A Critical Friendship: Donald Justice and Richard Stern, 1946-1961

Correspondence of 1954 to 1955

CORRESPONDENCE OF 1954 TO 1955 CORRESPONDENCE OF 1954 TO 1955 121 In June 1952 the Sterns moved to Iowa City. For the next two years, Justice and Stern studied together at the Writers’ Workshop. In 1954 they completed their doctorates. Justice’s creative dissertation, “Beyond the Hunting Woods, and Other Poems,” included a number of poems that would later appear, in some form, in The Summer Anniversaries. Stern’sdissertationwasabookof stories,many of which he publishedduring his time at Iowa. Following graduation, the Justices traveled to Europe on a Rockefeller Foundation grant, and, after a stint in New York City, Stern taught for a year at Connecticut College in New London. Friday [June 1954] | [New York] Dear Don & Jean, I guess Tom has told you about our trip.1 It doesn’t exactly pain me to think about it, but as long as you know the story, I’d just as soon refrain from writing it. We are now in process of trying to buy a good, standard make car for five or six hundred buckles. It was very sad leaving you that night.2 I’m going to miss you both very much & I do already. I’ll also miss Iowa City. Never did New York seem so disagreeable and the East so strait-laced. This must seem peculiar to you; perhaps my feelings stem in part from the rather disastrous entrance I made when all along I thought of driving up triumphantly to the various householders acknowledging the respectful loss of the non-drivers. I’ve been to two publishers so far, one a new second cousin who, to my surprise, publishes only books in psychoanalysis (he’s hit his first best-seller with the Jones biog. of Freud)3 and then to Doubleday where I asked for Ken McCormick & was met instead by a glad-handing assistant who told me “Ken would have been so glad to see me but he’s with the President.” I was soon disposed of mostly because I was too obviously awed by the splendour of the surroundings & the misdirected kindness with which they welcomed me. I’ll try a few more places because this cousin said that they were always looking for readers, especially for foreign books. I’m sure nothing will come of it. Excuse my enclosing a note for Tom—I don’t know his address. This letter is mostly to thank you for everything you’ve done for me for the past two & a half years, Iowa, the degree & above all the writing. I’m sure 122 CORRESPONDENCE OF 1954 TO 1955 I’d never have written 3 coherent lines if you hadn’t helped me. I probably won’t again. I’ll write you when things have shaped up a bit around here. I may just start working on a book & if so, I’ll tell you how that comes on. Best from all of us, Dick I started rereading this letter & it’s illegible. At least you’ll know it’s from me. Private MS. The Justices soon grew homesick. Moreover, they felt increasingly unable to afford Europe on a Rockefeller grant. Once again they returned to Miami to stay with Justice’s family. They also spent a short time in Iowa City while Justice looked for work. In 1955 Justice interviewed at the University of Chicago. The position was offered to him, but he turned it down in favor of another teaching job at the University of Missouri at Columbia. On Justice’s recommendation, Stern interviewed for the Chicago position and accepted it. Unlike Justice, Stern was fond of city life, and of Chicago in particular. He taught there until his retirement in 2002. February 27 [1955] | [Miami] Dear Dick & Gay, I started a letter to you a week or so ago telling you, among other things, of a race coming up at Hialeah the next day in which three horses were entered by the names of Dante, Plato, & Nickleby, all longshots, none of which in my opinion had a chance but which I supposed you’d be hunch-player enough to want me to bet for you; only I not only didn’t mail the letter, I didn’t go to Hialeah, and Nickleby of course came in paying a pretty fair price. (Ran again yesterday at small odds and trailed the field.) We’ve started listening to Amos and Andy4 on Sunday evenings as you used to do at Iowa City. Do you...