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ALS signed “E.H.,” one page, 8.5 x 11, Finca Vigia letterhead, June 24, 1952. Handwritten letter to C. W. Wilcox of Scribner's Retail Book Store in New York City, in part: "Thanks for sending me the presents. It was very damned nice of you. Would you please send and charge me the following: Flamingo Hunt—Paul A. Zabel, Bobbs-Merrill—The Trouble with Cinderella, Artie Shaw—Harpoon Venture, Gavin Maxwell, Viking—The Strange Brigade, John Jennings—The World of George Jean Nathan, Knopf—The Secret Road, Bruce Lancaster (Little Brown)—Submarine, Commander E. L. Beach, Henry Holt—The Atom Spies, Oliver Pilat, Putnam's—Tales of Adventurers, Geoffrey Household—Monsoon Seas, Alan Villiers—Basic Astronomy, Peter Van De Camp, Random—The Thurber Album, Simon and Schuster.
Haven't drawn many good ones lately. The trouble with that matador book is that if Manolete wasn't drunk on the day of the fight when he was killed it was a terrible thing to write. He had Manolete on the cover and references all through the book. Thank you very much for sending it though. Hope you like my new one. Let me know will you please." In fine condition. Accompanied by the original mailing envelope, addressed in Hemingway's own hand.
Wilcox's 1969 New York Times obituary opens with a mention of his relationship with Hemingway: 'When Ernest Hemingway was living near a lime grove in Cuba, Charles William Wilcox sent him a barrel of synthetic lime juice. It should have been no surprise. For years Mr. Wilcox had selected the books Hemingway read, so why not choose his lime juice? Between 1919, when he became a bookseller at the Scribner Store on Fifth Avenue, and his retirement 37 years later, Mr. Wilcox told Hemingway and many other writers of the day what to read—and chastised them if they did not follow his advice.'
Here, Hemingway requests a number of books to be sent to him in Cuba—ranging from adventure stories to entertainment memoirs. He also dishes some 'chastising' back to Wilcox, complaining about an unfair portrayal of the legendary Spanish bullfighter Manolete, who was killed in a fatal goring on August 29, 1947.
He goes on to refer to his "new one"—The Old Man and the Sea—which would be published in Life Magazine on September 1, 1952, and released in book form by Scribner's a week later. As one of Scribner's influential bookmen, Wilcox may have been afforded a preview of Hemingway's classic tale of Santiago, an aging fisherman, and his long struggle to catch a giant marlin. A fabulous literary letter by the celebrated American author.
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