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Erin Rhodes

About Erin Rhodes

http://www.colby.edu/directory_cs/enrhodes/

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Hall to McNair: June 21, 1979

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 21 June 79

Dear Wes,

Well, it’s damned discouraging. You are good!
Eventually, more than 4 or 5 of us will get the
message. Many good people have been slow to
get published – Frost & Muir for two. Harper
& Row is unbearably slow. Of course the letter
from Ochester is hardly a bad sign – but one
needs more than good signs. I was quick off
the study block, an ambitious & precocious
child – but my first book was rejected 13
times before acceptance. Jane is going through a
patch of getting everything rejected from mags,
having been lucky earlier. She’s discouraged
too. I cannot remember if you have ever tried
Wesleyan. Are you at all interested in a small
press? I just had a pamphlet with BOA.

2/

You might try Galassi (Jonathan) at Houghton
Mifflin in the autumn, saying to J.G. that I
asked you to try him. Publishers don’t
generally accept anything – but some will &
do.

No reputable agent is
useful to a point. I can explain, if this is
obscure. I do use agents – but not for poems.

The writing – I don’t need to tell you – is
what matters. Keep getting better, & improve
the mss. every time it comes back, & you
will win through. As Jane & I always
quote to each other, from “Mary Hartman,”
: “Trust me! Trust me!”

Love to you both,

Don

McNair to Hall: June 15, 1979

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 June 15, 1979
Dear Don –

Just got a rejection from U/Pittsburg Press.
My note (handwritten by Ed Ochester!) speaks
of “fine work here” and goes on to say that
“we have decided to go with other manuscripts,”
and that I should try the Press “again next
year if [my] book hasn’t been placed by then.”
The note brings back memories of another,
similar, rejection, sent me some months ago
by New Rivers Press, to whom I had mailed my
chapbook.

Since I figure I’m due soon for a
rejection from Yale, I’m writing to ask you
if you can think of any other publisher to whom
I might send the book. Do publishers generally
accept unsolicited manuscripts from poets?
I’m told there’s a NY agent named
Scott Meredith who is fairly reputable and
handles the work of many poets as well as
fiction writers. Do you know about this guy?

In my desperation, I’m up for any
suggestions – am beginning to fear that my

2/

“gratification” may be “delayed” forever.

Writing has been going well (up to today,
at least) and has been going steady and strong
for some time, thanks to your good influence.
I hope all is well with your writing – and with
Jane’s, in spite of her dismay on the night
we were at your house.

Down

Wes

A note from McNair about this letter: Jane’s “dismay” refers to the episode of depression that afflicted her during our visit.

McNair to Hall: January 23, 1979

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McNair-to-Hall-01-23-1979

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 23 January 1979

J.A. Amaryllis Incorporated
Box 71
Potter Place
New Hampshire 03265

Dear J.A.:

What an attractive letterhead you have chosen for your new
agency. And the color of the typeface, plant green, is just the right
thing.

I am of course flattered that Amaryllis Incorporated would
think of representing me as my literary agent. I hope that my poems
will contribute to the diversification which you say will increase
your credibility. Have you considered, by the way, the possibility
of a motto in those words? Credibility through diversification. I
see it as a logo, rising somewhat toward the viewer out of an
amaryllis bulb.

Anyway, about the poems. The ones that are as yet unpublished
are: The Bald Spot; Holding the Goat; When Superman Died in Springfield,
Vermont; Going Back to Elinore Quelch, A Ballad; The Poetic License;
Memory of North Suttob, rather, Sutton; and Country People. A
distinguished group, I’m sure you’ll agree. I think I sent TPL and
and MONS to the Iowa Review and the Ohio Review. These poems were also
sent to Poetry Northwest, along with TBS, CP, HTG and probably
WSDISV. Prairie Schooner saw some of the poems, but I’m not sure which.

Since it is difficult for me to send poems out after one or
two rejections, I am especially pleased to be your client. Needless to say,
I am also pleased that the day has finally come when a literary
agency has contacted me about my poems. After all these years of
obscurity, it is great to be famous.

