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Paula Fox isn't about to slow down. The 1974 Newbery Medalist, who recently turned 88, has a new book,
News from the World: Stories & Essays (W.W. Norton, 2011), and was just inducted into the
New York State Writers Hall of Fame.
SLJ spoke with Fox at the Brooklyn, NY brownstone she shares with her husband of 50 years, publisher and editor, Martin Greenberg.
Tell us about News from the World. It is a collection of short stories, essays, and observations of various towns and places, including New Orleans, where I lived for a few months. It is an odd collection, indeed. There are 12 to 14 pieces, some are fiction and others are real, as they say.
One of the stories is about censorship. What inspired it? Yes, it is about Maurice Sendak's book
In the Night Kitchen (Harper & Row, 1970)
. I was appalled at how it was greeted by the public and the controversy that was created over people's ignorance. Texas and Maine communities were outraged because it showed a little naked boy with his genitals exposed flying through the air. We are the only industrial country, except for China, that still has the death penalty and where homosexuality is considered an aberration. So I wrote about it because I think it is a good piece of defensive writing.
You're in good company with Mark Twain. Both of you have stirred controversy for using the n-word in your books. What do you recall from your own incident? There was trouble in Atlanta, Georgia, over my book,
The Slave Dancer (Bradbury, 1973). A teacher wrote to tell me that Black parents insisted it be removed from the curriculum because [the n-word] was used. I wrote a letter to the
Atlanta Constitution and said that the germ theory of disease took a while to change and to become what we know it is today. Likewise, attitudes about race had to develop and evolve. Of course, on a slave ship they used that word frequently.
You've spent some time in California and often use movie references in your works. Do you consider yourself a film buff? Oh no, but there is a piece in my new book about the actor, Franchot Tone (once married to Joan Crawford). There was a phrase at the time "Frank Sinatra at the Paramount," and I deliberately titled it "Franchot Tone at the Paramount." It is a piece that is close to my heart. It is very short, as most things are in this book. I really never had any contact with movie people except in a glancing way. Even though my father was in Hollywood, he was never around. He would make these lightning visits half drunk most of the time.
What was your time in Hollywood like? Fox and Martin Greenberg at home. It was the late 1930s, and I had worked in a dress shop that was constantly having going out of business sales. All the dresses were a dollar. I got a job in a ceramic factory painting pots. I painted Mexicans with sombreros over their faces so I didn't have to deal with features—a skill for which I was not equipped. I remember meeting Orson Wells once when I worked for a magician for a few weeks. Mr. Wells was very interested in magic. I had to deliver something from the magician to a young and attractive Wells and I was the only woman in a room full of men. But all I got was a smile. I also once met Harpo Marx under strange circumstances. I was doing a modeling job for a Hungarian dressmaker. I was befriended by another model, and we went to her apartment. As we were in the hall, there was Harpo Marx putting the key into the lock of the next apartment. Apparently, he had a girlfriend who lived in the apartment building. He did say "Hello, honey" to me. I guess he wasn't so silent after all.
You spent your early years being raised by a Congregational minister, the Rev. Elwood Amos Corning, "Uncle Elwood," whom you credit with your love of books and reading. What was he like? He was quietly wonderful, and he taught me to read. His church was in Blooming Grove, NY, and he took me in after I was placed in an orphanage by my mother and abandoned by my maternal grandmother. He was a former journalist with a love for history. In addition to being a minister, he was the New York State historian who was responsible for the historic roadside markers around the state. One of the memories I have of him was when I was five and walking by Mr. Corning's study on a Saturday morning, and he said, "What shall I preach about tomorrow, Paulie?" and I replied, "a waterfall." I said that because he and I had had a picnic by a waterfall. Last year, Bernadette Conrad, an author from Germany, who is writing my biography went to that church and miraculously found that very sermon. It was sent to me, but I have yet to read it because I am waiting for a special occasion. I remember a sad day when a taxi stopped at the end of the drive and out came my grandmother who returned from Cuba to fetch me. When I saw her, I said to myself, "The jig is up." I have had a long connection that has lasted all my life with Mr. Corning.
Did you ever think about using elements of your youth in a work of fiction? Well, I wrote two memoirs, one about my youth called Borrowed Finery (Holt, 2001), and the other about my year in Europe right after the war [World War II] called The Coldest Winter (Holt, 2005), which was more impressionistic. Borrowed Finery is very concrete in memory. I don't remember what happened yesterday because I am so old, but I do remember everything about my childhood and adolescence.
Is it true that Martin once sent you a rejection letter? Yes, he turned down my first story! Martin worked on a Jewish magazine called
Commentary, and he had to answer to the American Jewish Committee. In my thirties, after having two children, I attended Columbia University. I had written a story for a class I was taking with Louis Simpson, a poet of the period. I read it before the class and [Simpson] said briskly, "You ought to send that somewhere." I looked at magazines and naively sent it to Martin's magazine, even though it had nothing to do with Judaism. He turned it down but was nervous about it. So he invited me up to see him, and we went out to lunch. And 50 years later we sit in this house.
In all of the biographical information about you, there's always a reference to the fact that you placed rocker Courtney Love's mother, Linda Carroll, up for adoption years before you married Martin, making you Love's biological grandmother. Can you tell us some more? Courtney's mother wrote me about 18 years ago. This big package that I thought was from a school teacher arrived at my door on a Saturday. Then I looked at the card, and all it said was "Go Slow." I thought "It's her," and I called up to Martin, "She found me." Thinking back to the decision, I was in such a bad state when I discovered I was pregnant. I had gone to a woman doctor who said I wasn't pregnant when I was actually three months pregnant. I had no money, no prospects. It was a completely different time. It was the end of the Depression, and I was on my own as I had been for years.
Have you and Courtney ever met? I met Courtney once in the last 18 years and spent an hour with her in a very elaborate hotel where she was staying. I sent her some children's books for Frances, her daughter, from whom she is now completely alienated. [Courtney] is absolutely crazy. She called me up one time a few years ago to tell me that she was making a movie in Brooklyn and asked to come over the next day. I said of course, and then she didn't show up. She called a few months later. I asked, "How is it that you didn't call me?" She slammed the phone down. She is crazy, and to use a modern term, a psychopath.
How has being a Newbery winner affected your career? Well, it did increase sales. I do remember being at a book party, and a woman came up to me and said, "I hear you have written a very controversial book. Some say it is historically accurate, but it so antagonistically written" I was mute and found it heartrending. Then I won the Newbery.
What would you like your legacy to be? I first thought of "good person," but I think that is ridiculous, especially given my life. I am at an age and have a sense of the world in life where it is troubling that writers like Faulkner are forgotten and are only referred to by people who know literature. I think a few people will remember me for a few years.