W. C. Fields : his follies and fortunes (1949)

W. C. Fields 12 to 2 — Clean cellar, wash windows, tidy house, beat rugs. 2 to 2 : 1 5 — Eat simple lunch. 2:15 to 5:30 — Spade garden, darn socks, wash Rover, put up jelly, polish car, burn rubbish, wash woodwork, paint garage, clean side walls of tires. 5:30 to 7 — Drive to station for husband, shake cocktails, cook dinner, serve dinner, wash dishes. 7:00 to 12 — Keep busy — keep smiling — for, as every man knows, the husband is tired. The book, published by Dodd, Mead & Company, had only a moderate sale. Fields mentioned it wistfully in a note in October of 1 94 1 to Gene Fowler: "I received a letter just this morning from Mr. Dodd saying he did not think it would be wise to reissue my book, which has a great deal to do with liquor. You very wisely shunned the horrid stuff in your classic on Barrymore." Unencouraged by his success with books, Fields threw his best literary effort into his letter writing, which was marked by the same majestic hyperbole that characterized his other literary works. "Dear Dago," he usually addressed missives to La Cava, and in one of them, in 1937, he spoke of dining with Fowler and his "unholy family." Fowler's youngest son, Bill, Fields said, smoked black cigars and drank whisky until it ran out of his ears. His daughter, the letter went on, chewed tobacco, and spit tobacco juice on Fields' clean shirt front, and the eldest son "tried to roll me for my poke." In a letter to Fowler, when the comedian was in a sanitarium, Fields commented on a tidal wave which had recently struck the California coast. Their mutual friend, La Cava, said Fields, passed over his cottage and dropped a bottle saying he was headed for San Gabriel dam. He had a couple of "oars," according to Fields, and was doing his best with them. Dictating and probing his lawn with the spyglass kept Fields content through many a dull day. He wrote a lot of letters, but 280