Typed letter signed “Susan Ertz”.
London: 5 June 1974.
Price: $75.00
About the item
1 1/2 pages. 1 vols. 4to. To Wesley Hartley, an educator and teacher. Folds, else fine.
Item #29047
Responding to Hartley's letter asking whether she would have some advice for his writing students to help them to their literary goals. She emphasis the drive to write, the examination of the market, mentions the possibility of writing fictionalized biographies as possibly being a starting point for them. She continues “I think that one of the reasons for the present delince of the novel is the present over-emphasis on sex. People have grown weary of its expolitation, and too many writers write with the hope of shocking or startling I think this a poor ambition, bound to come to nothing unless combined with enough brilliance to please other than mere sensation seekers. I would advise all prospective novelists to look inwards as well as outwards. Your own lives, emotions, inclinations, dislikes and loves are of immense importance as usuable-however much transmuted and transformed. It is valuable material. The outward and observing eye is of no less importance. Its powers can make a jane Austen or a Trollope…I would advise all prospective novelists to read a lot of good poetry.” A very good letter.
