Katherine White’s World
“His father also gave him (beside the neighborhood’s first child size bike) his very own canoe when he was eleven, to use on the family’s August trips to Belgrade, Maine, which were to Andy ‘the golden time of year’ and ‘sheer enchantment.’” Of course, E.B. White passages are what I quickly turned to in The World She Edited, Amy Reading’s extra long biography of his wife Katherine and her New Yorker editing career.
Only August in Maine? I just realized that my Maine vacations for years were June and July. Only last summer was short for me with August renting only. E.B. White, according to this new biography of his wife, created Charlotte’s Web late in his New Yorker writing career. It took both him and his wife awhile to realize that the saltwater farm in Brooklin offered great tranquility and creative living.
Finally living there full time, E.B. White wrote and rewrote Charlotte’s Web for the children of the world. I must admit that this story touches me more as I share it with generation after generation. The eternal life of Charlotte’s children and the eternal nature of true friendship seems so human and real, even though it is Wilbur the pig and Charlotte the spider…
Of course, Katharine S. White, hired E.B. White for The New Yorker when she had her first husband’s name. I love the fact that Michelle Obama hired Barak as a summer intern in her law firm when Michelle had her maiden name.
Poetry written by E.B. to his future wife was touching to read:
In the warm sun Of a strange land, I beheld your life And possessed your hand. In the real cold Of things that are, I have lost hold Of a caught star.
Instead of quitting his job at The New Yorker over his newly discovered love of Katharine, “he tried a smaller version, hopping into his new Model A Ford roadster and heading straight north to Belgrade, Maine, where he stayed a week to ice-skate and ‘let a lot of cold fresh Maine air blow through [his] brains.’”
A few weeks later Katharine confessed in a letter to a loved one that her husband “knocked me down” during a quarrel in front of their children, so she walked out of the marriage. The Bryn Mawr collection of Katharine’s letters has this letter in spite of her direction to burn it. Granddaughter Callie donated it after Katharine’s death to the Katherine Sergeant Angell White archive at Bryn Mawr.
1936 was another pivotal year in E.B. White’s life when he lost his mother. Since both parents were now gone so quickly in one year and his childhood home as well, he once again made a trip to Belgrade and Great Pond. “Things haven’t changed much,” was the beginning of this famed essay rewritten many times (40, some report), but it started as a personal letter to his brother Stanley during this time of family grief: “The lake hangs clear and still at dawn, and the sound of a cowbell comes softly from a faraway wood lot…Yes sir, I returned to Belgrade, and things don’t change much. I thought somebody ought to know.”
It seems that this biographer portrays Andy White as a recluse, which perhaps he was, admitting to himself this character flaw as he felt it to be. Even when their son Joel was in second grade in New York, Andy stayed at his beloved farm in North Brooklin on the coast and sent weekly columns to The New Yorker.
In mid-October of their son’s second grade year, Andy White left the farm for Belgrade once again and Mount Vernon. He drove on to meet his wife and son at a friend’s home. The three dressed turkeys he delivered were a welcome gift and the three happy Whites returned together once again to New York…
Much about Katharine and her fine editing career and her many family obligations later in life. I skipped a lot of that because I am addicted to E.B. White. Index reading is good for me in this 496-page read, mostly about The New Yorker.
If you are a fan of that magazine, dear reader, you will read more of Katharine’s story than I did. I am still puzzled by the unusual cover because photos within this biography show a very lovely countenance which was one draw for our favorite Belgrade Lakes writer, E.B. White. I especially love the photo of Grandma Katharine reading to her grandchildren on a comfy sofa. Also, Andy and Katharine look so happy with their dog Minnie, one of many pets throughout their life together.
We have driven by their farmhouse in North Brooklin which now has new owners. E.B. White’s directive has been honored to keep it private as a home for the next owner and not become a museum of sorts. Sounds like On Golden Pond to me, where “[t]hings don’t change much…”
The local North Brooklin Public Library was a beneficial visit for me because of the librarian, of course! She told me that Katharine volunteered there many hours. So go to Belgrade Public Library and enjoy talking with our wonderful staff. Maybe check out a video or a book or look at a magazine or work at a computer. Rainy day fun there and air conditioned when it is too hot for hiking. Better yet, jump in the lake or calmly canoe in the shade like E.B. White did most summers of his long writing life.
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