703 E. 50th Place
Chicago, Illinois
16 June 1941

Dear Claude McKay,

Here are the poems from your books that I would *like* to include in
my anthology for young people.

From HARLEM SHADOWS:-

The Spanish Needle
The Tropics in New York
Home Thoughts

From SPRING IN NEW HAMPSHIRE:-

Spring in N. H.
Reminiscences
North and South
When Dawn Comes to the City
After the Winter

From CONSTAB BALLADS:-

Two-An'-Six

Of course, the list may have to be modified. The publishers expect to
make the usual financial arrangements for permissions, but I have been put
on a budget, and this will have to be split a number of ways. I will use as
many of the above as I can get in view of this limitation.

Meanwhile, Countee, Sterling Brown and others have offered suggestions
on my selections from their works. I would welcome the same from you. How
would you modify the above list, for example?

The publishers will write to Harcourt, Brace & Company concerning the
HARLEM SHADOWS selections, but I would be grateful if you would let me know
under what conditions I may use the poems from the other two books. Not as
a group, but as individual poems--since we may not be in a position to get
as many as we would like.

It is pleasant to think of you at North Wayne and Langston Hughes at Carmel--
poets in proper settings.

Claude McKay
North Wayne, Maine

COPY

FISK UNIVERSITY LIBRARY
Nashville 8, Tennessee

Arna Bontemps, Librarian

September 29, 1947

Mr. Claude McKay
c/o Bishop Bernard J. Sheil
4901 South Ellis Avenue
Chicago, Illinois

Dear Claude,

It's been a long time since I've heard from you or
seen you. This summer your name came up in a con-
versation with Robert Lowell at Yaddo. He, inci-
dentally, thinks very well of your poems.

And poetry is the subject of this note. Langston
and I are making an anthology of Negro poetry fow-
Doubleday. We want you to be included in a very
large way. We will make selections from "Harlem
Shadows", but we also want to include some of your
more recent poems. May we have permission to make
selections? We will pay, of course, and the rate
will be standard, at least. And haven't you some
very recent things we could look at?

I'd love to hear from you before the first of No-
vember when Langston and I are scheduled to have
conferences on the book.

AB/rdj

Claire Leonard

Authors' Representative

516 Fifth Ave., New York 18, N. Y.

Trafalgar 7-3082

Murray Hill 2-3383

PLAYWRIGHTS INTRODUCED:

ROSCOE BRINK

EDWARD CAULFIELD

RICHARD DIAMOND

RICHARD DWENGER

ABRAM HILL

VIVIAN JOHANNES

GERRY KEHL

S. LEWIS MELTZER

ROBERT E. McENROE

JAMES PATRICK SHERIDAN

A. B. SHIFFRIN

WARREN A. SILVER

PHILIP VAN DYKE

PHILIP YORDAN

FISK UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

Nashville 8, Tennessee

Office of Librarian

October 16, 1947

Mr. Carl Cowl
517 Fifth Avenue
New York 18, New York

Dear Mr. Cowl:

Thank you for your letter of October 9,
relying to my note to Claude McKay.
You will hear from Doubleday in due time,
for we are now making selections from
*Harlem Shadows* and other early publica-
tions by Mr. McKay. The publishers
have undertaken to arrange for the ac-
tual commission, however.

Thank you for your cooperation.

AB/rdj

COPY

FISK UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

Nashville 8, Tenn.

Office of Librarian

December 30 1947

Mr. Claude McKay

Dear Claude,

We have reached a point in the work on the anthology of Negro poetry which Langston Hughes and I are compiling where we need biographical material on the poets included. Will you rush us all the pertinent facts about your life and career? Some of this we could get from standard references, but we never know how pleased a poet is with the things that have been written about him. If you want to refer us to a reliable available source, you might do that. Even so, I think you would want to make fresh additions so that our book, when it comes out, will be up to date.

I'm sorry that I must urge speed in this, but we are about ready to deliver this manuscript and biographical data does seem essential.

Of course you will be contacted later by the publishers for
actual permission to use poems which we have selected from
your work.

With best wishes,

FISK UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

Nashville 8, Tennessee

Office of Librarian

February 2, 1948

Mr. Carl Cowl
516 Fifth Avenue
New York 18, New York

Dear Mr. Cowl:

Thank you for your reply to our letter concerning
biographical data pertaining to Claude McKay. There
is plenty of this available in standard sources, but
I wanted to give Claude a chance to supply me with
anything new which he might want to have included.
I am glad that he is willing to look over the copy
of what I have written when the time comes. You
may count on receiving this within a few weeks, I
believe. I will have to leave it to Doubleday to
indicate the selections from his work which we wish
to use. We have made our choices, but the publishers
have promised to arrange the actual permissions, and
I am not absolutely sure that the list will remain
as we turned it in last week. Needless to say we
have selected around ten or a dozen of Claude's poems
which we like best.

AB/rdj

C O P Y

"I do have one 10 inch record (both sides) recorded by Countee. I have felt always that it is a most important recording. In the beginning, he describes his work with Opportunity and points up how significant this publication was in making it's pages available to young talented creative persons. This is followed by him reading "Heritage" and then he tells in detail of his teaching here in New York and of his work in creative literature with his youngsters at P. S. 139."

"It is interesting that Mr. Asch of Folkways Records has been in touch with me within the last few days, discussing this recording and ways in which it might be made available commercially. I have had only preliminary discussions with him."