斯科特·唐纳森写著名作家的真实生活
“She kids me that ‘They’re all 20th century WASP males,’ “ he confessed while gently picking apart a sweet roll.
That’s certainly one way to characterize Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald and John Cheever.
另一种可能是将他们列入美国文学史上功能失调的巨擘之列。 自杀、酗酒、吸毒过量、婚姻不忠……
But they’re more famously responsible for much of the exemplary American literature from the 20th century. 《了不起的盖茨比》 夜色温柔。 《老人与海》 丧钟为谁而鸣。 游泳者。 《战争纪事报》。
Donaldson came to William & Mary as an assistant professor of 英语 in 1966 and stayed 28 years. The Donaldson 特聘程序, established in 1971 and still going strong, is funded in part by an endowment from Scott and Vivian.今晚7点在Ewell Hall， Donaldson回来参加由Patrick Hayes基金会和英语系赞助的Patrick Hayes作家系列活动。 Joining Donaldson, who will discuss his new book “Fitzgerald and Hemingway: Works and Days,” are Carol Sklenicka and W&M Writer-in-Residence Blake Bailey.
布莱克最近出版了理查德·耶茨（《革命之路》）和约翰·契弗的传记。 斯克莱尼卡即将出版短篇小说巨匠雷蒙德·卡弗的传记。 活动结束后将举行招待会和签售会。
唐纳森还为阿奇博尔德·麦克利什、诗人温菲尔德·汤利·斯科特和埃德温·阿灵顿·罗宾逊写过传记。 但在过去的四十年里，占据他时间和精力的却是他从未谋面的菲茨杰拉德和海明威——三部传记、三卷评论和42篇文章。
“I guess I have an identification with them because of their midwestern origins and mine,” explained Donaldson, a native of Minneapolis who spent 10 invaluable years as a reporter for the Minneapolis Star before turning in another direction. ”菲茨杰拉德来自圣保罗。 我想我是海明威的早期崇拜者； I did my senior thesis at Yale on T he him.”
唐纳森一直在轻敲塑料马克杯，似乎与他的心情很合拍，但突然扔下了一个重磅炸弹。
“My mother, who died very young - before I could ask her this - might very well have danced with Fitzgerald,” the soon-to-be 81 Donaldson theorizes. “She went to St. Paul Central, which was the high school closest to him. 他住在圣保罗。 他也一样大。 她很迷人； 他很有魅力。 谁知道呢? It might have been.”
That may be the only morsel regarding Fitzgerald or Hemingway that Donaldson hasn’t nailed down with incontrovertible certainty. 这十年的记者生涯让他提高了研究和采访技巧。 It also led to him developing a “judicious skepticism” he employed to strip away the “shields” Hemingway put up to deal with his depression, alcoholism and unwanted celebrity.
“Hemingway adapted the persona of the rugged, macho outdoorsman, fighter, warrior, lover, bullfight aficionado, boxer - all of these things as opposed to someone who sat in his room and typed out his copy,” Donaldson said. “That, of course, is what he had to do.
“A lot of it was a shield against his own sensitivity . . . if the public and those telling the stories to the public are depicting him as macho character, it’s a way of evading his own tortured sensibility. 他确实经常非常沮丧，这最终导致了他的家庭遗传的自杀。
“Also, he thought if he let the journalists get too close to the fact of the way he lived his life, as opposed to the life he invented, they’d be robbing him of material he might one day want to use in his own fiction.”
Commenting on Donaldson’s latest book, Jennie Kassanoff of Barnard College wrote “one is struck anew by Scott Donaldson’s kinship with the authors.” As someone who admits to “living someone else’s life as a biographer,” does Donaldson ever feel remorse about portraying their often chronic flaws? 是否有难看得不能暴露的疣？
“There are stories that I know that are not in my books, and that I would not put in my books,” he admitted. “If it’s really peripheral, nasty but peripheral, I try to leave it out. Otherwise, I don’t feel guilty trying to get at the way people were, even if that way was pretty unpleasant. You try to catch people at their best and their worst, and hope the reader can get a balance and figure out what these guys are like.”
In the introduction to “Fitzgerald and Hemingway,” Donaldson writes with great affection about his tenure at the College. 他和薇薇安在威廉斯堡玩得很开心，他们已经讨论过可能会回来。
“If I hadn’t come to William & Mary, a great many things would have been different in my life,” he said. “I’m glad I did.”
So should the students in the College’s writing program. 他们有机会向众多不同体裁的成功作家学习。
“The writer’s often the wild man or woman on campus, especially the creative writer, but that’s healthy, too,” Donaldson said. “They’ve been out there in the real world and they’ve managed to make some kind of success out of their work.
“Saul Bellow, when he taught at Minnesota, used to say about students, ‘I can lather you up, but you’ve got to shave yourself.’ Maybe these writers in residence here can supply the lather.”