PAUL GREEN - AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED 03/03/1979 - HFSID 185873

PAUL GREEN
Poignant letter discussing the travails of old age: "...time must take its due without favor and always does. Our imperative is not to hasten the taking ..." The letter is also full of references to Green's beloved outdoor drama, The Lost Colony.
Autograph Letter signed: "Paul", 1 page, 8x10. Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 1979 March 3. On personal letterhead to "Dear David". In full: "I have been in the hospital here for awhile for long and thorough check-ups, but am now back home and to my mail. Thanks for your note of some weeks ago. Mrs. Wynn passed the information relative to our beloved Don Somers on to Bob Hyatt, the general manager of 'The Lost Colony'. We all thank you, and maybe Bob has followed through. We are all happy that Sam Selden seems much content with his new rest home. A good man if ever there was one, but time must take its due without favor and always does. Our imperative is not to hasten the taking, and Sam has never done that. Best to you". Dramatist Paul Green (1894-1981), one of the South's most revered writers, was awarded the 1927 Pulitzer Prize in Drama for In Abraham's Bosom, his first Broadway play. The work was followed by six additional Broadway plays as well a screenplay, short story collections and non-fiction books. His pacifist musical Johnny Johnson (1936), featured music by Kurt Weill written while Green was having an affair with Weill's wife Lotte Lenya. Beginning with The Lost Colony (1937), Green created "symphonic dramas" intended for outdoor performance, the first of their kind in the US. In his later years he lectured on human rights for UNESCO and taught at the University of North Carolina. The Lost Colony is still performed every summer at the Fort Raleigh (N.C.) National Historic Site. Sam Selden - mentioned in the letter, was the stage director of the original production of The Lost Colony. Don Somers was a stage actor with several Broadway credits from the 1930s through 1970.Horizontal mailing folds. Fine condition.