Lot #600

Zane Grey Autograph Letter Signed

Description

"I have written seven chapters of The Last of the Plainsmen," writes Grey, "I don't know how good it is, but I'll gamble what the desert looks and feels like"

ALS signed “Zane,” two pages, 8.25 x 11, Cottage Point (Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania) letterhead, December 25, 1907. Penned on “Christmas Day,” a wonderful handwritten letter to his friend, Dan, in part: “I have never had a friend…I have always been a little afraid of you…because I liked you and was afraid you would soon see through me, and regarding me as an opaque, substanceless [sic] shadow, pass me by…I never thought of being different from my real self…I said, 'If he is ever to like me at all, it must be with bad and all!” Grey notes that he never cared what anyone thought of him, but that he “did care what you thought.” He refers to his wife, Dolly (Lina Roth), “She is a woman and thinks me a hero, and you are a man and know that I am not,” and elaborates, in a very romanticized manner, on he and Dan becoming friends: “Such glimpses as I have had myself in some gray sleepless morning hour…twilight lonesome…have bewildered and terrified me. I have seen a calm, deep, star-studded pool and I have seen a maelstrom. So here's to the day I blindly broke into your office, broke in when the world was dark…the day I broke in, to find a friend…What you said…is dearer to me than to see this lion-story with Harper's imprint.” [ostensibly referring to ‘The Last of the Plainsmen,’" which was not published by [Harper's] Grey talks of his “struggle against darkness” made light because “hope and faith are light,” and concludes the letter with details of his writing: “I have written seven chapters of The Last of the Plainsmen [published 1908] since I saw you. I don't know how good it is, but I'll gamble what the desert looks and feels like…the Grand Canyon…what Buffalo Jones was…simply telling the thing as reminiscence…But the story…has taken on a new life. I seem to have a different feeling for it…I've got the desert, and the forest…the wind…the sun, all right here with me. Well, Banzai! Old Man.” In fine condition.

Auction Info

• Auction Title: Fine Autograph and Artifacts
• Dates: September 28, 2024 - October 16, 2024

This item is Pre-Certified by PSA/DNA
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