A collection of Willa Cather’s letters are about to be published, despite her expressed instructions to the contrary:
As Jennifer Schuessler explains in the New York Times, “Cather was believed to have destroyed most of her letters and sternly ordered that her surviving correspondence never be published or quoted from, a wish her executors adhered to unbendingly, even as it fueled sometimes rancorous debate about her sexuality.” She goes on to point out that Cather wanted to be known for her work rather than her private life, as evidenced by her refusal to allow excerpts for anthologies or film adaptations, the latter following her disappointment with the 1934 adaptation of A Lost Lady.
The editors of the new collection, Andrew Jewell and Janis Stout, acknowledge in the introduction that this publication flies in the face of Cather’s instructions, as set forth by a will that partially expired in 2011. Still, they believe that publication of her letters will prove invaluable for her legacy, arguing that “these lively, illuminating letters will do nothing to damage her reputation.”
Doug Barry emphasizes that “Cather really wanted her work to be widely perused, and making her letters widely available can only help burnish her reputation” – and that they confirm Cather’s lesbianism:
The letters should be a boon to Cather scholars, who, in the 1980s and ‘90s, were engaged in a fierce debate over Cather’s sexuality, and the role it played in her fiction. Feminist and queer theory scholars began to read a lot of pyschosexual turmoil into Cather’s work, prompting a harsh rebuke from Joan Acocella in a 1995 issue of the New Yorker.
All that controversy can be put to rest now — we’ll all soon get to have a long peek into the personal correspondence that Willa Cather would probably rather us not have read.
The Dish 