Joseph Giovannini Oral History of Esther McCoy Archives of American Art, 1987, 1932, 1930s
EM: Yes, I stayed on. I went back to New York in 1935. During this time, those two or three years, that I was here, I began doing work in the left wing, the radical movement. I did things, articles, for--there were three or four of them-- EPIC [End Poverty In California] News was one of them, and then there was the communist paper in San Francisco, and then there was another one here. I can't remember the name of that other one, but I know that Kathryn Smith found it because I did some housing surveys, slum housing surveys, that I published there. This was something I just set myself to do. If you have lots of time, no money sense, and-- interested in the subject--so that was good. I published a lot of other things then, in the papers. I began publishing in the little magazines in . . . God, I don't even remember the names of them. One, I think was called Blast. Could that have been Jack Conroy, or one of those, that edited it?
JG: I don't know. I saw the word Blast somewhere, in the sketch here.
Ek.
EM: Good God.
JG: Was it at this time that you lived in Malibu?
EM: Oh, yes, after I left the place writing for the Russian woman, Tim and I house-sat a house in Malibu.
JG: What was Tim's last name?
EM: Robert.
JG: And you house-sat in Malibu?
EM: Yes, Zuma it was. I heard from his son not long ago.
[END TAPE 2, SIDE 1]
[BEGIN TAPE 2, SIDE 2]
JG: On June 8, in Santa Monica, this is tape 2, side 2, the second day of our sessions. Esther?
EM: Yes. I want to say that I think the chronology impedes progress, and I'd like to depart from that. And then I want to comment further on your categorizing me as a minimalist, and then asking me to say how I became a minimalist, and what my influences were in becoming a minimalist. As I understand the minimalism, I'm not sure that I am a minimalist, and I'm not sure that's it's correct to categorize what I am for researchers. I think they might come to their conclusions. I think that should be treated with some little . . . Well, drop it, since I can't find the word. Now let's close it off for a minute and talk about how we're going to--and whether we should [machine switched off, and on again] So what should we talk about?
JG: At the last session, we ended with you in Malibu.
EM: Yeah. Tim. He'd had some heart trouble. He was in the first World War and there'd been some injury, some slight, I think, gassing or something, and it had begun to affect his heart. He had just stopped everything and had begun to write and to do the things he wanted to. He was French-Canadian. His interests were Montaigne, and Remy de Gourmont and--I can't think of the others. But it made a difference. Oh turn it off! I can't, I don't know-- [Machine is turned off, and on again].
The Depression was a curious period, where everyone had lots of time, and there was nothing much to do. And in California, where there was no editorial work to do, it was almost impossible to earn livings in the way that I would have in New York. No publishing. So I did do odd jobs for writing, editing manuscripts, people who wanted to write. Then I began, through the Needhams, to get into the radical movement.
. . .
J.G: So before the Depression, you had a strong political instinct?
EM: Yes. Let's see, what else can I tell you about that.
JG: Were your political leanings similar to that of your parents?
EM: No, it was farther left, and then during the Depression, it became much more left. From the Needhams. There were all political groups came in there and so . . . But even Entenza, you know, who was not really political, but there was no one who wasn't on the left. It was a period of protestors, the thirties.
JG: Was Southern California a sort of conservative place at that time?
EM: Yes it was, it was--the Times called it "the last white hope," you know; it was a non-union town.
JG: Did the Times establish that climate or steer that climate?
EM: It prolonged it. [Long pause] Turn it off. [Machine is turned off, and on again.]
EM: I finally went back to New York in 1936 or '37 because things were not getting any better out here. I thought they might have been clearing up there. I was still hoping to get back into fiction and to sell more. I'd sold a couple of things--they were non-payment things. So Bonnie was going to England, offered me her place. She was going for a couple of months, so I went and stayed at her apartment. She had one on Ninth Street then. By this time, a friend that she had taken care of when the friend needed help set up a trust fund for her. So, she lived on Ninth Street and I stayed in her place. But there wasn't very much. I saw Dreiser, and I did things for publishers and applied for jobs and got little small jobs, freelance, and then I began to--because of California--really to like the freelance life. I think I've written even on John Flanagan.
