‘Forgotten’ Capote Novella

When last we talked to Marie Rudisill, Truman Capote’s aunt, she was bound and determined to publish the 8,500-word novella that she had found in a paper bag just days after he died in August, 1984. “Cousin Bud,” as the work was titled then, had been stashed away in the attic of Rudisill’s 200-year-old house in Beaufort, S.C. Capote, then 22, had given the story to his aunt shortly after he wrote it in the summer of 1946, but until Rudisill went upstairs to search out some Capote family facts for the mortuary in Los Angeles, she had forgotten all about it. Now, more than two years later, and retitled “I Remember My Grandpa,” the work is out in the December issue of Redbook--but not without some doing on Rudisill’s part. Capote’s 76-year-old aunt reports a major runaround on the part of four lawyers and most of the U.S. Copyright Office. Informed initially that “it would be impossible to get a copyright for a dead person,” Rudisill persisted. “I said I know it is not impossible because I am determined to do it,” she declared. Her next appeal was rejected, however, because she failed to include all the documents in one envelope. Finally, she remembered, “I said to myself, ‘Dammit, I am going to get to the root of this. This is mine. Truman gave it to me. It’s a beautiful, lovely story, and it was written completely from the heart.’ ” So she fired off a letter to the copyright office. “I said we were sitting at the kitchen table, and Truman came in with some papers in his hand. He handed them to me, and said, ‘Here, I want you to have this, it’s a story I’ve written for you especially about Bud.’ I said, ‘Truman, what do you want me to do with it?’ And he said, ‘Anything in the wild world.’ And as he walked out of the room, he said, ‘Who knows, someday I might be famous.’ ” The Capote story carries a copyright in Rudisill’s name, a fact U.S. senior copyright information specialist Richard Anderson said was in no way unusual. “We get copyright claims for works that have been authored by people who have been dead, sometimes, hundreds of years,” Anderson said from his office in Washington. Rudisill, for her part, got $20,000 from Redbook to publish the story, and is overjoyed to see it printed in a magazine that will “take this pure sweet story into the American home.” Said Rudisill: “I’m 76 years old and I’m as bull-headed as they come, but he gave it to me to do with it as I wanted to do, and that’s what I wanted to do. I want the world to see it.”

AWARDS TO PRISONERS: Ten inmates in prisons around the country have been selected from among more than 400 entrants as winners of the 1986 PEN Writing Awards for Publishers. Sponsored by the PEN American Center, the Writing Awards were begun in 1973 to encourage writing and education among the incarcerated. Prize money this year totals $575. The winners are: for poetry, R. Geren Edwards, “Nascence,” Jefferson City, Mo.; Charles Culhane, Ossining, N.Y.; Howard Ferrenberg, Pittsburgh, Pa.; for fiction, Kent Monroe Jr., Lawrenceville, Ga.; David L. Thomas, Huntsville, Tex.; Roger Buehl, Huntingdon, Pa.; for nonfiction, William R. Bates, Burgin, Ky.; John Zeh; William Hester, Tucson, Ariz.; Billy Sinclair, Angola, La.

PYM’S CUP: The fascination with Barbara Pym continues with the publication in December by the University of Iowa Press of Dale Salwak’s “The Life and Work of Barbara Pym.” This collection of 19 essays on the novelist who died in 1981, four years after both Philip Larkin and Lord David Cecil described her as one of the century’s most underrated writers, brings together works by (among others) Hazel Holt, Pym’s colleague and literary executor; Joyce Carol Oates, Gail Godwin and Shirley Hazzard. Salwak is a member of the Department of English at Glendora’s Citrus College.

PRIZE COLLECTION: Twenty-one letters written by Ernest Hemingway to his friend Eric Edward Dorman-Smith between 1950 and 1955 have been acquired by Stanford University. A gift of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Field of San Francisco, the correspondence will join the university’s Charles D. Field Collection of Ernest Hemingway, featuring first editions, galley proofs, scripts, articles, poems, letters and photographs. The newest letters are significant, Stanford curator of special collections Michael Ryan said, in that they reveal Hemingway’s frame of mind at the time he won the Nobel Prize, in 1954, and “after the disillusionments of the war.” Of the Nobel Prize, Hemingway wrote to the friend he met in Milan during World War I, “This Swedish business is not very impressive when you think of all the good writers they have not given it to that are dead.” Hemingway and Dorman-Smith remained friends throughout the writer’s lifetime.

KUDOS: In recognition of his 50 years of “meritorious service to the art of France,” Cezanne authority John Rewald, author, most recently, of “Cezanne: A Biography” (Abrams), has been elevated from knight to officer of the French Legion d’Honneur. A celebration of Rewald’s new rank coincided with simultaneous publication of the new Cezanne book in France, the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States. Renowned for his definitive books on French Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, Rewald, 74, escaped twice from the Nazis and now lives in New York. In 1984, he received a gold medal and honorary citizenship from Aix-en-Provence, Cezanne’s hometown, where Rewald was instrumental in preserving the artist’s studio as a museum.

