Lot #569

William Carlos Williams

Description

The Imagist promotes Lorca—“Spanish literature, aside from one book, is an almost unknown quantity in the United States”

TLS signed “W. C. Williams,” one page, 8.5 x 11, December 11, 1938. Letter to To John Crowe Ransom, editor of The Kenyon Review. In part: “Your letter, about the Lorca article, put me right back on my feet again, where I haven’t been for a year or more. To say that I’m delighted at your acceptance of it doesn’t half tell the story. Of more importance is that you’ve taken it just as I could have wished that you’d take it…Spanish literature, aside from one book, is an almost unknown quantity in the United States. But I wanted only one thing out of it. I had to begin in the Kindergarten. The effect sought, however, was not elementary. How in God’s name could I explain that to anyone?

As to the translations: they should appear along with my short treatise but I’m not the one to do them. Rolf Humphries. Don’t be afraid they won’t be appreciated by our audience. Look at the Lorca translations of his that appeared in a recent number of the New Republic. They were all well received. And H. has a large number of these ready. I feel sure.

The Five O’clock poem has already been translated into English by an Englishman. It is part of the long poem (as you know) The Death of a Bullfighter, which Oxford University Press brought out last year. Maybe you’d want to quote from that." In fine condition. Williams’s essay, ‘Federico Garcia Lorca,’ was published in the Spring 1939 issue of The Kenyon Review. Although Williams never translated any of Lorca’s works, he does reference the writer in the ‘Translation’ chapter of his autobiography—he looked to Lorca as a great influence and in a sense ‘translated’ his experimental techniques into his own writing. A fabulous association between great modern poets. Pre-certified PSA/DNA and RR Auction COA.

Auction Info

• Auction Title: Rare Manuscript, Document & Autograph
• Dates: #441 - Ended November 12, 2014

This item is Pre-Certified by PSA/DNA
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