In 1936, John Steinbeck’s puppy made confetti of half the manuscript of Of Mice and Men. “I was pretty mad but the poor little fellow may have been acting critically,” he wrote to a friend. “I didn’t want to ruin a good dog for a manuscript I’m not sure is good at all.”

He redid two months’ work and decided the puppy had been right. “I’m not sure Toby didn’t know what he was doing when he ate the first draft,” he wrote. “I have promoted Toby-dog to be lieutenant-colonel in charge of literature.”

Voltaire was stirring up trouble even after he died. According to a tradition in the 18th and 19th centuries, it was fatal to publish his complete works:

• Beaumarchais, the first editor to produce such a collection, lost a million francs in stock speculations and died suddenly in 1798.
• Desser published a 10-volume octavo edition and died shortly afterward of phthisis, and his friend who financed the project died in poverty of the same disease.
• Cérioux and his wife published a 60-volume edition and were ruined financially by it.
• Dalibon and René, editors of two separate editions, were forced to take jobs as workmen in printing plants.
• Touquet died suddenly at Ostend in 1831, and his partner, Garnery, was ruined and died.
• Deterville, who began as a wealthy publisher, went blind (!).
• Daubrée accused a woman of stealing a book; she assassinated him.

Over the course of 70 years, it is said, at least eight publishers went bankrupt publishing complete editions of Voltaire’s writings.

See Curse of the Ninth.

Robert Benchley kept a special shelf of books that he favored for their titles:

• Forty Thousand Sublime and Beautiful Thoughts
• Success With Small Fruits
• Keeping a Single Cow
• Bicycling for Ladies
• Diseases of the Sweet Potato
• Talks on Manure
• Ailments of the Leg

In a review of the New York City telephone directory, he wrote, “The weakness of plot is due to the great number of characters which clutter up the pages. The Russian school is responsible for this.”

‘Wordsworth,’ said Charles Lamb, ‘one day told me that he considered Shakespeare greatly overrated. “There is an immensity of trick in all Shakespeare wrote,” he said, “and people are taken in by it. Now if I had a mind I could write exactly like Shakespeare.” So you see,’ proceeded Charles Lamb quietly, ‘it was only the mind that was wanting.’

— Frank Leslie’s Ten Cent Monthly, December 1863

While editing The Sun Also Rises, Maxwell Perkins had to decide how to handle the many obscenities in Hemingway’s text. He planned a lunch with the author and kept a list of words to discuss with him.

While Perkins was at lunch, Charles Scribner came looking for him and, finding his office empty, consulted his calendar. It read “shit piss fuck bitch.”

When Perkins returned, Scribner said, “You must be exhausted.”