Sincerely,

Wesley McNair

Read The Bald Spot(published version)

Read Holding the Goat (published version)

Read When Superman Died in Springfield, Vermont (published version)

Read The Poetic License (published version)

Read Memory of North Sutton (published version)

Read Country People (published version)

Hall to McNair: January 20, 1979

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 20 January 1979

Wes McNair
North Sutton
New Hampshire

Dear Mr. McNair,

We understand that you have available for publication
a manuscript of poems, of which some have not yet
appeared in periodicals. Would you be willing to allow
us to represent you, as your literary agents, in placing
your poems in periodicals? We have had some success
recently with Mr. Gregory Orr of Earlysville, Virginia,
placing seven of his poems on our first attempts to be
literary agents. We feel that diversification will
increase our credibility. We also like your poems. We
also like sending out mail. We also imagine that by
retaining ten per cent of your earnings, we will be able
to pay our postage, take trips to Miami, etc….

If you would like us to proceed, we believe that we
can secure a copy of your manuscript from Mr. Donald Hall,
pry the staples from it, and use it for distribution.
Would you please tell us not only which of the poems
have been printed*, but which of the other poems have been
seen by which magazines. Thorough, complete, and
accurate records are essential, as we all know, in this
difficult world…

Yours truly,

J.A.
For Amaryllis Incorporated

*& where

II. “Would you be willing to allow us to represent you…?” (1/20/1979 – 11/16/1979)

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Donald Hall
Donald Hall at his farmhouse in Wilmot, New Hampshire

ja-crop

The section begins with an invitation by letter from Joseph Amaryllis, of the Amaryllis agency, to join his stable of poets. Though I didn’t say so in my reply, it was clear that Joseph was Don’s dual identity: his agency was located in the next town over from Wilmot, and the agency’s address was in the same font Don used for his letters. As Joseph Amaryllis, Don represented several poets whose work he liked, and he sent my own poems out to magazines for many years after I signed on, relieving me of that tedious and often dispiriting process. (Note the gradual creation of Joey Amaryllis as a humorous character during the eight-year period of these letters.)

Argus Champion 1979
Argus Champion, November 1979

As Amaryllis succeeded with his submissions and my first collection grew, I submitted this volume, called The Faces of Americans in 1853 (its title derived from the chapbook that preceded it), to a variety of publishers, fretting over how to arrange the contents. Early in that process Don, who was a poetry consultant at Harper & Row, suggested the book to the editor Fran McCullough as a new title there. In the meantime, Don read my poems in progress one by one, combining praise with suggestions for revision I was not always willing to accept, used to going my own way.

But it was impossible not to learn from his letters, which contained advice about everything from writing poems, to the substance and submission of my book, to what should be paid to poets for readings, to encouragement, sometimes in the face of rejection.

title-collage

(My own “first book was rejected 13 times before acceptance.” he tells me, and later remarks, “I tend to love everything you do, occasionally with one or two words to disagree about.”) Section II includes the happy news that I have received an NEA fellowship for poetry and can look forward to a summer and fall of free time for my writing.

[This section has 24 letters]

McNair to Hall: December 29, 1978

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McNair-to-Hall-12-29-1978

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 December 29, 1978

Dear Don,

I have finally finished typing the “book-book,” as you
once called it, and I am scared as hell. All the time I was typing
it, I was convinced no one had written a book this good. Now, I am
convinced it is no good at all.

In my off-moments, I think that section 2’s “porno poems,”
through which I recall the wildly male-chauvinist world of
adolescence, are not the right thing. And then I begin to think
that these and some of my other earlier poems are not tight enough
in their form. It gets worse.

Help! Please let me know what you think! Could it be that
a miracle has occurred, and I am done?

Yours in desperation,

Wes

A note from McNair about this letter: The “porno poems” of paragraph, referred to elsewhere as “dirty poems,” are two off-color poems leftover from my chapbook, intended to reflect the hormonal explosion of teenhood. They weren’t very good, and as I created more poems for my full-length book, I finally dispensed with them.

