Javier Jaén Benavides This week in The New York Times Book Review, Tom Perrotta reviews “The Selected Letters of Willa Cather,†a look at some of the correspondence that the great American writer wanted to keep private. Mr. Perrotta writes:
In their introduction, the editors admit they’ve defied Cather’s will (in both the legal and personal senses), but assure us they’ve done so with the best of intentions, hoping to liberate Cather’s actual words from the shackles of scholarly paraphrase: “Now we will all be able to read and interpret her letters for ourselves.†They also suggest the statute of limitations on the author’s personal preference has expired: “Cather is now a part of our cultural history. Her works belong to something greater than herself. It is time to let the letters speak for ¬themselves.â€
I don’t disagree with them, though I did find the reading experience uncomfortable, especially when I bumped up against one of Cather’s frequent declarations that she considers her letters “entirely personal and confidential,†or her request that a correspondent “just put them in the furnace, I shall be greatly obliged to you.†Ethics aside, Jewell and Stout have performed a valuable service with this book, from which Cather emerges as a strong and vivid presence, a woman at once surprisingly modern and touchingly â€" if not always sweetly â€" old-fashioned.
On this week’s podcast, Mr. Perrotta talks about Cather and her letters; Julie Bosman has notes from the field; Alexandra Starr discusses T. D. Allman’s “Finding Floridaâ€; and Gregory Cowles has best-seller news. John Williams is the host, filling in for Pamela Paul.
