White, in a little girl’s voice that mixed pride with peevishness. “I can’t complain, as to sales.”
And so the interview continued. A gentle interrogation with no embarrassing questions, because Andrea Clement White was now old and had become an institution and there was never anyone in her presence who did not evince respect.
“Let me put it this way,” she said. “It is more important that they are people, from the novelist’s point of view. A botanist might say of a flower, it is a red flower. He is really studying flowers.”
(Her mind had switched to automatic. No one had asked an interesting question in years.)
If she was famous, she wondered fretfully behind the alert face she raised for television, why didn’t she feel famous? She had made money, as the young woman—lamentably informed in other respects—had said. Lots of money. Thousands upon thousands of dollars. She had seen her work accepted around the world, welcomed even, which was more than she’d ever dreamed possible for it. And yet—there remained an emptiness, no, an ache, which told her she had not achieved what she had set out to achieve. And instead must live out her life always in the shadow of those who had accomplished more than she, or had, in any case, received a wider and more fervid recognition. But, on closer scrutiny, those “others” she immediately thought of—the talk show guests, the much reviewed, the oft quoted—had not received more acclaim or been more praised than she; why then did she feel they had?
(She knew she would not be satisfied with the interview when it was aired. She would come across as a fatuous, smug know-everything, or as an irritable, spacy old fool. Her chronic dissatisfaction was always captured by television, no matter how cleverly she tried to disguise it as, oh, fatigue, too much to think about, doddering old age, or whatever.)
She left the studio thinking of the luncheon for her that same afternoon. It was at the college where she’d taught English literature (how she’d struggled to prove Charles Chesnutt wrote in English!) for over a decade. The president would be there and all her colleagues, with whom she’d battled, sometimes successfully, sometimes not (for five years they’d resisted Chesnutt, for example) over the years. They would fulsomely praise her—obliterating from memory the times they’d wished her dead; she would graciously acquiesce. She thought of Cooke, the dean, now retired of course, but unthinkable that he would not show up; how he had always been the first to kiss her whenever she returned from even the slightest triumph, and how she had detested that kiss—his lips rough, cluttered and gluey—and how she had told him, explicitly, her feelings. “But ladies are meant to be kissed!” he replied. She had thrown up her hands—and endured. Or had avoided him, which, because they shared an office, was not easy.
Then there was Mrs. Hyde, her secretary, also retired from the college though still working for Andrea Clement White in her office at home, who was the closest thing she had to someone to lean on. Any time of the day or night she was able to call on Mrs. Hyde—and Mrs. Hyde seemed to have nothing better to do than serve her. She understood she represented to Mrs. Hyde a glamour utterly missing from her own life, and Andrea Clement White had, over the thirty years of their acquaintanceship, ridiculed Mr. Hyde unmercifully. Because, in truth, she grew used to being served by Mrs. Hyde, had come to expect her service as her due, and was jealous and contemptuous of Mr. Hyde—a dull little man with the flat, sour cheeks of a snake—who provided his wife little of the excitement Andrea Clement White felt was generated spontaneously in her own atmosphere.
Mrs. Hyde was, in fact, driving the car, Mrs. Clement White seated beside her. And one could tell from the restful silence in the car that they shared a very real life together. If Andrea Clement White
And so the interview continued. A gentle interrogation with no embarrassing questions, because Andrea Clement White was now old and had become an institution and there was never anyone in her presence who did not evince respect.
“Let me put it this way,” she said. “It is more important that they are people, from the novelist’s point of view. A botanist might say of a flower, it is a red flower. He is really studying flowers.”
(Her mind had switched to automatic. No one had asked an interesting question in years.)
If she was famous, she wondered fretfully behind the alert face she raised for television, why didn’t she feel famous? She had made money, as the young woman—lamentably informed in other respects—had said. Lots of money. Thousands upon thousands of dollars. She had seen her work accepted around the world, welcomed even, which was more than she’d ever dreamed possible for it. And yet—there remained an emptiness, no, an ache, which told her she had not achieved what she had set out to achieve. And instead must live out her life always in the shadow of those who had accomplished more than she, or had, in any case, received a wider and more fervid recognition. But, on closer scrutiny, those “others” she immediately thought of—the talk show guests, the much reviewed, the oft quoted—had not received more acclaim or been more praised than she; why then did she feel they had?
(She knew she would not be satisfied with the interview when it was aired. She would come across as a fatuous, smug know-everything, or as an irritable, spacy old fool. Her chronic dissatisfaction was always captured by television, no matter how cleverly she tried to disguise it as, oh, fatigue, too much to think about, doddering old age, or whatever.)
She left the studio thinking of the luncheon for her that same afternoon. It was at the college where she’d taught English literature (how she’d struggled to prove Charles Chesnutt wrote in English!) for over a decade. The president would be there and all her colleagues, with whom she’d battled, sometimes successfully, sometimes not (for five years they’d resisted Chesnutt, for example) over the years. They would fulsomely praise her—obliterating from memory the times they’d wished her dead; she would graciously acquiesce. She thought of Cooke, the dean, now retired of course, but unthinkable that he would not show up; how he had always been the first to kiss her whenever she returned from even the slightest triumph, and how she had detested that kiss—his lips rough, cluttered and gluey—and how she had told him, explicitly, her feelings. “But ladies are meant to be kissed!” he replied. She had thrown up her hands—and endured. Or had avoided him, which, because they shared an office, was not easy.
Then there was Mrs. Hyde, her secretary, also retired from the college though still working for Andrea Clement White in her office at home, who was the closest thing she had to someone to lean on. Any time of the day or night she was able to call on Mrs. Hyde—and Mrs. Hyde seemed to have nothing better to do than serve her. She understood she represented to Mrs. Hyde a glamour utterly missing from her own life, and Andrea Clement White had, over the thirty years of their acquaintanceship, ridiculed Mr. Hyde unmercifully. Because, in truth, she grew used to being served by Mrs. Hyde, had come to expect her service as her due, and was jealous and contemptuous of Mr. Hyde—a dull little man with the flat, sour cheeks of a snake—who provided his wife little of the excitement Andrea Clement White felt was generated spontaneously in her own atmosphere.
Mrs. Hyde was, in fact, driving the car, Mrs. Clement White seated beside her. And one could tell from the restful silence in the car that they shared a very real life together. If Andrea Clement White
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