Thursday, January 8, 1976
11 PM. Another semester has ended, and I have the rest of the month to myself. I’ll try to make good use of the free time and not squander it with ennui or meaningless activities.
Last night’s final exam was fairly straightforward. I didn’t give Prof. Murphy a postcard, but he’ll probably give me an A in the class, as I’m sure Baumbach will for both the Workshop and the Tutorial.
The people at the Junction meeting last night were me, Marie, Donny, Michael Malinowitz and Debra Quinlan. The first issue came out, and it’s quite handsome, although I wonder about the quality of the writing, especially the prose.
We’ve got to have another meeting when all the copies arrive, and Marie wants us to have a publication party, too. She showed me a photo of myself she’d taken in the office, and I couldn’t bear to look at it.
In the meantime, I’ve got the submissions for the prose for the spring issue. From this experience as a literary magazine editor, I’ll probably learn to tolerate rejections more easily.
Today I got a rejection from American Review for “Au Milieu Intérieur,” but they wrote, “Try again,” which is the first encouragement I’ve ever received from that publication. I’m going to try to get into some bigger markets now, and ones that pay, too.
This afternoon Simon implied that his own stories were too good for the little magazines and that he wouldn’t deign to send things to the places where I’ve been accepted. “Maybe my weakest stories,” he said. Simon is still so infuriatingly patronizing!
I’m going to send out a batch of stories tomorrow, and then I’m going to cool it and concentrate on my writing – which is, after all, the important thing.
Marc and I haven’t been the closest of brothers – he and Jonny are closer – but we have always respected each other. Today he asked me for advice about a personal problem, and I was flattered, as I was when Dad came to me last week.
Fern is home from school, and Marc thinks she doesn’t want to see him because she’s going through some emotional difficulties, something akin to what I had. I guess Marc still cares for Fern and wants to help her; I find that admirable.
Last night I dreamed of Jonny as a baby. Now that he’s a teenager, I’ve forgotten how much I adored him when he was a toddler. I used to think he was the greatest child in the world, and the feelings came back to me in several dreams last night.
My final class at LIU this morning was both a letdown and an anti
Mr. Cato, Mercedes Pessoa, and Arnold Batta didn’t come in to write their final paragraph today; I’m probably going to fail Arnold, who got a 38 on the test.
With the exception of a few students like Guilaine Richard and Daisy Soto, most of them didn’t do any work. I probably let them get away with too much because I wanted to be a nice guy.
But being easy doesn’t really help them to learn anything; still, I was gratified by the remarks Guilaine and Daisy wrote at the end of their finals, and by the comments Guadalupe made on Tuesday.
In our last Fiction Workshop today, we went over a story of Sharon’s. It will be good to take a break from the class before our last term in the MFA program.
On campus, I ran into Linda, who looked very well, with a deep tan from Puerto Rico. She said she’s almost through with her course work at the Graduate Center and will begin her dissertation soon.
Tuesday, January 13, 1976
I know enough about myself to know that my physical illnesses are very often somatic reactions to changes in my life, and mostly those changes having to do with loss.
My last illness, the stomach virus, came at a time when I knew Ronna and I were breaking up; since then, I really haven’t had any significant loss – or any significant illness, either.
The day after Rochelle Wouk told me she was leaving me without a therapist, I caught the flu. With Mrs. Ehrlich, my reaction when I had to stop therapy was almost entirely emotional, but I was prepared for that loss.
Now I am facing a new year fraught with change, really significant change. 
And for the last seven years, I’ve been going to college, where I did well, where it was easy for me to succeed academically, socially, politically. But last night I registered for my final semester of college; for the first time, there will be no “next semester” in the fall.
I don’t regret not going on for my Ph.D.; at this point, I think that would be a cop-out. Last night, expressing her reaction to my not continuing my education, Sharon said, “But, Richard, you’re a student!”
After graduating law school in Seattle, Sindy wrote that she misses being a student already, but I’m not yet out of school, and already I miss it.
Things are also so uncertain with my family. Dad is ruining his health worrying about his business; he just cannot seem to make up his mind what to do, and it’s costing him financially, emotionally and physically.
Dad took Joel back at his old exorbitant salary, knowing Joel won’t produce at work after he quit so hastily back in the fall. Mom says it’s because Dad wants Michael to get Joel’s support money.
