Max Perkins: Editor of Genius

Then, Max wrote, S. S. Van Dine called “to give notice” that he would bring in his newest manuscript—

John Smith, U.S.A.” He went on to develop his view of himself in some detail: He is the man who doesn’t know much, nor thinks that he knows much. He starts out with certain ambitions but he gradually accumulates obligations as he goes along, and they continually increase. They begin with his inherited family, and grow with the family that results f

movements, becomes too generalized, too little about a

quality endemic to all geniuses—he was like a great child.

The city fascinated Wolfe, and when he was not working, he enjoyed nothing more than walking through every part of town with his editor.

He vented any repressed desires to write by volunteering his ideas to authors who had the time and temperament to devote to a single project.

times in life, he said, and he thought they should come out of it fighting, not whining in public.

With Death in the Afternoon the words cojones and macho entered the Hemingway glossary

He held himself to no more than 1,000 words a day.

Hemingway had disliked Zelda since their first meeting in Paris, when he gazed into her “hawk’s eyes” and saw a rapacious spirit. He estimated that 90 percent of Scott’s problems were her fault,