19. WODEHOUSE, P.G.1pp. TLS Discussing the Publication of The HarmonicaMystery and Something FreshNew York: N.p., 19151pp. TLS. Office annotations in pencil and red ink. Very faint folds fromoriginal postage (envelope not present). Lightly browned, but very wellpreserved.1pp. TLS FROM P.G. WODEHOUSE (SIGNED ‘STEVE’), ALMOSTCERTAINLY TO HIS FORMER CONTACT AT MUNSEY’SMAGAZINE BOB DAVIS (ADDRESSED HERE AS ‘SQUIRE’), 15MARCH 1915, DISCUSSING PUBLICATION OF THE HARMONICAMYSTERY AND SOMETHING FRESH, THE FIRST BLANDINGSNOVEL.The Harmonica Mystery was first published in All-Story Cavalier Weeklyof New York on 13 March 1915 [McIlvaine D2.1] -- two days beforethe date of this letter. Clearly this had caused some confusion, withWodehouse believing the story had been embargoed for the time being:‘Touching that ‘Harmonica Mystery’ thing, don’t you remember mycalling you up from 27th Street and saying ‘May I have the Englishrights’? To which you replied that I was a hog, but that I might. I thensent the story over to England, and it was accepted by Pearson’smagazine. They wanted to use it in their Christmas number, so I calledand asked if it would be all right about simultaneous publication. [...] Ifyou hunt through the archives, you will find that letter. It was one of mypolished, courtly letters, thanking you and just registering the fact thatyou had consented to postpone publication. Surely you remember?’Hope respectively [McIlvaine D41.1 and D41.2]. In a letter written in1964 to David Magee, Wodehouse remembers ‘...when Bob Davis editedthe Munsey pulps and we young authors used to go to him for plots. Hewould take a turn around the room and come up with a complete plotfor a serial, usually horrible but of course saleable to Munsey’s! He gaveme the plot of [The White Hope] and I wrote it, but I have never thoughthighly of it...’. The White Hope (later expanded and published in bookform as Their Mutual Child [New York: Boni and Liveright, 1919] and asThe Coming of Bill [London: Herbert Jenkins, 1920]) features a charactercalled Steve Dingle, a retired boxer, in the habit of addressing people as‘Squire’ (‘Excuse me, squire’, said Steve, ‘I’ve been playing the part ofRubberneck Rupert in that little drama you’ve just been starring in...’).The letter’s markings show that it was filed in Munsey’s records uponreceipt, with ‘Steve’ identified as Wodehouse in pencil alongside thesignature, and another pencilled note recording that a copy was sent tosomeone referred to be their initials. In the top right corner, in red ink,partly overwritten with ticks and deletions in pencil (and thus only partlylegible) a note reads: ‘File -- Wodehouse. [three illegible words] makecopy of Wodehouse l[etter] for rights file return all papers to Mr. D[illegible initials].’A remarkable survivor, written just as Wodehouse was about to becomerich, famous, and immortal.£1,750 (plus 20% VAT to EU purchasers)(The story was not in the event published by Pearson’s, and did notappear again after its first publication until June 1955, in The SaintDetective Magazine [McIlvaine D57.2].)In the letter Wodehouse goes on to discuss the imminent serialisedpublication in the Saturday Evening Post of his new novel, Something New[McIlvaine D59.1-8]:‘I have just put my new novel over as a serial with the Saturday EveningPost. It was that ‘stolen scarab’ thing of which you saw the synopsis, butwhich you didn’t care for. I improved a whole lot on the scenario, and it isnow a pretty good story.’Something New was the first of Wodehouse’s work to appear in theSaturday Evening Post, the start of a long, successful and highly lucrativeassociation for both parties. It was also an early success for Wodehouse’snew US literary agent, Paul Reynolds, who was responsible for placingthe novel with George Lorimer’s flagship magazine. And it was a seismicevent for readers then and now: Something New was the book introducedLord Emsworth, Blandings Castle and the porcine Empress to the world.The recipient of the letter was almost certainly Bob Davis of Munsey’sMagazine, publishers in 1913 and 1914 of The Little Nugget and The White24
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