Journalist Joseph Mitchell (1908-1996) came to The New Yorker from the World-Telegram in the late 1930s and he continued to elevate the art of the profile. After 1964, he still showed up at his office at The New Yorker every day to write but, afflicted with depression and writer's block, he produced nothing more that was published in his lifetime. New Yorker illustrator Richard Merkin (1938-2009), born in the year Mitchell left the World-Telegram, found the writer somewhere—possibly still there in his office—on April 7, 1996, and asked him to sign a first edition of McSorley's Wonderful Saloon (1943). Mitchell, it is evident from the inscription, was familiar with Merkin's work from the magazine. He was to die of metastatic lung cancer on May 24, fewer than seven weeks after signing the book.
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Joseph Mitchell
AbeBooks listing accessed November 26, 2022
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No doubt Mitchell felt some kinship with the staff, both artists and writers, who worked at the magazine, and even some of those writers who didn't. There is another copy of this book currently listed online which he signed to theater and film critic Edith Oliver (1913-1998) in 1943, four years before Oliver even came to work at The New Yorker, and more than fifty years earlier than he signed Merkin's copy. Was this obtained at a book signing, or privately? Both copies are listed at $3,500.
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Joseph Mitchell
Abe Books listing accessed November 26, 2022
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