If you want to start with Arthur Upson, write Dr. Richard Burton (see Who's Who for present address, stating that I urged this, being an Upson fan, & that I said he knows & understands more about Upson as poet and man than any other. Get him to do you an article. I think you can land this. Burton wrote a really beautiful poem on Upson's death, a copy of which in a de luxe limited edition he gave me & which I still have. That could be reproduced with Burton's permission. I have also the Collected Poems of Upson in 2 vols which I got from his mother. If Edmund D. Brooks of Minneapolis is still living, he would help gladly & what he would give would have distinction. Brooks is, or was, a real person & published some exquisite things. Also, write to Arthur J. Russell, c/o the Minneapolis Journal, saying what you are doing and asking for help. Say I told you to do it. If Russell not dead, he should be able & eager to tell you how to get at good Upson stuff. He himself can — or could — write with real power & beauty, being a fine spirit — very fine indeed!
Do you want to borrow the Collected Poems of Upson & the Burton threnody?
As to the coming smash, I know clearly only that it is inevitable. My hope is based on the wiping out of great urban populations through gas, diseases, & scientific efficiency generallly. Killing the exaggerated urban view of life with most of the populations that perforce hold it would be a godsend to the remnant of the human race that may survive the self-destruction of the machine-industrial-profit system.
Only an intensely urban consciousness could believe that the human race as a whole will be wiped out! Good God! Think of the empty country on this planet & the sparsely populated areas which will not be touched by war! Reduce our excess population to something like the normal for an agricultural regime, & all major social problems will be solved.
Jno.
