Charles W. Chesnutt to William Dean Howells, [3 February 1900]
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(AC972)
The Dalhousie
40 to 48 West 59th Street1
Dear Mr. Howells,
I was in Boston yesterday, & Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. suggested that I see you on my way thro New York. This is an unconscionable hour to make a call, but I wanted to find out if I could see you this morning for a few minutes, if possible before 10 o'clock.
Sincerely, Chas. W. Chesnutt. Mr. W D HowellsCorrespondent: William Dean Howells (1837–1920) was a White novelist and critic, seen as the dean of late 19th-century American letters and a champion of literary realism. He served as editor of The Atlantic Monthly (1871–1881) and later, as a continuing contributor, praised Chesnutt's short stories ("Mr. Charles Chesnutt's Short Stories," Atlantic Monthly 85, no. 511 [May 1900]: 699–701). He also reviewed Chesnutt's Frederick Douglass biography ("An Exemplary Citizen," The North American Review 173, no. 537 [August 1901]: 280–288) and The Marrow of Tradition ("A Psychological Counter-Current in Recent Fiction," The North American Review 173, no. 541 [December 1901]: 881–883). Chesnutt and Howells briefly corresponded in 1900.
1. This letter is undated. However, Chesnutt wrote to his wife Susan on February 3, noting that he "[h]ad an interview with the famous Mr. Howells this morning" (Helen Chesnutt, Charles Waddell Chesnutt: Pioneer of the Color Line [Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1952], 140). This suggests that Chesnutt's letter to Howells was also written on the 3rd, as it inquires about seeing Howells "this morning." [back]
