52 | OCTOBER 27 • 2022 

ARTS&LIFE
JEWISH BOOK FAIR

M

ark Eden Horowitz has worked 
at the Library of Congress for 
31 years, going from a music 
specialist to a senior music specialist with 
a four-part job — acquiring collections, 
processing collections, handling references 
and taking on special projects.
When Horowitz 
encountered the massive 
amount of letters held 
by famed lyricist Oscar 
Hammerstein, he knew there 
was something special that 
would interest the public. 
Joined together, they became 
a book of some 1,000 pages, The Letters of 
Oscar Hammerstein II.
Horowitz, appearing virtually, will discuss 
the content at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 12, 
with Temple Israel cantor Neil Michaels 
and before a live concert of Hammerstein 
music performed by Josh Young and Emily 
Padgett. The couple, based in Michigan, 
will offer selections from Hammerstein’s 
popular productions that include 
Oklahoma, Carousel and South Pacific.
“
A colleague had just finished processing 
the collection, and I knew how rich it was,
” 
Horowitz said about the inspiration for the 
book. “I also knew how buried things were 
in the collection.
“Researchers wouldn’t know what 
letters were there just the way things 
were organized so it seemed like a perfect 
opportunity. I applied for a grant [to work 
on a book] and got that.
”
Horowitz read business letters and family 
letters, serious letters and funny letters, 
Judaism-related letters and love letters. He 
picked out the ones he thought would be of 
interest to readers and researched the fine 

points of background information to add 
context to content.
“For one year, seven days a week, I was 
reading through and transcribing Oscar 
letters,
” Horowitz recalled. “I wound up 
transcribing some 4,600 letters out of which 
a little less than 1,000, I think, appear in the 
book, sometimes even excerpted. 
“I felt these were the letters that revealed 
the various aspects of Oscar and also 
many of his friends, colleagues and family 
members. One of the great things about the 
Hammerstein collection is he kept carbons 
of his outgoing letters so you could have 
the conversations between people — people 
who wrote him and his responses and vice 
versa.
“There are several letters to his second 
wife, Dorothy. I didn’t include all of them. 
Most of them were from when she was 
in Reno, Nev., getting a divorce from her 
first husband. They’re quite passionate and 
reveal a side of Oscar that was certainly a 
surprise to me.
” 
The earliest letters in the book are from 
1917, and the writing continues into 1960, 
the year that Hammerstein died. Although 
the letters are scattered before 1939, they 
become very plentiful afterwards. 
“I think readers will learn how varied 
his life was,
” Horowitz said. “I think they 
think of him as just the lyricist and don’t 
realize he was also a librettist, a producer, a 
director, a businessman and a social activist. 
He was constantly doing so many different 
things.
”
Hammerstein was half Jewish, and he 
supported Jewish charities, organizations 
and fundraising efforts. A couple of letters 
showcase his fundraising concerns. 
Horowitz said he was especially affected 

by one letter written to Hammerstein’s 
publicist. It had to do with Hammerstein 
traveling one Christmas when he was 
supposed to be represented on a radio show. 
Hammerstein did not want listeners 
to think they were being deceived by a 
performance that had been pre-recorded 
so he requested that either the audience 
be told the performance had been pre-
recorded or that it be completely removed 
from the program.
“There was something about the 
honorableness of it that most people would 
think is the most mundane thing, but going 
through Oscar’s letters has made me want 
to be a better person. That was one of the 
letters that most did that. His honorableness 
and goodness resonated with me.
”
Horowitz hopes those same feelings reach 
readers. 
“Oscar really invented, more than 
anybody else, the idea of musical drama as 
opposed to musical comedy or operetta,
” 
said Horowitz, who also has written the 
book Sondheim on Music: Minor Details 
and Major Decisions. 
“I want to share my passion for Oscar 
and get people excited about the thought 
of him. I hope people read the letters. 
Sales are great, but that’s not my focus. My 
focus is wanting to share Oscar with the 
world because I think he made the world 
a better place in so many ways. I hope my 
enthusiasm will translate to that.
” 

Author who edited his letters to appear virtually 
before a concert of Hammerstein favorites.

An Intimate Look at 
Oscar Hammerstein

SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Mark Eden 
Horowitz

