James Agee Rediscovered: The Journals for 'Let Us Now Praise Famous Men' and Other New Manuscripts [Hardcover]

Drafts and fragments of James Agee's eclectic writings from the 1930s to near the end of his life in the 1950s--from the Depression to post-War United States--offer incomparable access to his eye which was the source for this writings, his note-taking habits, and the self-editing he engaged in. Such self-editing by Agee, or any other writer, not only evidences the concern with grammar and clarity of expression, but also with the author's moral sense, impulses, instinct for communication, and philosophy. The writings, many with print markings resembling or symbolizing changes made by Agee, are journal entries and drafts of poems, novels, essays, and writings such as scripts or treatments Agee did for Hollywood. Sixteen previously unpublished photographs by Walker Evans, including some of Agee, are also found in the volume; thus once again linking this famous photographer and author who together did the unforgettable portrayal of the Depression, "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men."

When I saw this newest book about Agee at the downtown library, I was (at first) relieved that Dr. Lofaro had used an innocuous title, not what he'd threatend at a public meeting I attended here in Knoxville some time ago. A recent one, AGEE AND CHAPLAIN, told things I really would rather not have known about his latter days. This one is purely documentary, using previously unpublished materials, but very heavily edited. I'm not a great fan of Agee, so I overlooked this fallacy; for those purists who hate change, it may be a different matter altogether.

"In 1988, the Special Collections Library at the University of Tennessee purchased the papers of David McDowell, publisher and editor of ... A DEATH IN THE FAMILY." McDowell is the author of two volumes of AGEE ON FILM in 1958 and 1960. It was with much trepidation I put off perusing this volume. Now, I find it's just an interim, as Lofaro hasn't gotten around to descrecrating Agee's Pulitzer prize winning novel yet. "The manuscript relating to A DEATH IN THE FAMILY and "John Carter" will be dealt with in subsequent works." I plan to skip it.

In 1992, Mr. Lofaro edited JAMES AGEE: RECONSIDERATIONS. He's no expert on Knoxville's "claim-to-fame" author, coming from Connecticutt. He just happend to be in the right place at the right time to use the plethora of "six hundred pages of mostly handwritten Agee manuscripts, three bound journals, two unpublished chapters of A DEATH IN THE FAMILY, and an extensive collection of poems and drafts of poetry [included in this book], particularly of "John Carter," Agee's unfinished Byronic epic."

The best thing about this book is the Chronology of Agee's short (but full) life and the few candid photos of him as a young man in the 30's in New York. In one of the journals, Agee wrote: "though I knew the south, the Tennessee mountain-city-valley aspects of it, I knew little or nothing about the cotton country." That is the focal point of his LET US NOW PRAISE FAMOUS MEN written in part as a response to the 1937 YOU HAVE SEEN THEIR FACES by Erskine Caldwell and his wife, the photographer Margaret Bourke-White.

Other notables which caught my interest as explained in footnotes throughout, this one in particular: "Percival Lowell, astronomer and brother of poet Amy Lowell, wrote three books on Mars arguing that the planet's canals had been constructed by intelligent beings and devoted much of his career searching for "Planet X." When the ninth planet was discovered at Lowell Observatory in Arizona, it was named partially in his honor, the 'Pl' in 'Pluto' standing for his initials."

In addition to the obscure poems of this sensitive, asthetic author, "Notes on World History," and "Notes from backs of envelopes," there are letters -- personal letters which had been held in The Agee Trust. I'm sure it took much dilligence on the part of the doctoral student, Hugh Davis, to get this in shape and for Lofaro to do the final editing.

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