Charles W. Chesnutt to Houghton Mifflin Company, 9 March 1922
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March 9, 1922.
Messrs. Houghton Mifflin Company,
4 Park Street,
Boston, Mass.
Gentlemen:
Please send me by parcel post or by express, whichever is least expensive, copies of my books as follows:
2 copies of "The Conjure Woman,"1
2 copies of "The House Behind the Cedars,"2
and either charge same against my royalty account, or send me a bill and I will remit promptly.
Yours very truly, CWC/FLCorrespondent: Houghton Mifflin Company had its roots in Ticknor and Fields, a notable publishing house founded in 1832 in Boston, Massachusetts. By 1880, Houghton, Mifflin & Company (later incorporated as Houghton Mifflin Company) had become a major force in U.S. publishing, a position strengthened when it began to publish textbooks in the 1890s. The firm published both of Chesnutt's short story collections, two of his three novels, and, as publishers of the Atlantic Monthly, several of his short stories. Chesnutt corresponded with the company from 1891 to 1931.
1. Chesnutt's collection of short stories, The Conjure Woman, was published by Houghton, Mifflin & Company in March 1899. [back]
2. The House Behind the Cedars (Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1900) was Chesnutt's first published novel. House evolved over more than a decade from a short story, "Rena Walden," first drafted in the late 1880s. It was the only novel by Chesnutt to be serialized, once in 1900-1901 in the monthly Self Culture and again in 1921-1922 in the Black weekly Chicago Defender. House was also his only novel to be adapted to film (1924 and 1932). [back]
