My Lost Mexico - Hardcover

Michener, James A.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0938349937 ISBN 13: 9780938349938

Publisher: State House Pr, 1992

Synopsis

Traces the history of Michener's novel, describing how an early manuscript version was lost thirty years ago

About this title

From the Inside Flap

Michener uses his original journals and notes of his travels in Mexico and Spain, and his memories of the people he met, to illustrate how the characters and plot of the novel were conceived and how they matured. Included is a chapter on the beguiling "Texas Girls" who were eliminated from the novel in an editorial cut that might have defeated the author thirty years previously. Here also is the very personal and provocative account of Michener's relations with his publishing firm, and his own evaluation of his string of bestselling works.

From Publishers Weekly

In this intermittently interesting portrait of a writer's mind at work, Michener reconstructs the birth of his recently published novel Mexico , which he had originally abandoned in 1961. He blames the novel's derailment on a mocking editorial suggestion by Bennett Cerf, then his publisher at Random House, which caused him to lose control of the story's diverse strands. Misplaced for three decades, the lost manuscript turned up in 1991 and Michener completed the multigenerational saga centering on a three-day bullfighting festival. Discussing the "colossal" writer's blocks he has faced over the years, Michener offers advice to aspiring writers as he describes his many trips to Mexico, divulges his sources of inspiration and relives the writing of Mexico with the aid of reproduced journal pages, workbook entries and photographs.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: State House Pr
• Publication date: 1992
• ISBN 10: 0938349937
• ISBN 13: 9780938349938
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 176