gstaad，5 february 1927

　　dear mother：

　　thank you very much for sending me thecatalogue of the marshal field exhibit with thereproduction of your painting of the blacksmithshop in it.it looks very lovely and i should haveliked to see the original.

　　i did not answer when you wrote about thesun etc.book as i could not help being angry andit is very foolish to write angry letters；and morethan foolish to do so to one's mother.it is quitenatural for you not to like the book and i regretyour reading any book that causes you pain ordisgust.

　　on the other hand i am in no way ashamed ofthe book，except in as i may have failed inaccurately portraying the people i wrote of，or inmaking them really come alive to the reader.i amsure the book is unpleasant.but it is not allunpleasant and i am sure is no more unpleasantthan the real inner lives of some of our best oak park families.you must remember that in such abook all the worst of the people's lives is displayedwhile at home there is a very lovely side for thepublic and the sort of thing of which i have hadsome experience in observing behind closed doors.besides you，as an artist，know that a writer shouldnot be forced to defend his choice of a subject butshould be criticized on how he has treated thatsubject.the people i wrote of were certainlyburned out，hollow and smashed——and that is theway i have attempted to show them.i am onlyashamed of the book in whatever way it fails toreally give the people i wished to present.i have along life to write other books and the subjects willnot always be the same——except as they will all，i hope，be human beings.

　　and if the good ladies of the book study clubunder the guidance of miss fanny butcher，who isnot an intelligent reviewer——i would have feltvery silly had she praised the book——agreeunanimously that i am prostituting a great talentetc.for the lowest ends——why the good ladiesare talking about something of which they knownothing and saying very foolish things.

　　as for hadley，bumby and myself——althohadley and i have not been living in the same house for some time（we have lived apart since lastsept.and by now hadley may have divorced me）we are the very best of friends.she and bumby areboth well，healthy and happy and all the profits androyalties of the sun also rises，by my order，arebeing paid directly to hadley，both from americaand england.the book has gone into，by the lastads i saw in january，5 printings（15000）copies，and is still going strongly.it is published inengland in the spring under the title of fiesta .hadley is coming to america in the spring so youcan see bumby on the profits of sun also rises.iam not taking one cent of the royalties，which arealready running into several thousand dollars，havebeen drinking nothing but my usual wine or beerwith meals，have been leading a very monastic lifeand trying to write as well as i am able.we havedifferent ideas about what constitutes good writing——that is simply a fundamental disagreement——but you really are deceivingyourself if you allow any fanny butchers to tellyou that i am pandering to sensation-alism etc.etc.i get letters from vanity fair，cosmopolitan etc.asking me for stories，articles，and serials，butam publishing nothing for six months or a year（afew stories sold to scribner's the end of last year and one funny article out） because i know thatnow is a very crucial time and that it is much moreimportant for me to write in tranquility，trying towrite as well as i can，with no eye on any market，nor any thought of what the stuff willl bring，oreven if it can ever be published——than to fall intothe money making trap which handles american writers like the cornhusking machine handled mynoted relative's thumb .

　　i'm sending this letter to both of you becausei know you have been worried about me and i amalways sorry to cause you worry.but you must notdo that——because，although my life may smashup in different ways i will always do all that i canfor the people i love（i don't write home a lotbecause i haven't time and because，writing，i findit very hard to write letters and have to restrictcorrespondence to the letters i have to write——and my real friends know that i am just as fond ofthem whether i write or not）that i have neverbeen a drunk nor even a steady drinker（you willhear legends that i am——they are tacked on everyone that ever wrote about people who drink）and that all i want is tranquility and a chance towrite.you may never like any thing i write——andthen suddenly you might like something very much.but you must believe that i am sincere inwhat i write.dad has been very loyal and whileyou，mother，have not been loyal at all i absolutelyunderstand that it is because you believed youowed it to yourself to correct me in a path whichseemed to you disastrous.

　　so maybe we can drop that all.i am sure that，in the course of my life，you will find much cause tofeel that i have disgraced you if you believeeverything you hear.on the other hand with alittle shot of loyalty as anaesthetic you may be able to get through all my obvious disreputability and find，in the end，that i have not disgraced youat all.

　　anyhow，best love to you both，

　　ernie