Author | Truman Capote |
---|---|
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Publisher | Random House |
Publication date | 2005 |
Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) & e-book, audio-CD |
Pages | 142 |
ISBN | 1-4000-6522-4 |
OCLC | 441129903 |
Summer Crossing is the second novel written by American author Truman Capote. He started the novel in about 1943 and worked on it intermittently for several years before putting it aside. Capote's manuscript came to light almost 20 years after Capote's death and the novel published in 2005.
The novel tells the story of an independent-minded young socialite whose romantic dalliances grow increasingly serious when her parents leave her alone in New York City for the summer while they travel to Europe.
Capote started writing Summer Crossing in 1943 when he was working for The New Yorker . After taking an evening walk in Monroeville, Alabama, and being inspired to write his first published novel, Other Voices, Other Rooms , he set aside the manuscript. On August 30, 1949, while vacationing in North Africa, Capote informed his publisher that he was approximately two-thirds through his first draft of Summer Crossing. He optimistically spoke of finalizing the manuscript by the end of the year, even making a vow that he would not return to the United States until he did, [1] but he never submitted more than a first draft to his publisher. [2] Capote had been making minor edits to the work over a period of approximately 10 years. Robert Linscott, Capote's senior editor at Random House, was unimpressed with the first draft. He said he thought it was a good novel, but that it didn't showcase Capote's "distinctive artistic voice". [3] After reading the draft several times, Capote noted that the novel was "well written and it's got a lot of style", but that he just did not like it. In particular Capote began "to fear [the novel] was thin, clever, unfelt". [4] Later Capote claimed to have destroyed the unpolished manuscript, along with several other notebooks of prose, in a fit of harsh self-criticism. [5]
When Capote left a basement apartment he had been renting in Brooklyn Heights around 1950, he instructed his landlord to trash anything he had left. The next occupant of the apartment, described as a "house sitter", nevertheless rescued materials that appeared valuable and held them until his death fifty years later. His nephew and heir came into possession of these materials and identified and arranged with Sotheby's to auction these materials in 2004. Included were manuscripts of works both published and unpublished, drafts, notes, photographs, and correspondence. The collection received no bids at auction because of the high reserve price that was set and because those responsible for Capote's estate had, with Sotheby's assistance, asserted their claim that ownership of the physical papers did not confer publication rights, which were held by the Truman Capote Literary Trust.
The New York Public Library reached an agreement to buy the papers and archived them in its permanent Truman Capote Collection. Capote's lawyer, Alan U. Schwartz, as trustee for the charitable trust established by Capote's will, made the decision to publish Summer Crossing after consultations to assess its quality and significance. He concluded: "While not a polished work, it fully reflects the emergence of an original voice and a surprisingly proficient writer of prose." The novel appeared in 2005. The first edition was set from Capote's original manuscript, which was written in four school notebooks accompanied by 62 supplemental notes. [6]
An excerpt from the story was also published in the October 24, 2005, issue of The New Yorker .
The story takes place in New York City over the course of the hot summer of 1945.
Grady McNeil, a 17-year-old upper class Protestant débutante, steadfastly refuses to accompany her parents on their usual summer ritual of travel, in this case to France. Left in the city for the summer by herself, she pursues a covert romance with Clyde Manzer, a Jewish parking lot attendant, whom she had noticed several months earlier. Grady spends time with Clyde and meets some of his friends, and in turn the couple visits the Central Park Zoo together. There, Clyde mentions his brother's bar mitzvah as a way of introducing the fact that he is Jewish.
As the summer heats up, so does Grady's and Clyde's romance. The couple is soon wed in Red Bank, New Jersey. Once married, Grady meets Clyde's middle-class family in Brooklyn, and only then is the couple truly faced with the stark reality of the cultural divide between her family and his. Grady then realizes at her sister Apple's home that she is six weeks pregnant.
Grady has passed over a couple of opportunities to spend time with the handsome young Peter Bell, a man of her social stature who is romantically interested in her. Eventually Grady's sister, Apple, confronts her about her relationship with Clyde. In an abrupt ending, Grady aims her speeding Buick with passengers Peter, Clyde, and Clyde's friend Gump so it will crash off the Queensboro Bridge, killing everyone.
Plans for a film adaptation of Summer Crossing were announced 2013. Playwright Tristine Skyler was working with Scarlett Johansson on the screenplay and Johansson was slated to direct in her feature film directorial debut. She said: "Being able to bring this story to the screen as my full-length directorial debut is a life dream and deep privilege." [7]
Truman Garcia Capote was an American novelist, screenwriter, playwright, and actor. Several of his short stories, novels, and plays have been praised as literary classics, including the novella Breakfast at Tiffany's (1958) and the true crime novel In Cold Blood (1966). His works have been adapted into more than 20 films and television productions.