Rewald and his Cezanne book also took top honors as winners of the 1986 Mitchell Prize, awarded annually by trustees of the Mitchell Foundation to authors “of outstanding original contributions in English to the study and understanding of the visual arts.”

GOLD BILLION: Can it be? One billion Little Golden Books? So momentous was the occasion that Western Publishing Co. Inc. of Racine, Wis., publishers of Little Golden Books, saw fit to trot out the Porky Little Puppy for his first public appearance ever in a celebration at Lincoln Center here. With a group of neighborhood 4-year-olds hanging eagerly on his every syllable, actor Tony Randall read “The Porky Little Puppy,” an oeuvre now numbering more than 13 million copies since its first printing in 1942. Peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches and Porky-shaped cookies were served at a luncheon that also honored National Children’s Book Week.

THE FACTS: Just 20 days after the Nov. 4 general election, complete congressional and gubernatorial results are listed in “The World Almanac and Book of Facts 1987” (Pharos Books/World Almanac). “Time-sensitive” entries in this 119th edition of the 50-million copy best seller were hand-delivered to the printer within days of the election, editor Mark Hoffman said, thus enabling swift publication.

STATE AND THE ART: Short-story writer, feminist and self-described “somewhat combative pacifist and cooperative anarchist,” Grace Paley has been chosen New York’s first state author. The honor carries with it a two-year term as well as the Edith Wharton Certificate of Merit and a $10,000 stipend. Paley, 63, lives in Greenwich Village. She has published three collections of short stories: “The Little Disturbances of Man” (1959), “Enormous Changes at the Last Minute” (1974) and “Later the Same Day” (1985).

COVER GIRL: The smiling face of Camille Glenn, author of “The Heritage of Southern Cooking” (Workman), graced the cover of the November issue of Louisville magazine. Glenn is 78.

CAN YOU TRUST A BOOK OVER 30? Dr. Seuss’ “The Cat in the Hat” turns 30 next year, and to mark the occasion, Random House and its ad agency, Geer Dubois, plan a $1-million promotional campaign. “The Cat in the Hat” has sold 2.5 million copies during its lifetime.

CHANGING PLACES: After 15 years at Bantam Books Inc., most recently as executive editor, Linda Raglan Cunningham has been tapped to become editorial director of Avon Books. Cunningham will have “total responsibility,” according to Avon, for the mass-market publishing company’s editorial department.

ECONOMICS 1A: A survey of 4,349 randomly selected college students from around the country shows that the average college student spends about $236.40 on textbooks during the school year. Conducted by the College Stores Research and Education Foundation, the survey further showed that 68% of the students said they were collecting books that would aid them in their careers and 67% said they were saving books they felt to be of lasting value. Fifty-two percent of the students said they had collected at least 50 books. On the other hand, 68.3% of the students said textbooks cost too much.

HIGH-PRICED WHIRLWIND: Having already forked up $5 million to publish James Clavell’s “Whirlwind,” William Morrow & Co. is continuing the monetary pace with a promotion budget said to be a whopping $500,000.

ROMANTIC OCCASION: To mark its 20th anniversary, Dell Books’ Candlelight Romance line is releasing its readers’ “all-time favorite” Ecstasy titles. Also in celebration of two decades of heavy passion, Dell will host birthday parties around the country, featuring Candlelight’s most popular authors.

LARGE-PRINT NEWS: Set for publication March 27, Danielle Steele’s “Fine Things” will be the launch title of Delacorte Press’ new Large-Print Collection. The collection, officially endorsed by the National Assn. for Visually Handicapped, will be offered simultaneously with each book’s publication, rather than one year after (as is standard practice). Also, the new large-print volumes will feature the same jacket art that adorns regular editions, but with specially designed belly bands to identify them as large print.

SOLVING THE PUZZLE: Having threatened legal action over Dell’s “Rubik’s Magic: The Solution,” puzzle wizard Erno Rubik has instead authorized and licensed the book that offers the answer to his newest brain twister. The new book is retitled “A Practical Solution to Rubik’s Magic.”

PRIZE MOMENTS: Harry Ford, senior vice president and director of design and production of Atheneum, has been chosen for the eighth PEN publisher citation. At the same time, Anne Freedgood, senior editor at Random House, has been awarded the PEN/Roger Klein Award for Editing.

FELLOWSHIP: Twelve to 20 aspiring screen and television writers will receive fellowships of $3,500 under a new program sponsored by the Writers Guild of America East Foundation. Only writers who have never before had a script produced for television or the screen will be eligible for the award, under which each fellow also will be assigned a mentor in the person of an established screen or television writer. Applications are available from the Writers Guild of America East Foundation, 555 West 57th St., New York, N.Y. 10019.