Beschreibung:

Zwei Seiten dünnes Briefpapier mit rot gedrucktem Kopf "Finca Vigia, San Francisco de Paula, Cuba" und Wasserzeichen "Esleeck - Fidelity Onion Skin - Made in USA". Knapp anderthalb Seiten mit maschinenschriftlichem Text und vereinzelten Korrekturen Hemingways in Tinte, die zweite Seite in Tinte signiert "Papa". Je doppelt gefaltet. Nach Robert Mannings Besuch Hemingways in Cuba 1954, bei dem der damalige Time-Reporter und spätere Herausgeber von "The Atlantic" (bis 2007 "The Atlantic Monthly") den Schriftsteller unmittelbar nach der Verleihung des Nobelpreises für Literatur interviewen durfte, dankt ihm Hemingway für einen Brief: "You were just as straight as you sounded on the phone when I decided you were trustworthy. It was a lot of fun fishing together and we were lucky that the fish were there". Zudem dankt er für Fotos und "the piece" (Anm.: das geführte Interview): "Bob I didn't mean I wouldn't read the piece. I meant for you to write anything you wished and I would not read it except to check direct quotes. Thought you handled the quote on Ezra (Anm.: der amerikanische Dichter Ezra Pound, 1885 - 1972) exceptionally well". Hemingway möchte ein ihm vom Time Magazin geschenktes Porträt an Manning weitergeben: "A man keeping many portraits of himself around his house always makes a bad impression on me. Mary has that old days picture of me as Kid Balzac by Waldo Peirce that she likes and she has to look at my damned face every day". Zudem nimmt Hemingway Stellung zur NBC-Radiosendung "Meet Ernest Hemingway" vom 19. Dezember 1954 mit Kritikern und Freunden Hemingways wie Sidney Franklin (1903 - 1976, US-Torero), Robert Manning (1919 - 2012), Max Eastman (1883 - 1969, sozialistischer US-Schriftsteller, seit seiner Reise in die Sowjetunion 1923 Freund von Leo Trotzki, ab 1941 Kritiker von Sozialismus und Kommunismus), Edward "Ted" Scott (neuseeländischer Journalist und Boxer, der Hemingway 1954 zu einem Duell mit .45er Pistolen herausforderte, nachdem Scott Hemingways Frau Mary nach einem Streit über Steaks aus Löwenfleisch beleidigt hatte, Hemingway verweigerte jedoch das Duell) oder Marlon Brando, der aus "The Old man and the Sea" vorlas. Hemingway: "That night they had that NBC broadcast I tuned in around when Franklin was about half through bull shitting. There was a big electrical storm north of us and I could only hear whispers most of the time. [.] You sounded healthy and in good shape. Kamikaze Scott seemed very annoyed that I did not wish to kill him. I can't write books and kill people and go to jail to help their need for publicity. [.] Max Eastman was sort of comic too. [.] But that poor bastard has to always wake up in the morning remembering what really happened to him. On the other hand maybe he has convinced himself that his lie is true. For your own private information, I never travelled with Franklin's 'troupe'. That is all ball room bananas. I did pay for one of his operations though and tried to get him fights in Madrid when no promoter would have him [.] His version like Eastman's and Scott's makes them more comfortable. Maybe it is necessary to them. Franklin was a first rate novillero but was never worth a damn as a matador after the first time he was gored seriously. We were good friends for a long time and until I went to Mexico in 1940, I think, and saw with a bunch of fags I could not take and with his stories, that once were true and wonderful, all changed to delusions of grandeur. He'd forgotten the true ones and the ones he invented he published finally." Er lädt Manning wieder nach Cuba ein: "Be a good boy, Bob, and come down here sometime when I'm through working and you don't have to write any piece and we will have fun. You were damned good company piece or no piece and I never saw anybody except a fighter pilot learn to fish so fast". Er schließt mit "Best wishes for a good New Year to you and your wife from Mary and me. Yours always", mit eigenhändiger Tintenunterschrift "Papa". Dazu das "