John Cheever enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1942. When an officer and MGM executive read his first collection of short stories, The Way Some People Live, Cheever was transferred to the Paramount studio in Queens to write military training films. It was here that he first met John Weaver, another writer on military assignment, in 1943. When Weaver moved to California, the two stayed in touch. Over several decades, they exchanged over 200 letters, covering topics from Cheever’s newfound critical success to both of their troubled marriages. In this letter, Cheever tells Weaver about how he convinced William Shawn, then editor of The New Yorker, not to cut down the length of one of his stories.
5 December, 1961
Dear John,
I’m very glad you liked the story and there was a story within the story. When I went in to correct galleys I found that the story had been cut in half and was told that Mr. Shawn wanted it this way. I saw trouble ahead and told Bill I’m meet him at the club in half an hour and had a couple of drinks. I kept the conversation, during lunch, on the subject of his wife and children but when we said goodbye he asked about the cut. “Do anything you want,” I said and walked over to the station where I bought a copy of Life in which J.D. Salinger was compared to William Blake, Ludwig von Beethoven and William Shakespeare. I went into a slow burn which didn’t erupt until nine that evening when I telephoned Bill who happened to be entertaining Bowen and Eudora Welty. “You cut that story,” I yelled, “and I’ll never write another story for your or anybody else. You can get that Godamned sixth-rate Salinger to write your Godamned short stories but don’t expect anything more out of me. If you want to slam a door on somebody’s genitals find yourself another victim. Etc.” Anyhow the magazine had gone to press and they had to remake the whole back of the book and stay up all night but they ran it without the cut.
Best,
John
From The Letters of John Cheever. Edited by Benjamin Cheever. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988.
FURTHER READING
An original copy of one of Cheever’s notes to Weaver.
Cheever’s interview for the Paris Review in 1969.
Geoff Dyer on the tortured private writing of Cheever in his journals.