{"id":2104,"date":"2012-04-27T13:34:15","date_gmt":"2012-04-27T17:34:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/?p=2104"},"modified":"2013-12-18T21:28:30","modified_gmt":"2013-12-19T01:28:30","slug":"mcnair-to-hall-november-23-1981","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/mcnair-to-hall-november-23-1981\/","title":{"rendered":"McNair to Hall: November 23, 1981"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
\"McNair-to-Hall-11-23-1981\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[Click image to view]<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

November 23, 1981<\/p>\n

Dear Don,<\/p>\n

It was very good to see you and Jane last night. I\u2019ve made up
\nmy mind we will do it more often, barring conflicts in your
\nschedule or Jane\u2019s, It does seem silly not to get together more
\nthan once a year–a hazard, I guess, of living so near each other.<\/p>\n

Enclosed is the revised manuscript I forgot to give you.
\nAs you suggested, I made it \u201cbulky\u201d. I am very excited about the
\nresult. What do you think? If I hear nothing negative from you,
\nI will have it run off next week.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve also enclosed two poems for Joey, if you agree they\u2019re
\nready. I am awfully glad you like \u201cMina Bell\u2019s Cows\u201d
\n[Written in margin<\/em>: and thanks for your suggestions!].
\nI was worried about that one. I like my poems, too, when they are \u201cthick and
\nmuscular and even fat,\u201d as you put\u2026 \u201cthick and gross.\u201d (Your
\ndescription is so close, it gives me hope!) I was hoping for that
\nkind of thing in this poem, and I thought I was on the way with
\nthe handling of the story, and with words like \u201cApe\u201d and \u201cwalleyed\u201d.
\nI\u2019m glad you discover \u201cgrossness\u201d in the poem.<\/p>\n

I sometimes think of the energy and even the vulgarity of
\ncountry-Western music with poems like these–of getting that sort
\nof thing into a poem and refining just enough to make \u201cliterature\u201d.
\nEarly comics, say, or dirty jokes have a similar energy. Or Dear
\nAbby letters. \u201cThe tears have washed I love you from the blackboard
\nof my heart\u201d and \u201cI want to be a cowboy for Jesus in the Holy Ghost
\nCorral\u201d–words like these have in them the yearning and sadness and
\nhumor of the poetry I often want to write–this in spite of their
\nbathos, maybe even because of it.<\/p>\n

Anyway, I hope you like book, poems and all. Let me know
\nwhen you can.<\/p>\n

Love,<\/p>\n

Wes<\/p>\n

P.S.: How did the reading at Iowa go?<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\n

A note from McNair about this letter:<\/em><\/strong><\/span> The two poems referred to in this letter are a revision of “Mina Bell’s Cows” and the same version of “A Dream of Herman” I mailed to Don on October 8<\/span><\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n\n

\n <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Click image to view] November 23, 1981 Dear Don, It was very good to see you and Jane last night. I\u2019ve made up my mind we will do it more often, barring conflicts in your schedule or Jane\u2019s, It does seem silly not to get together more than once a year–a hazard, I guess, of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2206,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35323,35504,42976,42963,293],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2104"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2206"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2104"}],"version-history":[{"count":31,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11347,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2104\/revisions\/11347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}