A prelude landscapes, characters and conversations from the earlier years of my life

312 Pages·1967·23.3 MB·English

by  Wilson, Edmund

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A PRELUDE
a
~
--·
Landscapes,
Characters
and Conversations ·
from the Earlier
Years of My Life
BOOKS BY EDMUND WILSON
I THOUGHT OF DAISY
AXEL's CASTLE
THE TRIPLE THL'iiKERS
TO THE FINLAND STATION
THE WOUND AND THE BOW
THE SHOCK OF RECOGNITION
ME"IOIRS OF HECATE COU:STY
EUROPE WITHOUT BAEDEKER
CLASSICS AND COMMERCIALS
THE SHORES OF LIGHT
FIVE PLAYS
THE SCROLLS FROM THE DEAD SEA
RED, BLACK, BLOND AND OLIVE
A PIECE OF MY MIND
THE AMERICAN EARTHQUAKE
APOLOGIES TO THE IROQUOIS
WILSON'S NIGHT THOUGHTS
PATRIOTIC GORE
THE COLD WAR AND THE INCOME TAX
0 CANADA
THE BIT BETWEEN MY TEETH
A PRELUDE
EDMUND WILSON
A Prelude
Landscapes, Characters and Conversations
from the Earlier Years of My Life
FARRAR STRAUS AND GIROUX
NEW YORK
Copyright© 1967 by Edmund Wilson
All rights reserved
Library of Congress catalog card number 67-15011
"Lieutenant Franklin" copyright 1936 by
Harcourt, Brace & Co., copyright renewed 1964,
Edmund \Vilson
Except for the illustrations, the contents of this book
appeared in The New Yorker
First printing, 196 7
Published simultaneously in Canada by Ambassador
Books, Ltd., Rexdale, Ontario
Printed in the United States of America
CONTENTS
First Trip to Europe, 1908
1
Family 27
School and College Friends
39
Princeton, 1912-1916
71
Plattsburgh, Summer of 1916
149
New York, 1916-1917
153
The Army, 1917-1919
171
v
Illustrations appear following pages 88 and 152
First Trip to Europe
1908
In the summer of 1914, I began keeping a notebook,
which eventually turned into something like a journal
-though it neYer became for any length of time a day
bv-dav diarv. I never noted the weather or recorded
e~·crything that I did but only aimed to catch sur le v~f
things that struck me as significant or interesting. Th1s
volume is a first instalment. At this stage, my notations
were scrappy, and I have had to fill them in with some
thing in the nature of reminiscences. Later on, I came to
develop this chronicle on a very much larger scale, and
even to some extent to organize it in the form of episodes
that consisted of interwoven elements of experience. It is
unlikely that very much more than this volume, with
perhaps a second volume, can be published till after my
death.
Of the two short stories included here, The Death of a
Soldier first appeared in book form in The Undertaker's
Garland, written in collaboration with John Peale Bishop,
and Lieutenant Franklin, in Tral'els in Two Democ
racies. In the notebooks, I have corrected punctuation and
spelling, and have occasionallv corrected the stvle in order
to remedy some intolerable ~lumsiness. I do' not much
recommend for its interest the 1908 diary of my first trip
to Europe, but I am printing it for the sake of complete
ness, and because it provides me with a pretext for
explaining certain family matters.
"My Trip Abroad"
Edmund Wilson Jr.
Red Bank N.J.
Presented
By
Miss Margaret
Edwards
[Margaret Edwards, about my own age, was at that
time my closest friend in Red Bank. I shall tell more
about her later. The diary, bound in leather, that she
gave me when I was going away, had "My Trip Abroad"
stamped on the cover.
I crossed with my family on the North German Line
Konig Albert. At the dock, I bought a riddle-book, which
must have been British. Two of the riddles, because of
their badness, have remained in my mind ever since:
"Why is a needy pauper like a man getting down a pork
pie from the top shelf?" Answer: "Because he is a pore
creature." "\Vhat is the difference bet\veen a beggar
and the Tsar of Russia?" Answer: "The Tsar issues
manifestoes, and the beggar manifests toes without his
2
FIRST TRIP TO EUROPE, I 908 3
shoes.'' This joke-book is forever embedded in the memory
of mv first excitement at going to Europe.
0~ the boat was \Villiam Randolph Hearst, of whose
sinister reputation I had been const1ntly hearing and
reading. He resembled the caricatures I had seen of him.
Tall and stooping, gray-eyed and gray-faced, he walked
the deck by himself.]
May 8, 1908 [My birthday. I was thirteen]
The Azore Islands
In the afternoon we passed three of the Azores. First
we passed Fayal, then Peko. On Peko is Mount Peko
7613 ft. high, the top of which is in the clouds. After that
we saw San Jorge, which was very beautiful.
On the tops of the hills we could see palm trees. The
houses were nearly all white with red roofs and there
were a great many windmills, which looked like large
pinwheels. From San Jorge a man in uniform, the
American consul and some Portuguese came out to the
ship to get the mail, which was lowered to them while
the captain talked to the consul, who wore an eyeglass,
through a megaphone.
The people on the Azores are mostly Portuguese (be
cause the islands are owned by Portugal) and are very
clean. So clean that some emigrants from the Azores were
not allowed to mix with the others, but were given a
place by themselves.
The islands themselves are verv uneven and moun·
tainous and seem to be surround~d by high cliffs, on
which the waves dash \'cry high.
A ladv told us she had three sons who had never seen
the Azo;es, all bovs.
We passed St: Michael at 4 o'clock in the morning.