Last year, when Dad had a chance to go partners with that guy in his building, Grandpa Nat vetoed the idea, feeling that he still wanted to work. As it turned out, the man’s business failed and he’s gone from 87 Fifth Avenue, but who’s to say it wouldn’t have worked out better if Dad had gone in with him?
Dad claims he can’t go out of business because then his customers wouldn’t 
So Dad just plods along half-assed, taking Marc into the business or not, taking tranquilizers, smoking, and overeating. But I’m not in much better shape.
Last night Mom said she and Dad would pay my way if I wanted to fly down to Florida for a few days. That is tempting, the idea of sitting in the sun . . . But I don’t know if it would solve anything.
Well, maybe I’ll have to go through another week or two of this depression until I reintegrate my circuits to cope with the changes coming in my life. The daily rejection notices do not help much, I have to admit. And I cannot seem to write a line.
Wednesday, January 14, 1976
Slowly my strength and spirits are returning. I went to LIU this afternoon and completed all my marking. It was a great deal of work and quite a chore, but I’m glad it’s all over. I love teaching, but the clerical work that is part of final grades is a total bore.
I handed Margaret all my keys and told her I’d be available next semester if anything turns up. There were pluses and minuses to this term, but on the whole, teaching at LIU again was a rewarding experience.
Last evening I called Ronna after deciding I was being foolish in not speaking to her until she called me first. She was on the other phone, her sister told me, and would call me back.
Half an hour later, Ronna called, saying that I was the second of two calls she was planning to make that night. She had been talking to Ivan before me.
“How’s Ivan?” I asked.
“Fine,” she said. “He’s still working, still seeing Vicky, and that’s about it.”
I could tell from the matter-of-fact way she said it that something was wrong, but I passed over it as Ronna told me her big news: she was accepted into the American Studies program at Penn State.
She was accepted for the winter trimester after it had already begun, so she wrote them, asking to be considered for the fall term. (Ronna hopes to work for a summer stock theater company this summer.)
I was so happy to hear Ronna’s good news, as I feel I share in her good fortune. Till the time comes, Ronna will continue to work at Telenet, although they’ve asked her not to leave.
I told Ronna about some of the things I’ve been doing and then said, “I think I’m beginning to be a garrulous old bore.” Ronna said she liked hearing me talk.
Then the other phone rang, and Ronna excused herself; I could just barely make out that she was talking to Susan. I heard Ronna say, “Why did I tell him? I felt so foolish . . . that night in Neponsit.”
When Ronna returned to the phone with me, I said, bluffing, “You know I just heard every word you said. Do you want to talk about it?”
She was horribly embarrassed and said, “I didn’t want you to know . . . I feel so foolish.”
“Didn’t you realize I knew about your feelings for Ivan already, before you told me or before I overheard you talking to Susan?” I told Ronna. “I know you, Caplan; I know your feelings by now, and if there’s anyone you shouldn’t feel foolish with, it’s me. After all, I’m in a similar position.”
(And, to avoid feeling foolish myself, I mentioned my feelings for Avis, not my feelings for her.)
“Why should you feel foolish?” I asked Ronna. “Because you were honest with yourself and with Ivan? You did a very difficult thing, and I admire you for it.”
Finally she said she felt somewhat better. It’s a comedy, really – or some bad Chekhov play. I love Ronna; Ronna loves Ivan; Ivan loves Vicky. But there’s little Ronna can do to get Ivan, and there’s little I can do to get Ronna. She told me, point-blank, that I can’t give her what she needs.
This afternoon, I spoke on the telephone with Richard Kostelanetz, the young poet and critic whose new book, The End of Intelligent Writing: Literary Politics in America, has stirred such controversy.
I want to break into the New York literary scene, and modeling myself after Alice, I decided to be direct and pushy. Because Peggy said there wasn’t much work today, I didn’t go into the Fiction Collective office.
Saturday, January 17, 1976
2 PM. I feel like I’m drowning in depression. I haven’t been like this in years. It seems absolutely everything is going wrong. Little things make me cry. I am lonely. My life seems a waste. Nobody loves me. I pity myself. But the pain is real; it is.
