Bernard DeVoto (1897-1955) was a historian, critic, editor,
professor, political commentator, and conservationist, and above
all a writer of comprehensive skill. As a contributor for more than
thirty years to "Harper's" and other magazines, he was known for
his forceful opinions. His essays were often brash and opinionated
and kept him in the public limelight. One stinging essay even led
the FBI to create a file on him. His five serious novels are
forgotten today, but his magazine short stories and the well-paid
potboilers that he wrote under a pseudonym (John August) subsidized
the first of the significant works of American history that brought
DeVoto lasting fame. Four of his historical works, all still in
print, are "The Year of Decision: 1846," a Book-of-the-Month Club
selection in 1943; "Across the Wide Missouri," which won the
Pulitzer Prize in history in 1948; 1953 National Book Award-winning
"The Course of Empire"; and his popular abridged edition of the
"Journals of Lewis and Clark," which also appeared in 1953.
A busy man with a busy life, DeVoto found time to write and answer
letters in abundance. In 1933 he received a fan letter from
Katharine Sterne, a young woman hospitalized with tuberculosis; his
reply touched off an extraordinary eleven-year correspondence.
Sterne had graduated with honors from Wellesley College in 1928 and
had served as an assistant art critic at the "New York Times"
before her illness. Despite her enforced invalidism she maintained
an active intellectual life. Sterne and DeVoto wrote to each other
until her death in 1944, sometimes in many pages and as often as
twice a week, exchanging opinions about life, literature, art,
current events, family news, gossip, and their innermost feelings.
DeVoto's biographer, Wallace Stegner, states that in these letters
DeVoto "expressed himself more intimately than in any other
writings." Although their correspondence amounted to more than 868
letters (and is virtually complete on both sides), DeVoto and
Sterne never met, both of them doubtless realizing that physical
remoteness permitted a psychological proximity that was deeply
nourishing.
This volume contains 140 of their letters. They have been selected
by DeVoto's son Mark, who has also provided detailed notes
clarifying ambiguities and obscure references. Readers will enjoy
these letters for their wit and literary flair, but they will also
gain insight into the cultural and historical crosscurrents of the
1930s and '40s while taking an intimate and engaging look at a
friendship forged entirely through words.
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