We Dream of Honour: John Berryman's Letters to His Mother [Hardcover]

Richard Kelly (Author), John Berryman (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Of the more than 700 letters poet John Berryman wrote to his mother from 1928 to 1971, 22 are printed here. They are of biographical and literary interest, and illuminate their close, intense, complex relationship. Nineteen of hers to him, some early versions of subsequently published poems and 12 poems never before published are also included. The letters are important for what they disclose about a major poet, but also for what they reveal about his feelings for his ambitious, disappointed, difficult mother (he called her both "Dearest" and "Jackass"), his friends and enemies, politics, religion (a Catholic, he once considered converting to Judaism), his marriages, divorces, affairs, alcoholism, mental illness and urge toward suicide. Berryman killed himself in 1972 in Minneapolis by jumping off a bridge. Kelly's editing and annotations are very fine; he is a bibliographer at the University of Minnesota. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

This is the first appearance of any of Berryman's correspondence, 221 letters to the person he has called his "unspeakably powerful possessive MOTHER." At different times she was benefactor and adversary, encouraging his work and driving him to the brink of self-destruction. These extraordinary letters plunge the reader into his tortured private life and show such friends as Schwartz and Lowell from a new perspective. "If I had begun to adlib I'd never have stopped," he wrote of a speech. These letters are one life-long adlib chronicling his fears, longings, and successes, and stopping only at the bottom of his long slide into alcoholism, madness, and suicide. Michael Edmonds, State Historical Soc. of Wisconsin Lib., Madison
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 430 pages
• Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc; 1st edition (March 1988)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393024776
• ISBN-13: 978-0393024777
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #425,849 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Oedipus rising, February 23, 2005

By 

Boz Hubris "thecultofbob" (Detroitish) - See all my reviews

This review is from: We Dream of Honour: John Berryman's Letters to His Mother (Hardcover)

The normal inclination after reading this book is to say, "I can see why he jumped off the Washington Avenue bridge." and that's pretty much the picture it draws for the reader.

The constricting relationship between Berryman and his mother from his days at Cambridge to the end of his life was often contentious and demanding, though loving in nature. The seemingly tight-knit love slowly unravels as the young man blossoms into a self-reliant(albeit maniacal) man of letters and esteemed poet. Early on it is evident that the glue sticking this family(brother Robert Jefferson is alluded to often)together was the suicide of John Allyn Smith, Berryman's(his name belonging to his step-father) father. The grief of that incidence, which the poet witnessed, plagued him until his own untimely demise and likely contributed to his alcholism and other physical and psychosomatic maladies which the poet incurred and often brought on himself.

As Berryman graduates from college and begins his life as an academic he is often reliant upon his mother for support, both morally and financially. This carries through three marriages and until after many years, when the roles begin to reverse and the pressures of his growing popularity and stature wears him to a thin wire of nerves and anguish. Through it all he always strives to please her and provide for her expectations as much as his own bravado. It is only when the two goals clash, and they often do, that the strain becomes evident and irreversible.

As the book wears on and a few of Mrs. Berryman's melodramatic letters are placed alongside his, it becomes obvious where much of his grotesque public theatrics is rooted. I loathed to read any of her syncophantic retchings and felt totally sympathetic with his side of the relations.

Berryman's letters are often inciteful and funny, cocksure and self-important all the while being plagued with desperation and suffering. Though he tried to mask much of the reckless behavior (at least in the selections provided)he had engaged in (extra-marital affairs, alcoholism, drug dependency), much of the personal and psychological struggles are discussed exhaustively.

Although not as complete as one of the two major available biographies on Berryman, it certainly serves as a good companion piece, providing missing insights and general proclivites of the troubled poet.