Letter from Louise Kertesz to Kate Daniels

An original, typewritten letter dated January 26th, 1984. The letter is from Louise Kertesz to Kate Daniels. Louise begins the letter by saying that she is happy that Daniles is working on a biography of Muriel, and Louise will help in any way she can. Louise also congratulates Daniels for getting Random House as he publisher. Louise will send Daniels xeroxes of her correspondence with Muriel. She will also xerox letters some of her colleagues wrote about her and her work. Louise will have to locate some of these items, since she has moved. Louise has a xerox machine, and she just asks Kate to reimburse her for the postage. Louise has also taped interviews with Muriel. They are precious to her. She will allow Daniels to listen to them, but she doesn't have equipment that would let her make transcriptions, and she is nervous about mailing the originals. They can discuss this at a later date, and Louie is sure that hearing Rukeyser with an interviewer will interest Daniels. While she was writing her book about Rukeyser, Louise describes her relationship with Muriel as “...a student trying to understand her work in its context. I grew to admire it and her more and more a I read her work and interviewed her and spoke to her on the phone. She was very strong, despite strokes. I felt she had the inner strength and insight and the “magic” of utterance of the true artist”. Louise is sure that people close to Rukeyser can describe her personality and mind in greater detail. Louise was with Rukeyser, in person, not more than 10 times, and maybe less. Louise had lunch with Rukeyser in her apartment once, drinks once, and the rest of the time they worked and Louise had a bus or plane to catch. They did speak on the phone frequently. Louise describes Rukeyser as “...warm, welcoming, generous”. Her standard exclamation when Louise announced she was on the phone was “Oh, Good!” She never said anything about anyone, or took swipes at her detractors on the phone. As Daniels may know, Louise’s book is about Rukeyser’s work and her critics. Besides showing the interconnecting themes of her work, she also wanted to illustrate the phenomenon of the verbal abuse of a great artist by small (sexist) minds. Louise has enclosed a review of Rukeyser’s Collected Poems, which was her last published book, that appeared in the Hudson Review. The review demonstrated how disgraceful “respected “ critics could be, until the very end. Muriel mailed Louise that review, with no comment. Prichard used to teach, or maybe still does, at Amherst College. Muriel saw all of Louise’s chapters before they went to press. The books were published and a copy appeared in Louise’s mailbox two weeks after Rukeyser died. Her secretary, a woman from Sarah Lawrence called Jan Levi, was reading Rukeyser Louise’s page proofs on the last week of her life, and she was weeping and saying, ”Right on.” Jam Levi told Louise this when she phoned with the news of Muriel’s death. Louise ends the letter by saying that she will mail Daniels anything she has on hand that might interest her. Louise wishes Daniels good luck on her book. Louise has also handwritten more questions and comments on the sides of the letter, such as “Why have you decided to write your book?”