A chance meeting : intertwined lives of American writers and artists, 1854-1967 / Rachel Cohen.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [331]-346) and index.

Henry James and Mathew Brady -- William Dean Howells and Annie Adams Fields and Walt Whitman -- Mathew Brady and Ulysses S. Grant -- William Dean Howells and Henry James -- Walt Whitman and Mathew Brady -- Mark Twain and William Dean Howells -- Mark Twain and Ulysses S. Grant -- W.E.B. Du Bois and William James -- Gertrude Stein and William James -- Henry James and Annie Adams Fields and Sarah Orne Jewett -- Edward Steichen and Alfred Stieglitz -- Willa Cather and Mark Twain -- Willa Cather and Annie Adams Fields and Sarah Orne Jewett -- Edward Steichen and Alfred Stieglitz and Gertrude Stein -- Carl Van Vechten and Gertrude Stein -- Marcel Duchamp and Alfred Steiglitz -- Willa Cather and Edward Steichen and Katherine Anne Porter -- Alfred Stieglitz and Hart Crane -- Hart Crane and Charlie Chaplin -- Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston -- Beauford Delaney and W.E.B. Du Bois -- Hart Crane and Katherine Anne Porter -- Elizabeth Bishop and Marianne Morore -- Zora Neale Hurston and Carl Van Vechten -- Joseph Cornell and Marcel Duchamp -- Beauford Delaney and James Baldwin -- Joseph Cornell and Marianne Moore -- James Baldwin and Norman Mailer -- Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Bishop -- John Cage and Richard Avedon -- W.E.B. Du Bois and Charlie Chaplin -- Langston Hughes and Carl Van Vechten and Richard Avedon -- Richard Avedon and James Baldwin -- Marianne Moore and Norman Mailer -- John Cage and Marcel Duchamp -- Norman Mailer and Robert Lowell.

A Chance Meeting shows how the lives of various prominent figures (e.g., Alfred Stieglitz and Hart Crane, Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Bishop, Marianne Moore and Norman Mailer) have intertwined to produce some distinctly American forms of expression. Considering the years between the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement, Cohen evokes the relationships of some 30 writers and artists, focusing on those moments in their lives when they became aware of what it meant to be American (as when a young Henry James posed for Civil War photographer Mathew Brady in his studio). Cohen begins and ends each chapter with fictionalized re-creations of the meetings and then fills in the accounts with facts gleaned from her extensive research and quotes from correspondence and other sources.