'I am well. How are you? It is wonderful here,' the first letter in this selection begins, and goes on: 'I love it here; real mad fun. Especially the evening game of gin rummy before beddy-by (9.30); the 8 p.m. cup of cocoa.' The letter was written on 15 November 1951, a few days after James Schuyler had been admitted to Bloomingdale Hospital, a mental institution in White Plains, New York. Schuyler still gets his semi-colons right, and his appetite for gossip is undiminished: 'Is it still Connecticut, the dear deer, the steady lay, the unprivate walls?' His correspondent, John Hohnsbeen, an art-dealer friend, was having an affair with the architect Philip Johnson, and the 'unprivate walls' are those of Johnson's famous Glass House.

LRB 17 November 2005 | PDF Download