LETTERS: Two letters, signed, to Richard Elman, with a signed photograph.
Olsen, Tillie. Autograph letter signed "Tillie"; single sheet: 5-3/4 x 4-5/16"; letterhead of The MacDowell Colony; folded once to fit an envelope, else fine.
In Olsen's minuscule script, she writes Elman, "Our friendship is very precious to me, Dick, and I want despairingly to refresh it." She plans to come to New York "straight from here — just to have time
with you and a few other beloved friends." She concludes the note by telling him that she "relished what of the Stones [Elman's Uptight With Stones, 1973] I read at Hannahs last spring - felt that...I had had time with you. / Please abide, Dick / Lovingly, / Tillie."
Together with:
Olsen, Tillie. Typed letter signed,"Tillie"; single sheet: 4 x 6"; blue writing paper; folded once to fit an
Envelope; original envelope addressed by Olsen accompanies.
Olsen replies to a letter from Elman, saying,
I was happy for your note - best the 'fine & working well' - & saddest the necessity part. I assume you've done all the getting the AWP list & writing the conferences; the only one that asked me - I said no - is University of Colorado at Boulder, Sidney Goldfarb; do write him...Hartwick also asked me, but for a special all women (incl. staff) workshop. Sex discrimination everywhere. Instead of workshop or teaching I am doing a reading/talking tour April, early May to make moolah to ensure stretch of writing time ahead. Alas that I must break the continuity of this -- leave this solitude - and sea...
Together with:
[Olsen, Tillie]. Original snapshot of Tillie Olsen. [Peterborough, New Hampshire; c. August, 1968].
Photograph: 3-1/2" square with developer's printed date "AUG 1968" at the right margin; staple puncture at upper margin of photograph (not affecting Olsen image); small (1/4") faint brown stain at
upper edge; evidence of mounting at reverse; about very good.
Inscribed by Olsen at the reverse, I thought I'd sent you this MacDowell picture.
Richard Elman, novelist, reviewer and journalist, had a long, if checkered, career. He lived most of his working life in New York City acquiring a far-flung network of friends within the literary community, many of whom he described in his memoir, Namedropping (1998). One such friend was writer Tillie
Olsen whose affection and concern for Elman are apparent in these two brief, but far from casual, letters. Elman, in Namedropping, confesses that "I occasionally would sell off items from my library, including correspondence which wasn't very personal, to dealers in order to make ends meet." Perhaps this
correspondence fell into this category for Elman whose financial needs appear to have dogged his writing.
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