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New York felt like the center of the publishing world; it took a long time to learn a writer can flourish outside its gates.
It is a truth widely acknowledged that every man or woman with literary aspirations must be in search of a route to New York.
In New York, the myth goes, these aspiring gods and goddesses of arts and letters can mingle among themselves and recreate contemporary fantasies of literary commingling past. Every gathering in a dingy apartment with bottles of cheap wine and sprinklings of literary gossip is imbued with the potential of being the next cauldron of literary production. There’s the new Elizabeth Hardwick on the couch, the next Joan Didion discreetly folded on the ottoman beside her, with Dorothy Parker slinging sly asides at the Mailer-to-be. Continue reading...