419. RICHARD CONDON American novelist of frequently satirical thrillers, including The Manchurian Candidate and Prizzi's Honor. A fine group of 24 letters including: two A.L.S. "Dick Condon", each 1p. 4to., twenty-two T.L.S. signed "Richard Condon" [1], "Rich" [1], and "R", total 28pp. mostly quarto, Jan. 14, 1958 to May, 1963, to NY Post columnist Leonard Lyons. In small part: "The Summer Book Favorite to win the Nobel Prize for Literature...is Pablo Neruda of Chile...Of all the artists of the world, Louis Armstrong was chosen for the celebration of the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Tivoli Gardens here...Among the Danes...he is as big as Babe Ruth once was for Americans...'The Manchurian Candidate' will have been published in 27 countries, two weeks before the opening of the film... I have a very clear memory of your long obituary column on Henri Bernstein, the French playwright-lover-duellist producer...I have such an important-in-effect if minor-in-scope character in mind to open 'An Infinity of Mirrors' [published in 1964] who is so much like Bernstein that I really must get more color...and your obits have more color than Picasso's palettes. At long last...I will meet our mutual friend Professor A. Schlesinger, Jr....details, real and fancied, concerning a novel I have written called THE OLDEST CONFESSION...It will be produced as a book in four and a half months which is something of a record...Through all the...pitching I have to pretend that the book is a case of ketchup and that I am a grayflanneled, adspace pilot. When one begins to do one's own bragging...the words shy and discreet do not describe one, but id one is greedy, what can one do?...I now (gulp) write to ask whether you or Sylvia would so read galleys and if you liked the words...send them to Mr. Hemingway for a short quote...You have gone to such considerable trouble to line Debo [Condon's daughter Deborah] up with Mr. Lindsay's opponent then to have it appear as though I was endorsing the opposition [included is the newsclipping to which this incident refers] - A REPUBLICAN! It ain't me...but we are a long way from being the only Richard Condons on the island you chronicle...We have a felling that Nixon is about to slide over the abyss into a breakdown. Can one imagine what it must be like to want the presidency that badly only to be thwarted?...I began legal proceeding to change my name to Walter Mitty because I found fourteen clippings of your column which said the President [John F. Kennedy] had read and enjoyed THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE...the day I visited Ernest Hemingway...in the year which Jose Ferrer and I produced 'TWENTIETH CENTURY' and 'STALAG 17', about 1951. I went to Havana to talk to Josephine Baker about appearing in a musical...set in Cuba or Haiti [that] would demonstrate how the tropics might possibly melt the inhibitions of a Headmaster from New England boy's school. A respectable, conventional theme which is in no way alarming in the expectation of its presentation to Hemingway because it had been done before by Maughm [sic], Conrad and others...Miss Baker liked the idea...It occurred to me that Hemingway might add a bit of dash to the package...I explained over the telephone what I had in mind and Hemingway said I should come on out and talk about it...He was at once and afterwards most cordial and hospitable...He did say he would think about writing it...The drinks kept coming...Hemingway did nothing to terminate the interview...I returned to New York at once and announced to the theatrical press that Hemingway was considering writing a musical play for us...Hemingway inveighed against the announcement. [Lyon's rival columnist Walter] Winchell demolished Miss Baker. Ferrer got a movie offer. It would be hard to say who forgot about the dented bu[n]gle more quickly...The Frank Sinatra fete for Paris orphans...is selling out. The discreet letters of invitation confide that this is 'the only time Mr. Sinatra has ever sung in France'. There are eleven girls on the Riviera who can prove this is not true...We have finished, delivered and had accepted the original story commissioned by Frank Sinatra called 'ROBBO!', which he will put into production on May1st. It is the legend of Robin Hood set among the gangsters in Chicago...and the first musical Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Sammy Davis, Jr., have done together [released in 1964 as 'Robin and the 7 Hoods']..." A compelling archive with much more good content, should be viewed. Overall good condition. $1,200-1,500