Hall to McNair: November 1, 1978

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 1 November 1978

Wes McNair
No. Sutton
New Hampshire

Dear Wes,

It seems so silly, to have you back here from Chile – and
me looking forward to your return – and then not to call you up
and drag you over here. It seems to me that this has happened
before, in my life. I am working, approximately, from about 5:30
AM to 10 PM. And I’m not going to tell you that I don’t enjoy it,
because I do. But life is full. …And we do look forward to seeing
you. We have several times hit on a date, between us, when we were
going to ask you – but had to hold off, and then seen the time go.
Probably it would have been difficult for you to come over, any
one of these days, anyway. But we must give it a try.

I’m delighted that you like the book. Wonderful. Remembering
Poets is coming out in paperback in January. Kicking the Leaves
sold out its first printing, and has been reprinted. Things are
going quite well.

I do look forward to your volume of poems. I certainly do
want to see it, and I hope I can be of some help.

Best as ever,

Don

McNair to Hall: October 28, 1978

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McNair-to-Hall-10-28-1978

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 October 28, 1978

Dear Don –

I am sorry to have not written to you since my
return – and that I’ve written so little to Jane. I have had
a crushing work load during the past two months. I’m not
out from under it yet.

But I must tell you about your book. It is just
wonderful! Diane bought me a copy at the Dartmouth bookstore
last week. My particular favorites are “Kicking the Leaves”,
“Flies”, “The Black-Faced Sheep”, “The Ox Cart Man”
& “Names of Horses”. We have both read the book over
and over, savoring it. It is an awfully good thing.

We have also enjoyed Remembering Poets. The Raynos
lent me their copy, and I read it straight through,
stopping only once when Diane asked me to do some errands
and began reading it herself. We were both sorry when
we had no more book to read.

My own book – the volume of poems – 1) almost ready.
I figure I have only 2-3 poems left to do. I
plan on a count of 24 or so. If you are still
interested in seeing it, I’d like very much to show it
to you sometime up ahead.

In any case, would like to see you both sometime soon –
when the “wild” schedule to which Jane refers quiets down.

In the meantime, thanks for so much truly
pleasurable reading.

Wes (& Diane)

A note from McNair about this letter: The Raynos, twin brothers and former high-school students of mine, introduced me to their neighbor, Don, knowing that I wrote poems and would appreciate the favor. To them I owe my correspondence and my relationship with Don, which have lasted until the present moment.

Read Kicking the Leaves (published version)

Read Flies (published version)

Read The Black-Faced Sheep (published version)

Read Ox Cart Man (published version)

Read Names of Horses (published version)

Hall to McNair: July 10, 1978

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10 July 1978

Wes McNair
5716 C. Colon
Santiago 10
Chile

Dear Wes, Dear Goucho [sic],

Good to hear from you. The Parra book sounds almost
untranslateable. In such a curious way, sfound poetry depends
upon the true naïf, and I would imagine that translating it
might always make it sound faux. Which is not to say that it
is not worth struggling with – and that you might not even succeed.
But it does sound hard!

We were just to the wonderful conference of English and
American poets at Stony Brook. Chile was very much a subject
of poems: Adrian Mitchell, one of the English poets, had
sheltered a Chilean refuge and her children for awhile, after
she managed to get out, after her husband was tortured to death –
famous guitar player and singer – by the Pinochet gang.

We brought Geoffrey Hill back up here with us for a few
days. Wonderful. I think that possibly he is the best person poet
writing in the English language. Sometimes I think he is one
of the best who ever wrote in it. He gave a wonderful reading
last Friday night. I wasn’t too bad myself, Friday afternoon.
I told Geoffrey after his reading that there was only one other
poet on the two continents who could read as well as he. He
did not hesitate for a moment, in identifying this poet.

My book ought to arrive any day. [Written in margin: Just came!] Jane’s will be another
month or so I suppose. We look forward to your return.

Don

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