. . .
The Depression changed the picture for my father. Before that, I knew that if things got really bad I could swallow my pride and ask for help. And then I had to face the nitty-gritty, and I learned to think ahead. This is something every free-lancer has to learn, to know that the checks, when they come in, don't belong to you, but to the creditors. When I meet people who can write or paint, and want to free-lance, I always look to see how they use their money, because that's the way to know whether they're able to go through the lean periods, to write a book, or to paint. In my case, getting the last installment from a publisher, which went to the photographers, and to repay what you may have borrowed, that was the problem. It's only after you're established that you can expect to get grants.
So, in my case, gradually, very early, I began to cut down on my needs, to simplify my life. You live more and more simply and need less and less, and that's good. I saw how Schindler lived, R.M. Schindler, the architect. He wanted something more than money and he simplified. So, I guess that's the morality that I'm trying to say, of writing. All of this is sort of a moral tale. You learn to go to the typewriter every morning and you learn that the money isn't yours, that you spent it before you get it. You come out of a book exhausted, and also broke, and that's something to handle. Because if you like the book, and you think you did a good job, you really have an inclination to reward yourself, and you can't. The money's not there for any real rewards.
. . .
Interest in California architecture began in '32 when I saw the Monterey houses, the second floor balcony. That was my first love, and then I saw Neutra and then other houses. I got so I would stop and look at houses under construction. I think I've said that before. I don't want to repeat too many times. So I got interested in how they were done. With Tim, who was a draftsman, we could talk about that, and then my natural interest in how things are put together, how stories are put together, how a television show is put together . . .
. . .
JG: What about the difference between architecture on the East Coast, and modernism on the East Coast, and the modernism here? You had said that you enjoyed . . . One of your groups had met in Lescaze's house, and that it was very strictly . . .
EM: But you saw so little of it. There wasn't very much of it. There was the Museum of Modern Art, but it was impossible in New York City to see it. This was one of the few things, that I could see. The two things were the house, Lescaze house, and the Museum of Modern Art.
. . .
JG: What about the movie community here, as you experienced Los Angeles? Was the movie community pretty isolated, as it seems to me to be now, or was there more interface with intellectuals and certainly people from . . .
EM: Well, now let's see. There were so many people, Germans, coming over, and I think there was the German group. I didn't know about that until I knew the Davidsons, later, and Ernst Lubitsch. And I think he was a friend of Thomas Mann's, and I think that was how Davidson got the design for the Mann house, through Lubitsch. It is Lubitsch, isn't it, Ernst Lubitsch? It doesn't quite sound right. Anyway, it was separate--it was quite separate.
And music was separate, too. But architecture did impinge on this. Let's see, Schindler did--all the architects I've known did something for musicians. Schindler did a remodel for Kompinsky, a violinist I believe he was, and Davidson did--they've all had-- Harris did one, it was never . . . It was a project, but it was a house for the composer who was at UCLA. What's his name, you know, the famous one . . .
JG: Schoenberg?
EM: Schoenberg, yes. He did a house for Schoenberg.
JG: He also did a house, Schindler, for the music critic of the Herald. [note: was music critic for Arts and Architecture.]
EM: Who was that?
JG: [note: 1938-1947 Schindler renovation, homeowner/music critic Peter Yates] Oh, it was the hillside house, I think in Silver Lake. It's the one with that wonderful rail, that kind of a paperclip rail, up to the uphill part of the site [inaudible]. My impression of the art of that time, through Arts and Architecture, was that there was a lot of conversation between people in different fields, but apparently that was really not the case.
EM: That is what a following generation always likes to believe. It sounds as if they must have liked each other, and they must have discussed, talked a lot. And I know that they always felt, in Europe, during that transition period, transition magazine, that everyone liked each other. But I have never found that true. In any case, there were--and I know Neutra was the most jealous of people.
JG: Was there more sort of interdisciplinary conversation in New York than here, or was it that there was more conversation in New York?
EM: More conversation, but I think there was as much backbiting everywhere.
. . .