People in a Magazine
The Selected Letters of S. N. Behrman and His Editors at "The New Yorker"
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- $19.99
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
Playwright, biographer, screenwriter, and critic S. N. Behrman (1893–1973) characterized the years he spent writing for The New Yorker as a time defined by “feverish contact with great theatre stars, rich people and social people at posh hotels, at parties, in mansions and great estates." While he hobnobbed with the likes of Mary McCarthy, Elia Kazan, and Greta Garbo and was one of Broadway’s leading luminaries, Behrman would later admit that the friendships he built with the magazine’s legendary editors Harold Ross, William Shawn, and Katharine S. White were the “one unalloyed felicity" of his life.
People in a Magazine collects Behrman’s correspondence with his editors along with telegrams, interoffice memos, and editorial notes drawn from the magazine’s archives—offering an unparalleled view of mid-twentieth-century literary life and the formative years of The New Yorker, from the time of Behrman’s first contributions to the magazine in 1929 until his death.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In order to rescue longtime New Yorker contributor S.N. Behrman from obscurity, playwright Goodrich (Blood Relations: The Selected Letters of Ellery Queen, 1947 1950, editor) has dusted off and assembled a generous cache of the playwright-turned-essayist's personal correspondence with his editors:. These include Harold Ross, William Shawn, and Katharine White, all legendary figures in their own right. Although Behrman spent over four decades at the magazine, from 1929 to 1972, higher-profile colleagues have long overshadowed his understated contributions, which notably included profiles of such luminaries as Max Beerbohm, Eddie Cantor, and Ira Gershwin as well as a popular, long-running series about his Worcester, Mass., upbringing. Though one might expect Behrman's own letters to be the standout attraction, his mild-mannered writings are consistently upstaged by Ross's playful wit, which can make even a rejection letter sound genial. White's polite, New England flavored sensibility makes for an amusing foil to Ross's alpha-male banter. Inevitably, a number of documents included here read more like completist filler than key biographical insights. But as a whole, this collection succeeds as a trip back in time to a long-lost literary era, as well as a tribute to an undervalued player in the New Yorker's early years.
