Almost a Family: A Memoir

352 Pages·2011·3.57 MB·English

by  John Darnton

ALSO BY JOHN DARNTON
Black and White and Dead All Over
The Darwin Conspiracy
Mind Catcher
The Experiment
Neanderthal

THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
Published by Alfred A. Knopf
Copyright © 2011 by Talespin, Inc.
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf,
a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada
by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
www.aaknopf.com
Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks
of Random House, Inc.
Grateful acknowledgment is made to Harold Ober Associates
for permission to reprint an excerpt from “Sunday: New Guinea”
by Karl Shapiro, copyright © 1943, 1970 by Karl Shapiro.
First published in Good Housekeeping. Reprinted by permission
of Harold Ober Associates.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Darnton, John.
Almost a family : a memoir / by John Darnton.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-30759524-9
1. Darnton, John. 2. Darnton, John—Family. 3. Authors, American—20th century—
Biography. 4. Fathers and sons—United States—Biography. I. Title.
PS3554.A727Z46 2010
813′.54—dc22
[B] 2010016835
Jacket photograph courtesy of the author
Jacket design by Carol Devine Carson
v3.1
For Nina
and
Kyra, Liza, and Jamie
and
Zachary and Ella Asher and Adara
A man who has spent his life in newspaper work is apt to believe that in the long run
the best thing to do is to tell the truth.
—BYRON DARNTON

And over the hill the guns bang like a door
And planes repeat their mission in the heights.
The jungle outmaneuvers creeping war
And crawls within the circle of our sacred rites.
I long for our disheveled Sundays home,
Breakfast, the comics, news of latest crimes,
Talk without reference, and palindromes,
Sleep and the Philharmonic and the ponderous Times.
I long for lounging in the afternoons
Of clean intelligent warmth, my brother’s mind,
Books and thin plates and flowers and shining spoons,
And your love’s presence, snowy, beautiful, and kind.
KARL SHAPIRO,
“Sunday: New Guinea”
Contents
Cover
Other Books by This Author
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Epigraph
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
A Note About the Author
Illustrations