when I replied to Kristol, reflect on the fact that Jeffrey Hart, the single working academic professor on the staff of NR , who also writes editorials, happened to be the author of the editorial in question. National Review has never, in its twenty-five years, been in any significant sense "distant" from the academic scene: we have always roamed among professors and other intellectuals—it is simply amusing to denominate a journal whose principal editorial figure for twenty-three years was philosophy professor James Burnham as alienated from academic thought.
But Irving likes to make his points categorically, so I let it go. And now, having replied to him, I drop a note to Jeff Hart, my learned colleague, full professor of English at Dartmouth, who is traveling on the West Coast so I can't now reach him on the phone. Did he, I ask, get the facts on Bradford wrong? Well, interestingly enough—having now seen both accounts—I would judge that Hart was much closer on than Irving; but, really, it turned out not to be important, or in any case that is my reading of it. The appointment was finally given to Bennett.
It is hard to devise a happier couple with whom to share lunch than Priscilla Buckley and Joe Sobran. Pitts (her nickname) is the single unmarried of the original ten Buckleys (two of my sisters died young, leaving between them fifteen children). I lured her from Paris where she was working for the United Press, bringing to the large office there the quiet pleasure she has given everyone ever since (alongside Nancy Davis Reagan) she graduated from Smith College. She combines extraordinary efficiency with the most obdurate affability, self-effacement, intelligence, and charm. Joe Sobran is one of the two or three wittiest men I have ever met, with a cultural intelligence as penetrating as that of anyone around twice his young age. He was doing graduate work in English at Eastern Michigan University, trying to support three children and a sick wife (from whom he is now divorced) when our paths crossed. He has now been four years with National Review as a senior editor, and his editorials, book reviews, and culture pieces are in every issue. He is also launched as a syndicated columnist, and (he will tell you) is writing two or three books.
The parentheses above are something of a joke, because Joe is terribly disorganized in the endearing sense that Samuel Johnson was disorganized, though I am not absolutely sure that Joe would have ended by actually producing that dictionary. Recently someone sent me, with the notation "Can't wait to get it a full page from Publishers Weekly , advertising a book: " The Conservative Manifesto. The Philosophy, the Passion, the Promise . By Joseph Sobran. Introduction by William F. Buckley, Jr." The final sentence of the ad read, "Leading conservative spokesman William F. Buckley, Jr. has written a cogent and entertaining introduction to this definitive work." And, emblazoned on the top of the page: " Every disenchanted liberal and every American who calls himself a conservative—or is thinking of becoming one—must read this book.— Wm. F. Buckley, Jr."
On reading the ad I was faintly put off by my utterly certain knowledge that the book did not exist; that I couldn't, therefore, have written an introduction to it, let alone a cogent and entertaining introduction (though when it is written, it will of course be at least those two things); and I didn't even remember composing a tribute to the book that didn't exist, though on faith I'd venture to say, sight unseen, at least as much about anything Joe Sobran undertook to write. So I sent along the PW page to Joe with a questioning note, and in his wonderful, reassuring, there-there way, he called and reminded me that when the publisher asked whether I would write an introduction for the book he was commissioning from Joe, I had said sure; but they needed something on the spot, so / had told Joe to say something appropriate to
But Irving likes to make his points categorically, so I let it go. And now, having replied to him, I drop a note to Jeff Hart, my learned colleague, full professor of English at Dartmouth, who is traveling on the West Coast so I can't now reach him on the phone. Did he, I ask, get the facts on Bradford wrong? Well, interestingly enough—having now seen both accounts—I would judge that Hart was much closer on than Irving; but, really, it turned out not to be important, or in any case that is my reading of it. The appointment was finally given to Bennett.
It is hard to devise a happier couple with whom to share lunch than Priscilla Buckley and Joe Sobran. Pitts (her nickname) is the single unmarried of the original ten Buckleys (two of my sisters died young, leaving between them fifteen children). I lured her from Paris where she was working for the United Press, bringing to the large office there the quiet pleasure she has given everyone ever since (alongside Nancy Davis Reagan) she graduated from Smith College. She combines extraordinary efficiency with the most obdurate affability, self-effacement, intelligence, and charm. Joe Sobran is one of the two or three wittiest men I have ever met, with a cultural intelligence as penetrating as that of anyone around twice his young age. He was doing graduate work in English at Eastern Michigan University, trying to support three children and a sick wife (from whom he is now divorced) when our paths crossed. He has now been four years with National Review as a senior editor, and his editorials, book reviews, and culture pieces are in every issue. He is also launched as a syndicated columnist, and (he will tell you) is writing two or three books.
The parentheses above are something of a joke, because Joe is terribly disorganized in the endearing sense that Samuel Johnson was disorganized, though I am not absolutely sure that Joe would have ended by actually producing that dictionary. Recently someone sent me, with the notation "Can't wait to get it a full page from Publishers Weekly , advertising a book: " The Conservative Manifesto. The Philosophy, the Passion, the Promise . By Joseph Sobran. Introduction by William F. Buckley, Jr." The final sentence of the ad read, "Leading conservative spokesman William F. Buckley, Jr. has written a cogent and entertaining introduction to this definitive work." And, emblazoned on the top of the page: " Every disenchanted liberal and every American who calls himself a conservative—or is thinking of becoming one—must read this book.— Wm. F. Buckley, Jr."
On reading the ad I was faintly put off by my utterly certain knowledge that the book did not exist; that I couldn't, therefore, have written an introduction to it, let alone a cogent and entertaining introduction (though when it is written, it will of course be at least those two things); and I didn't even remember composing a tribute to the book that didn't exist, though on faith I'd venture to say, sight unseen, at least as much about anything Joe Sobran undertook to write. So I sent along the PW page to Joe with a questioning note, and in his wonderful, reassuring, there-there way, he called and reminded me that when the publisher asked whether I would write an introduction for the book he was commissioning from Joe, I had said sure; but they needed something on the spot, so / had told Joe to say something appropriate to
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