For a while I thought today would bring me out of it. Last night I was so 
Finally, at 11 PM, she called, after I had fallen asleep with the help of the four tranquilizers I swallowed all at once hours earlier when I thought I could not get through the evening. Frankly, I was surprised that she called, though I’d never given up hoping.
I was really a jerk on the phone, telling her how lonely and upset I was, and if I could just see her, it would make me feel so much better.
All day it was the only thing I was looking forward to; I even bought a new shirt to wear tonight. And half an hour ago, Ronna calls: I knew why immediately, and she must have sensed it, for she said, “Is anything the matter?”
I knew the gist of what was coming; the specifics were that she had been informed this morning that there would be a party at her grandmother’s tonight, and attendance is compulsory.
Why do I waste my time and energy on that girl when she’s made it patently obvious by her actions that she couldn’t give a damn about me?
I don’t care what Ronna says: about missing our date that night because she “forgot about the time” in talking and drinking with her bosses at Telenet and about not returning my phone calls and now this.
If Ronna were honest with herself, she’d know it, too. I can’t ever have a relationship with her again.
As Avis said to me the other night, “I’ve learned that there are people you can have a relationship with, and other people with whom it is just a one-way street.”
And his parents treat her wonderfully, and Leslie himself seems to be so sweet – and very talented too, with a chance of getting into the Royal Academy of Art.
Mrs. Judson called me, which was so thoughtful of her. Avis and I will go over this week to help Mrs. Judson celebrate her birthday. Libby’s mother has become a good and unexpected friend to me.
Avis, like Libby, is also happy. Helmut has written her twice this week, and his letters are full of love for her. So Avis is definitely going back to 
Things have not gotten back to normal here. I still have a cold. My car is making a funny noise. I feel awful about the things I said to Grandpa Nat yesterday when I found out that Aunt Sydelle will be going to Florida and not me.
There’s at least one rejection notice in the mail every day. I have absolutely no money, no joy, no purpose to my life. For the first time in a long time, I feel unhappy most of the hours in the day.
Monday, January 19, 1976
I must admit that I’ve been predisposed to accept Kostelanetz’s argument, but his argument is so compelling, I can’t see how anyone can refute it, outside of the New York literary mob – Norman Podhoretz, Jason Epstein, Irving Howe and the rest of the goons I called on Saturday night – who want to protect their fiefdoms.
I don’t think I’m using the book’s thesis to rationalize my own rejection notices, two of which came today. Magazines do not seek out new talent, nor do they wish to publish it when it comes their way; most of them use material which confirms their already-conceived biases and positions.
The literary mob and the publishing industry censor work just as surely as the Soviets do; of course, they do it prior to publication.
Look, I know I’m a talented writer in control of his craft – but it will be impossible for me to ever gain any recognition as long as things are the way they are, for it seems that even the younger literary magazines are generally resistant to new things.
So I really shouldn’t take my rejections personally; actually, either I’ve been extraordinarily lucky, or I have a great deal of talent, or both. A year ago, I got my first acceptance, from New Writers. Today I’m a much more sophisticated and realistic seller of stories, understanding the limits of the field I’ve chosen.
(I also hope that my writing itself has become more complex, innovative and resonant, and I think it probably has. I feel I have about fifteen stories in my files which are as worthy of publication as those I’ve already had accepted.)
But writing has become my life – whether it’s because I’m just another lonely, unfulfilled bastard who can use words, or not – and it’s what I want to do, at least for now.
And unless I face these facts, it is clear that I will have a very frustrating, disappointing life as a writer. Of course, those in power cannot live forever, but then neither can I sit around forever waiting for Irving Howe to drop dead. ‘Nuff said.
Yesterday I was in the Eighth Street Bookshop when I saw Avis walk in with Ellen and Wade; Avis had a terrible cold. They had been bargain-hunting with their parents on the Lower East Side.
Today Avis called on a break from work, and she sounded no better. We 
Last night I spoke to Alice, who had spent the entire day researching two stories, one dealing with the most popular names for babies in 1976, and the other an interview survey with hotel doormen around the city.
Alice’s brother is leaving next weekend for Norfolk, and starting this summer, he’ll be stationed in Washington at the State Department for at least two years.
Marc and Joel went on a business trip for the week – to Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington.