MARGARET MITCHELL - TYPED LETTER SIGNED 11/29/1937 - HFSID 55662

MARGARET MITCHELL
Letter to friend and fellow author Edwin Granberry, full of humorous observations about someone seeking souvenir stones from her previous dwellings.
Typed Letter signed: "Margaret", 1p, 7¼x10½. Atlanta, Georgia, 1937 November 29. On personal letterhead to Mabel and Edwin (Granberry). In full: "Recently it has been necessary for me to be out of town considerably and that is why I have not answered your letter sooner. I could not help laughing at the memo you sent me about the 'stone from the home of Margaret Mitchell.' He'll have a tough time getting such a stone. The house in which I was born burned in the 1917 fire; the house in which I spent my childhood disappeared in the same conflagration. Not a stone remains of either and for years a factory has been on the site of one and a Negro tenament [sic] house on the other. Father's house, where I lived till I married, is still standing, of course, but I cannot see Father permitting the ravishment of a stone as he feels the same as I do about such matters. I do not believe the landlords of the various apartments in which John and I have lived would permit a brick to be pried loose. Anyway, I'm agin the idea. You were right about the honorary degrees, too. Of course, if my own Alma Mater came through, that would be different. But to date they have shown no especial interest in the matter. I'm mailing 'Co. 'Aytch' to you. There isn't an awful lot about General Granbury in it but the items it does contain are very interesting. Up until this week John and I had thought we could get away to Florida sometime around Christmas. Now, however, business matters have arisen which will probably spoil our plans. Yet, if we do not get the vacation during the holidays, I do not think John can manage it later. Of course, we will let you two know if we do manage the trip. How I envy you a vacation at Long Boat! I look back on that vacation with you as the loveliest thing that has happened to me in years. I was so sorry to hear that you had been forced to put aside the book for a while. I had hoped you were having to do less teaching instead of more this year. I do hope the four of us can get together sometime this winter. It would be such a joy to John and me. With love to you both". MARGARET MITCHELL MARSH (1900-1949), a native of Atlanta, Georgia, was awarded the 1937 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction for Gone With the Wind, her epic novel set against the backdrop of the American Civil War and Reconstruction South. At first uncertain about her book's literary merit, she had submitted her manuscript to Macmillan Company in 1935. Mitchell was stunned -- and thrust into the public spotlight -- when the book sold over 1.3 million copies in its first year. It remained on the best-seller list for 21 weeks, enjoying a resurgence in sales with the release of the 1939 film based on the novel. EDWIN GRANBERRY, a freelance book reviewer and critic, had reviewed her book 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 had written to thank him. Her letter started a lifelong correspondence -- and a friendship between the two couples: Margaret and her husband, JOHN MARSH, and Edwin (a Southerner himself) and his wife, MABEL. Margaret and John first met the Granberrys at Blowing Rock, North Carolina, the summer campus of Florida's Rollins College, where Granberry was a Professor of English. It was during this visit that she had agreed to accept $50,000 in movie rights for her book pending contract negotiations with producer David O. Selznick (against Granberry's advice). Besides their visits to Blowing Rock, the Marshes often vacationed with the Granberrys at their home in Winter Park, Florida. Company Aytch is a personal account of the Civil War by Confederate infantryman Sam Watkins. Slightly creased and soiled. Otherwise, fine condition.