Maxwell Perkins fostered the development of 20th century American literature like no other, as the editor of Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Sherwood Anderson, Dawn Powell, and James Jones. He always made his p&l’s editing Taylor Caldwell, but the “Perkin’s touch” also guided his literary luminaries to bestseller status.
Perhaps none of Perkins’ bestsellers were as unlikely as Thomas Wolfe’s “Look Homeward, Angel” and "Of Time and the River," nor were any of his other professional dealings as tempestuous as those with the Southern modernist. Their storied editor-author, surrogate father-and-son relationship is dramatized in Michael Grandage’s “Genius.”
The Great Depression is in its early days, but Perkins’ world remains untouched. He lines edits during the day at the prestigious publishing house Charles Scribner’s Sons, returning to his quiet home outside the New York City in the evenings.
Thomas Wolfe hardly seems to have noticed the current state of affairs either. The garrulous writer seems to live in his own little world, financially maintained by his formerly married lover, Aline Bernstein. Thanks to her support, he has completed an intimidatingly long manuscript that has been rejected by nearly every house in New York—but not Scribner’s.
Much to everyone’s surprise, Perkins agrees to buy what was then known as “O Lost,” but he insists Wolfe trim some of its girth. The novelist is amenable in principle, but he will fight for every phrase and passage. It will be a difficult editorial process, but it yields “Look Homeward, Angel”—and the rest is history.
