The Selected Letters of Frederick Manfred, 1932–1954 ed. by Arthur R. Huseboe and Nancy Owen Nelson

Abstract

274 Western American Literature Notes seems contrived to convince the reader that this really is a journal. In a three-page span the author manages to talk about how it feels to know oil is beneath the ground, a winter in Utah, and the global oil crisis. He then con­ tinues with, “. . . soft-shell crab. Key lime pie. Tomatoes.” “Girls with big chests. . . . Calves that have been to aerobic class.” “Shish kebob. Mediterran­ ean beef. Melon balls.” It’s the sort of non-sequitur nonsense that one might have heard in a San Francisco coffee house during the late ’50s. Nonetheless, there are manyelements, and I suspect these are not the lucky punches of a “wild fighter,” to commend the book. For starters, anyone under thirty who sits on his porch in the morning and listens to a John Prine album can’t be all bad. Also, as Bass tells the reader, “I know how to find oil.” And in the process of relating this knowledge of “reverse history,” he tells us many fascinating things about his craft. The history of oil exploration in Black Warrior Basin is brief and interesting. The discussion of geological mapping and drilling new holes is well wrought. In addition, there are many fresh and delightful images that make Oil Notes worthwhile. Bass reflects on the slowness of changes, saying, “We do not see them, do not call them ‘changes’at all, no more than we call a beach ‘sand­ stone’ or a jellyfish ‘oil.’” Comparing keeping discovered oil samples in a frosted glass jar with an Olympic gold medal, or a photo of a home run hit in a World Series, Bass says, “But you can’t hold those things and you can’t put them in a bottle and see them after they are gone. Immortal as these other things may sound, capturing energy is really the most magnificent experience.” So what is the final verdict on Rick Bass and Oil Notes? Is he, as Annie Dillard suggests on the book’s jacket, “the best young writer to come along in years.”? Probably not. Is good writing like finding oil, asBass tells us, a combi­ nation of luck and skill? Probably. Am I impressed with Oil Notes enough to read more Rick Bass? You bet! DICK KIRKPATRICK Mesa Community College The Selected Letters of Frederick Manfred, 1932-1954. Edited by Arthur R. Huseboe and Nancy Owen Nelson. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1989. 421 pages, $35.00.) One of the many delights of attendance at our annual WLA conferences is the regular appearance there of Frederick Manfred, whose ebullient person­ ality and approachability for discussion of his books (or anything else, for that matter) are great attractions even for such shamefully irregular attenders as myself. For such a major writer not only not to avoid, but in fact to seek out both formal and informal dialogue about his work is quite unusual and refreshing. Reviews 275 The dialogue continues in this superb collection of letters from his forma­ tive period, to the great benefit of students not only of Manfred’s work and of western literature, but of American culture in general. The letters span the period from his college years through his struggle with tuberculosis, his early loves and marriage, his development as a writer, to the appearance of his masterpiece, Lord Grizzly. In 1946, in a project initiated by Sinclair Lewis, Manfred began deposit­ ing his papers at the University of Minnesota, and in 1982, prompted by fears of nuclear destruction, he designated Augustana College, in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, as a repository for duplicate copies of many of his papers. The collec­ tion has grown to some three thousand letters, virtually all of which are open to research. For this collection, the editors, with Manfred’s invaluable assist­ ance, have selected 161 which seem best to document his personal and intel­ lectual development. Manfred’s correspondents run the gamut from family members and col­ lege friends to editors and prominent writers and critics like Mark Schorer, Robert Penn Warren, John Crowe Ransom, and Van Wyck Brooks. Only Manfred’sletters, of course, are included;giving the other side of the dialogues...