UPTON SINCLAIR

MONROVIA, CALIFORNIA

March 23, 1953

Mr. A. Friedman
9720 Kings Highway
Brooklyn 12, N.Y.

Dear Mr. Friedman:

Yours is the second request I have had for help in writ-
ing about Lewis. I cannot be of much help to you because my papers
are in a mixup. We are planning to move to Arizona. We have been
planning it for some two years and gradually getting our papers box-
ed for shipment, and some have already been shipped. Practically
nothing is accessible to me at the present time, so I can't get his
letters to me or mine to him. I think there is something about him
in my autobiography "American Outpost."

I had some correspondence with him, but I saw little of
him after Helicon Hall. I offered a novel to Doran during the per-
iod that he was their advisor. I think the novel was "Sylvia."
They declined it. I remember we had lunch together, at which time
I got the bad news. Another time I called on him at his hotel in
New York, but found that he and another man were rewriting a scene
in a play which had to go into rehearsal that night, so, of course,
I didn't stay. Most of our other dealings were by letter. It is
true that he bitterly resented criticism of his books, but I knew
that, so did not worry about what he wrote me. I forget if I answer-
ed.

He was very enthusiastic about the "Prophets of Religion,"
as you will see from the enclosed circular. I was extremely enthus-
iastic about both "Main Street" and "Babbitt." I think that it was
about "Babbitt" that I wrote a quote which was used extensively by
the publishers.

I remember that I once wrote him that people were continu-
ally reporting to me a rumor that he had taken the name Sinclair as
an honor to me. I wrote him that I didn't think it was so, but I
wanted to be able to deny it authoritatively, and would he please
tell me. He answered that it was not so. Somebody, I have forgot-
ten who, reported to me that he had been present with some New York
writers who had criticised me severely, and Lewis had interjected:
"but you can't help liking him. I was very happy to hear that be-
cause I always had cordial feelings about Hal, as I called him. But
I never could give up the effort to make everybody into a Socialist;
naturally I annoyed a great many people.

One other amusing circumstance; we continually got each
other's mail and would faithfully send them to each other. I once
gave a lecture in St. Louis, a gentleman who was called "an eminent
astronomer" had the job of introducing me. He told the audience he
had written what he thought was a nice little speech about me, and