Eugene Field, a Study in Heredity and Contradictions — Volume 2 — Edition Insights

Letters as Self-Portrait

The volume reproduces numerous letters and drawings by Field, offering a direct view of his voice. In one letter, he includes a self-portrait captioned "As I would have looked but for the refining influence of Old Nompy," blending self-deprecation with a caricaturist's eye. Another letter contains a "Bowling Challenge" and a "Stamp Account," showing his fondness for playful bureaucracy. These documents are not mere supplements; they are the primary evidence Thompson uses to build his case for Field's contradictions—the poet who wrote "Little Boy Blue" also sketched absurd scenes like "The Little Dress-Maker" and "A Proper Sonet." The letters reveal a man who treated correspondence as performance, often embedding drawings and doggerel verses that undercut any solemnity.

The Saints' and Sinners' Corner as a Structural Device

Thompson devotes an entire chapter to the Saints' and Sinners' Corner, a loose gathering of Chicago journalists, lawyers, and actors that Field mythologized in his newspaper column "Sharps and Flats." The excerpts describe a New Year's Eve party in 1890, where Field concocted the punch and sent out cards reading "Be there 10.30 P.M. Sharp." Thompson notes that no formal club existed—Field invented the membership and the meetings. This chapter functions as a microcosm of the biography's method: Thompson uses a specific event to illustrate Field's talent for fabricating community. The description of the darkened store, drawn curtains, and the "subtle influence" that prevented boisterousness suggests a carefully staged atmosphere, one that Field controlled even in his absence.

Collecting as a Recurring Motif

Field's passion for book collecting appears repeatedly, often framed as a comic obsession. Thompson includes a long, mock-heroic hymn about the perils of procrastination in buying rare books: "Now—now is the accepted time / To eviscerate your purse!" The anecdote about the purchase of a chair for The Players' Club—where a dealer, a critic, and a collector haggle—shows Field's interest in the theater of acquisition. The chair itself becomes a prop in a story about rivalry and timing. Thompson uses these episodes to connect Field's journalistic instincts to his bibliophilia: both involve the chase, the deal, and the story that follows. The recurring image of the "snooping" bibliophile mirrors Field's own prowling through literary and social scenes.

Movement Between Public and Private

The biography's structure shifts between public events—publication of first books, a second trip to Europe—and private documents like the "Auto-Analysis" chapter. Thompson does not attempt to reconcile these spheres; instead, he lets them stand in tension. The excerpts show Field moving from the intimacy of a letter to his brother to the broad comedy of a newspaper column. In one passage, a serious discussion of heredity gives way to a farcical account of a chair purchase. This movement is not chaotic but deliberate: Thompson implies that Field's contradictions are not flaws but the engine of his work. The reader is left to observe how the same man who wrote "Little Boy Blue" could also draft a parody of a hymn about buying books.

Readers should attend to the illustrations and facsimiles included in this volume, as they are not decorative but integral to Thompson's argument. Field's drawings—of himself, of colleagues, of imaginary scenes—offer a counterpoint to the prose, often undercutting or complicating the biographical narrative. The book rewards those who move between text and image, letter and poem, treating each as a piece of evidence in the study of a man who made a career of playing with personae.