July 3, 2024
Last Boxes
This morning, I requested my final five boxes. These contain correspondence, still, and are long-shots, but were written during the time he was publishing his last books that contained short fiction. Hopefully, there will be a nugget or two. Now, to find time to get in there over the next three days. Tonight, too, is the last fellows’ happy hour, so I’m going to do my best to attend—at least for a drink.
After picking up the rental car and the family at the airport, we dropped off our stuff at the VRBO and hit Jewboy Cantina. Henry was not impressed, but Autumn and Max sure liked their dinner. I knew Max would like a bean burrito, and he munched and munched. Henry said everything tasted “weird,” but I think he was just being recalcitrant after a long day. Early dinner consumed, we picked up some necessities at H.E.B., and took it easy the rest of the evening. I’m not sure what’s on the agenda for today, but everyone’s still snoozing after Max had an early morning burst of energy.
I really feel like I should be at the HRC. Academics are always working.
Man, walking here in the midday heat is no joke. Holy moly. Well, it’s now 15:00, so I have two hours to get a bit of work done. However, the boxes I requested this morning have yet to. be paged. That’s my fault, I guess, for not being here earlier.
Boxes 661 and 664 were a bust. Box 669 wasn’t much more helpful, but did have a letter from Jules Fisher, dated July 30, 1981, that discussed being unable to sell a film treatment of “The Last Night,” but seems optimistic about the future prospects of the project. There was also some correspondence about the hardback version of SFNM (also DP and BS) that Howard Fertig is publishing, including the dust jacket copy:
| “ | Ranging from the sol1d conventionality of its three war stories to the experiments in style and subject of the often-acclaimed “Advertisements for Myself on the Way Out,” “The Time of Her Time,” and “The Man Who Studied Yoga,” this volume contains all of the short fiction thus far written by Norman Mailer. | ” |
Well, that last sentence isn’t quite accurate. Maybe my collection will?
