The Funny Side of Millay

We've all had day jobs to make ends meet, particularly those of us with aspirations to be artists in one form or another. After all, the bills have to be paid. This is why the poet Edna St. Vincent Millay spent many hours writing satiric short fiction in the early years of her career. They were her bread and butter when all else failed.

Millay's 1924 publication of pieces she'd written under a pseudonym featured a preface by herself as herself about a writer in whose work she had "never failing interest and delight."

Although she had just graduated from Vassar College, young Edna St. Vincent Millay found it hard to get enough poetry published and sold to earn a living. She acted, took typing assignments (people say she typed 95 words per minute), and published work under another name. When her friend and sometimes lover Edmund Wilson once told her she could make a lot more money for her short satires if she published them under her own name, the poet replied, "My name is for my work, my satires are for food." But what a nom de plume! Nancy Boyd. It sounds innocent enough until one realizes that a gay man was called a Nancy Boy in her era. It's kind of like the pseudonym "Paige Turner." It's completely tongue in cheek.

Millay was on her honeymoon when she submitted the compilation of pieces she'd written years before to make ends meet. By this time her career had taken off and she was capable of earning a modest but sufficient living as a poet. In order to assure sales, her publisher asked if she knew a celebrity who would write the preface. She said yes: then wrote it herself.

Miss Boyd has asked me to write a preface to these dialogues, with which, having followed them eagerly as they appeared from time to time in the pages of Vanity Fair, I was already familiar. I am no friend of prefaces, but if there must be one to this book, it should come from me, who was its author's earliest admirer. I take pleasure in recommending to the public these excellent small satires, from the pen of one in whose work I have a never-failing interest and delight.

The subject matter of the satires varied greatly. Sometimes she wrote about why she liked Americans ("...they are the nicest people in the world [who] still believe in Santa Claus [and] smoke with their meals."), others she offered advice on how to fake being artistic ("Get into the habit when alone of crushing out your cigarette against the wall-paper, or dropping it on the floor and carelessly grinding it into the rug, or tossing it in the general direction of the fireplace."), she even submitted ridiculous satiric plays, including one featuring an "implacable Aphrodite," an unattainable female that everyone wants ("HE: Of course I'll go if you want me to. But my heart I leave here. SHE (languidly): Pray don't. I have room for nothing more in my apartment.").

There were many works that reveal something of Millay's feelings for her family. Despite the fact her father was out of the picture by the time she was eight--and certainly not a politician--in a piece called "Out of the Reach of Baby" she laments.

Father is crazy about the baby. Really, you'd think that weakness and helplessness were virtues, the admiration Father has for them. ... Father is a politician. He has spent the best years of his life in an endeavor to make the world safe for stupidity. It has been an up-hill struggle, but at last things begin to look as if his dream were about to come true.

I have many favorites in this little book, but among them is "Cordially Yours," a guide to what to write people under specific situations. For instance, should you need to send a letter to a man who has proposed marriage but whom you reject she suggests starting with, "Do you take me for an idiot?" On the other hand, if you want to accept the proposal she offers this advice on what to write, "Of course there are things about you that would drive me frantic in a month's time. ... But all men, even the clever and good-looking ones, are irritating at times." And, in case you ever had occasion to write the President about a book he borrowed but didn't return, she suggests writing, "I think you will agree with me that a man who is negligent, dishonest, and procrastinating and acquisitive in his private life, is unworthy to stand publicly at the head of a great nation. ... If I do not receive [my book] by return mail, I shall throw a quart of Scotch into a suit-case, take a flying trip to your little old White House, and do myself the honor of pushing in your face."

This book is out of print and hard to find. If you do find a copy, it will likely cost a pretty penny. I must admit I think the search would certainly be worth it.