mitchell had been so impressed
by the report, which compared her book to Tolstoy's War and Peace,
that she wrote to thank Granberry. Her letter started a lifelong
correspondence and friendship between the two couples: Margaret and John,
and Edwin (a Southerner himself) and his wife MABEL. Marsh was
the husband of Gone With the Wind author Margaret Mitchell from 1925
until her death in 1949. Marsh, a professor of English and philosophy at
University of Kentucky-Henderson Community College, played an important role
in the writing of Gone With the Wind. After his wife was rendered
bedridden after a 1926 accident, Marsh suggested that she write a novel, then
continually edited her manuscript and offered key ideas and advice.
Interestingly, Marsh had been Mitchell's suitor before she married her first
husband, ex-footballer and bootlegger Berrien "Red" Upshaw, in 1924. Her stormy
marriage to Upshaw ended in divorce, and she married Marsh, an editor at the
Atlanta Journal Sunday Journal, where she worked. He later became
director of Georgia Power Company's advertising department. Lightly toned, foxed
and creased. Missing top left corner. Paper clip impression in top left corner.
Folded once horizontally and twice vertically and unfolded. Otherwise in fine
condition.
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