48. And So It Goes, Kurt Vonnegut: A Life by Charles J. Shields I had the opportunity to meet Charles J. Shields and his wife Guadalupe at The Writer's Center in Bethesda, MD. The only authorized biographer of Vonnegut was a wonderful speaker, I wished I'd had him to speak the rest of the book to me, for as thorough and direct as his prose is, plus a prodigious knack for hitting all the most interesting details, his speaking was even more entertaining. In the Introduction, he writes of his first attempt to convince Vonnegut that he was a worthy biographer. His initial plea produced a mailed self-portrait from Vonnegut, with the caption “A most respectful demurring by me for the excellent writer Charles J. Shields, who offered to be my biographer.” In person, Shields recalled that it was his wife who "fastened on the word 'demurring'" and convinced him to try again, which he did with success. That little tidbit was left out of the book, as were the details of...
Life, Books, and SFF