The Wilmington morning star., 1940-12-08

THE SUNDAY A
out exactly knowing why, he al
ways wanted to write. AS a boy
Of ten he asked his father to bring
home from the country store,
Three tablets, so I can write"
As a boy of college age at Chapel
Hill he liked poetry, particularly,
Dante Gabriel Rosseti, but at the
university his literary productions
were not remarkable, mainly SON.
nets and short articles for the Car
DINA magazine.
While there, he was elected to
Phi Beta Kappa, to Sigma Epsilon
and to Sigma Delta, the last
named an important local social
fraternity which numbered among
it's membership at that time an
unusual group of young men who
were interested in life-and espe-
cially literature. Many of them, in
GLIDING W. T.. Couch, present direc-
tor of the University Press, "Jim'
Hawkins, of the Kingsport Press,
Robbins Fowler, author of '.All the
Skeletons in All the Closets" and
John Marshall, now of the Will
mington Star-News, later continued
this literary bent and made it pay.
Graduating from the university
in June 1929, where he had been
on the varsity wrestling team, but
not, az he puts it, "a joiner OF a
politician" Charles Wood put
thoughts of a literary career out
Of his mind, turning instead to the
more practical solution of a job
with an oil company which took
him to Pennsylvania and New Eng.
land, including Boston. Two OF
three years later, still with the oil
people, he came south and operat'
ed several filling stations in Ra-
leigh, where the better part Of
First, the Fields" was written in
off hours spent in a tourist cabin.
View From Apart
Like many other young writer's,
Mr.. Wood says he did not begin
to appreciate the South, including
the "Sligo" country and its people,
for the complexities of associations
with Poles and Italians in Penn
sylvania and with Bostonians,
some of whom were not a d
Last Puritans." In his hotel room
at night, after making out oil re-
ports, he would sit and think Of
the ''Sligo" country and its people
particularly of his grandfather and
his own father. Beginning as
sketches about thei- lives, in the
fall of 1880, the book that was to
become First, the Fields" began
to take shape, although the young
author did not at that time think
of himself as writing a novel. Hav-
ing, as he says, mo feeling for
the short story, a literary form
for which he does not care" the
sketches grew, from n place to
another where he spent his nights,
and finally, in Raleigh, in 1885, the
book as it now is, was finished.
About this time the author de-
cided to come home to Roxboro.
where he entered an investment
business with which he is still con-
nected. With him came the manu-
script, placed in a bureau drawer
where it was forgotten, except for
casual references now and then to
close friends. Few people in Rox-
boro knew that one of them, had
written a novel. The manuscript,
one of the few of its kind produced
in Person county's 40 years of
existence, had in it not only Per-
sons peculiar story, but a human
ity making that story of universal
significance, but it lay in the draw
er and gathered dust, until Christ
mas of last year, when Miss Eu-
genia Bradsher, of Durham, heard
of it when she came to Roxboro
for the wedding of a mutual friend.
Second UNC Novel
"A friend of the authors family
and his friend, too, Miss Bradsher,
without ever seeing the manu-
script, thought enough of what she
had heard about it to suggest to
Mr.. Wood by letter that he submit
it to the Press at Chapel Hill.
Being a modest, man, especially
where writing is concerned, Mr..
Wood at first demurred. Then he
sent it, and that is why this inter-
view has been written. Having had
unusual success with Bernice KEEL
ly Harris "P%urslane," Mr.. Couch
and his associates were looking
for another novel worthy of publ
cation. They think they have
found it in "First, the Fields"
written by another North Carolin-
ian, who like Mrs. Harris, h d
never had a book submitted for
or accepted for publication until
the Chapel Hill Press stepped in.
A few revisions we're made in
the spring and summer and now,
before another summer comes
First, the Fields" will be on the
market. There's no telling what
will happen then. for this o11iet