Abstract

The traditional story of Contact portrays an instantaneous bond between William Carlos Williams and Robert McAlmon, in which their ideas and vision for the magazine united seamlessly. Historians and critics site Williams as the fountainhead and McAlmon as his protégé. This story neglects McAlmon’s contribution to the magazine and his role as “instigator” in the process (Williams 175). In his short story “Post-Adolescence,” McAlmon provides the details of his conversations with Williams. The story reveals McAlmon’s persistence in “getting writers and painters together” and Williams’s resistance to action (McAlmon 12). By illustrating this tension with Williams, McAlmon exposes the fundamental problems in Contact’s framework.

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