Thank you both so much, Melissa and Kari. This is a big help. I will revise
accordingly!
Best,
Julie

On Tue, Apr 5, 2016 at 11:25 AM, Kari Ronning <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Dear Julie,
>
>
>
> I don’t recall any specific place where Cather outright says she wants
> British spellings, or at least the ‘-our’ one. I agree with Melissa that
> she didn’t use it in her letters or her own typing of her manuscripts.
>
>
>
> Alfred Knopf told Sue Rosowski that house style was never imposed on
> Cather—see *A Lost Lady* textual essay, p. 323. It is, of course possible
> that he was romanticizing the relationship.
>
>
>
> It may still have been Knopf house style but one to which she agreed; he
> was positioning himself somewhat as an international publisher.  It would
> be interesting to look at other Knopf books from the same period as
> Cather’s to see if they have the same style. I suspect she was valuable
> enough to Knopf that she could have asked for something different.
>
>
>
> Houghton Mifflin did not use British spellings—but the house style of the
> Autograph Edition was very British, going much further than ‘-our’—grey,
> programme, axe, waggon, whiskey, and others. We have always thought Cather
> agreed to this, even if she did not originate the idea. And she made other,
> more slightly more substantive revisions that followed the same
> path—enquired is the only one I can think of off the top of my head.
>
>
>
> Hope this is of some help.
>
>
>
> Sincerely,
>
>                 Kari
>
>
>
> *From:* 5 Bank Street: The Listserv for Willa Cather Scholars [mailto:
> [log in to unmask]] *On Behalf Of *Olin-Ammentorp, Julie
> *Sent:* Tuesday, April 05, 2016 9:11 AM
> *To:* [log in to unmask]
> *Subject:* [5BANKSTREET] Cather and British spelling
>
>
>
> Dear 5 Bank Streeters,
>
>
>
> I'm trying to locate a solid source that states that Cather preferred
> British spellings to American spellings, but so far have come a cropper.
> Online I found the Bernice Slote edition of *Uncle Valentine and Other
> Stories, *which states that “In ‘Coming, Eden Bower!’ Willa Cather for
> the first time used the English spelling in words like ‘*neighbour*’”
> (183), but felt this was inconclusive. I checked the textual essay in the
> Scholarly Edition of *Youth and the Bright Medusa, *which confirms the
> substitution of English spelling for American in this book (470, 478), but
> does not indicate that this was Cather’s personal preference; on the
> contrary, it *may *have been house style (470). I checked Woodress on the
> publication of YBM, and found lots of publishing details, but nothing about
> Cather's spelling preferences; I also checked the online Calendar of
> Letters to see if I could find anything, but had no luck; the same with
> re-reading some key letters in the print Cather *Letters, *though it may
> be there someplace.
>
>
>
> If anyone has any suggestions, I would greatly appreciate it. Please feel
> free to tell me, too, if I'm fabricating the idea of "Cather preferred
> English spellings" because it fits an argument I'm making!
>
>
>
> Thanks so much.
>
> Julie Olin-Ammentorp
>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Julie Olin-Ammentorp
> Dept. of English
> Le Moyne College
> 1419 Salt Springs Rd.
> Syracuse, NY 13214
>
> 315-445-4429
> [log in to unmask]
>



-- 
Julie Olin-Ammentorp
Dept. of English
Le Moyne College
1419 Salt Springs Rd.
Syracuse, NY 13214
315-445-4429
[log in to unmask]