Recently Read: Letters of James Agee to Father Flye

Spanning the years 1925, when Agee was only sixteen, until his premature death in May 1955, this collection shows the author in moods mostly reflective. He meanders, obfuscates, muses, complains, gently argues and shares art he's experienced, all in often poetic letters to the man who became, in effect, a father figure to him, Episcopal priest Father James Harold Flye. Neophytes to Agee's work will want to first read his essential texts (A Death in the Family, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, etc.), but for the Agee completest, this 1962 book, which includes notes and an introductory essay by Flye, will fulfill a desire to better understand the artist, his thinking processes and struggles between the freedom to create versus financial responsibilities.

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Recently Read: James Agee: A Life, by Laurence Bergreen

 

Laurence Bergreen's book, the fullest and most ambitious biography of James Agee's life, gives a balanced, well-researched and unsparing look at the short life of the novelist, poet, journalist, critic and screenwriter.

It's largely a tale of wasted, sporadic talent, practiced by a man nearly hell-bent on self-destruction (and the destruction of those around him) through his addiction to alcohol, undisciplined work methods and perpetual affairs with women who weren't his wife (or wives). His talent, even so, was so pronounced that, even with a premature death, he made a name for himself as one of the best and first important film critics (writing for two magazines simultaneously); the author of a masterpiece of poetic, investigative journalism (Let Us Now Praise Famous Men), the author of a classic, near perfect novel (A Death in the Family) and the author (or partial author) of two major screenplays (The African Queen and The Night of the Hunter), the latter of which has, over time, become accepted as a masterpiece of gothic Americana.

Bergreen's book is now thirty-seven years old. I have disappointments with its lack of completeness and context in places. (What were the sharecroppers' reactions to the book Agee wrote about them? What became of Agee's several children? Who became the executor of his estate after his death? What became of Louise Saunders, who Agee wrote to for decades? Did his wives write memoirs of their own?, etc.) A better Agee biography, though, isn't likely to happen in 2023 or in the future. For better or worse, this effort, alongside Agee's published work will continue to be the record historians refer to.

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Recently Read: The Morning Watch, by James Agee

The Morning Watch, more of a novella than a novel, was first published in 1951 and is a precursor to Agee's more mature and accomplished, though posthumous, A Death in the Family (one of the finest novels I've read).

Drawing upon his experiences as a boy attending the Saint Andrews School for Mountain Boys, run by Episcopal monks, The Morning Watch takes place over the course of about three hours, as Richard and his fellow students are awoken in the very early hours of Good Friday to pray at the chapel alter. Similar to novelist Nicholson Baker's later experiments in relating minute amounts of time, every minute of the time spent in chapel as experienced by Richard is described. A sensitive and earnest soul, twelve-year old Richard is torn between a passion for holiness and the contradictory self-centeredness he believes extreme piety must require. The characters and situations have all the subtle, carefully observed frailty and flawed humanity of a Rembrandt sketch.

A second section involves a delinquent walk to a lake. Here the symbolism employed uncharacteristically becomes somewhat heavy-handed, though no less compelling.

Agee's writing is as poetic and poignant as always. The length and reach of The Morning Watch is modest, though, and probably of most interest to those who have read Agee's more important work, particularly A Death in the Family.

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