Letters

Still Misses Matt
Richard – I have been an O’Hara fan since junior year in high school in 1976 when an English teacher at Episcopal Academy had us read Appointment at Samarra. I grew up in Philadelphia and went to Lafayette College and Dickinson Law School (now Penn State Law School) so much of what O’Hara wrote about –his Region, Philadelphia, New York – was all very familiar to me. I think I have read everything JOH has written (many several times over), all of the biographies and some of literary criticism. I wrote Mr. Bruccoli after having read the JOH Hollywood book he did and thanked him for it sort of on a whim because to this day it bothers me that JOH is not in most bookstores even “literary” bookstores but with the Hollywood book JOH was still in print. I had read a number of Mr. Bruccoli’s other books on JOH, Hemmingway, Fitzgerald, Wolfe etc and always admired his work. He was very gracious and responded to my assertion of JOH as the best American short story writer as forwarded to you (I personally think there is not even a legitimate argument for Hemmingway/Fitzgerald doesn’t have comparable volume although his short stories are excellent/Salinger isn’t even in the conversation/Poe is perhaps the only 19th century contender/ BTW I agree with Mr. Bruccoli that in the English language Maugham is in the hunt as his short stories are superb)… I have to dig thru my email further as Mr. Bruccoli and I discussed meeting in NY but it never came to pass as I believe his illness was diagnosed shortly thereafter. Absolutely count me as a member as well as my son Kevin (26). By all means print Mr. Bruccoli’s email to me with his observations about JOH. I was honored to receive his reply and am sorry to this day that we never got to have our NY dinner. It would have been a great evening listening to someone as knowledgeable as him talk about JOH. Look forward to meeting you before too long.


Kind regards,
Andy Ryan


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