Nelle Harper Lee was an American novelist whose 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird won the 1961 Pulitzer Prize and became a classic of modern American literature. She assisted her close friend Truman Capote in his research for the book In Cold Blood (1966). Her second and final novel, Go Set a Watchman, was an earlier draft of Mockingbird that was published in July 2015 as a sequel.
In Cold Blood is a non-fiction novel by American author Truman Capote, first published in 1966. It details the 1959 murders of four members of the Clutter family in the small farming community of Holcomb, Kansas.
Music for Chameleons (1980) is a collection of short fiction and non-fiction by the American author Truman Capote. Capote's first collection of new material in fourteen years, Music for Chameleons spent sixteen weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, unprecedented for a collection of short works.
Answered Prayers is an unfinished novel by American author Truman Capote, published posthumously in 1986 in England and 1987 in the United States.
Capote is a 2005 American biographical drama film about American novelist Truman Capote directed by Bennett Miller, and starring Philip Seymour Hoffman in the title role. The film primarily follows the events during the writing of Capote's 1965 nonfiction book In Cold Blood. The film was based on Gerald Clarke's 1988 biography Capote. It was released on September 30, 2005, coinciding with what would've been Capote's 81st birthday.
The Grass Harp is a novel by Truman Capote published on October 1, 1951 It tells the story of an orphaned boy and two elderly ladies who observe life from a tree. They eventually leave their temporary retreat to make amends with each other and other members of society.
John Malcolm Brinnin was a Canadian-born American poet and literary critic.
Breakfast at Tiffany's is a novella by Truman Capote published in 1958. In it, a contemporary writer recalls his early days in New York City, when he makes the acquaintance of his remarkable neighbor, Holly Golightly, who is one of Capote's best-known creations. In 1961 it was adapted into a major motion picture of the same name.
The Black and White Ball was a masquerade ball held on November 28, 1966, at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. Hosted by author Truman Capote, the ball was in honor of The Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham.
The Thanksgiving Visitor is a short story by Truman Capote originally published in the November 1967 issue of McCall's magazine, and later published as a book by Random House, Inc. in 1968. The story takes the form of a childhood tale about a boy and his bully problem. The story has a strong moral lesson related to revenge. It is a sequel to Capote's A Christmas Memory.
Other Voices, Other Rooms is a 1948 novel by Truman Capote. It is written in the Southern Gothic style and is notable for its atmosphere of isolation and decadence.
"Miriam" is a short story written by Truman Capote. It was originally published in the June 1945 issue of Mademoiselle. "Miriam" was one of Capote's first published short stories, and in 1946 it earned an O. Henry Award in the category Best First-Published Story.
Get Happy: The Life of Judy Garland is a biography of entertainer Judy Garland. Published in 2000, Get Happy is author Gerald Clarke's follow-up to his 1988 biography of Truman Capote. Clarke conducted some 500 interviews, including some with subjects who had not previously spoken about Garland, and also drew upon tape recordings that Garland had made in the 1960s for an autobiography. He found Garland's unpublished 68-page manuscript in the Random House archives. Clarke spent ten years on the book, and only made his final decision to write about Garland after reading the extant biographies. "I did not want to write a book about her if the definitive book had already been written....So, I sat down and I read the biographies that had already been written and came up with no real impression of Judy....There was a disconnect between the woman who emerged from the pages and the woman I saw in the movies and heard on the records....I knew that the book had not yet been written."
Sally Bowles is a fictional character created by English-American novelist Christopher Isherwood and based upon 19-year-old cabaret singer Jean Ross. The character debuted in Isherwood's 1937 novella Sally Bowles published by Hogarth Press, and commentators have described the novella as "one of Isherwood's most accomplished pieces of writing." The work was republished in the 1939 novel Goodbye to Berlin and in the 1945 anthology The Berlin Stories.
Observations is a collaborative coffee table book with photography by Richard Avedon, commentary by Truman Capote and design by Alexey Brodovitch. It features a slipcase with color, all-capitalized lettering; the book itself is further housed in a clear acetate/glassine slip cover and is printed with the same bold design as the slipcase in black-and-white. Simon & Schuster published the work in 1959 having it printed using the photogravure method in Lucerne, Switzerland.
Local Color is the third published book by the American author Truman Capote, released in the Fall of 1950. Local Color includes notes and sketches about persons and places, including travel journal-style essays on cities and countries Capote had lived in or visited.
A Tree of Night and Other Stories is a short story collection by the American author Truman Capote published in early 1949. The title story, "A Tree of Night", was first published in Harper’s Bazaar in October 1945.
"Children on Their Birthdays" is a short story by Truman Capote, published serially in the late 1940s and appearing in A Tree of Night and Other Stories in 1949; it is noted as one of his better quality early short stories.
The Grass Harp is a play written by Truman Capote based on his novel of the same name. Producer Saint Subber staged it on Broadway in 1952. It was Capote's first play.