Garland in His Own Time: A Biographical Chronicle of His Life, Drawn from Recollections, Interviews, and Memoirs by Family, Friends, and Associates

[On Garland’s Early Praise, 1960]

[206] X [On Garland’s Early Praise, 1960] Kathleen Norris Kathleen Norris (1880–1966) was a prolific writer of sentimental novels, with more than eighty titles, and was married to the novelist Charles Norris, the brother of Frank Norris. San Francisco, August 1960 The first letter of heartening encouragement and commendation I ever received from a “real live” writer came from Hamlin Garland with a comment on a story in the Atlantic in November, 1910. The story was called “What Happened to Judy.” It was my first published story; nobody had ever heard my name. I was stunned with ecstasy. There is no second ecstasy like that. He wrote three lines. “You have something precious. Dickens had it. Keep on.” At that time I was in a hospital with a baby who is one of San Francisco’s good doctors now. And in all the long years I have never seen the name of Hamlin Garland without the sort of thought that is a prayer. I met him only once, stammered out some incoherencies—was cut off by a waiter with canapés. But the gratitude, the love, and the prayers go on. Thanks for this chance to express them! Kathleen Norris, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 7–8. ...