INDIANA UNIVERSITY
BLOOMINGTON, INDIANA

DEPARTMENT OF ZOOLOGY

October 28, 1952

Dr. Joshua Lederberg
Department of Genetics
University of Wisconsin
Madison 6, Wisconsin

Dear Joshua:

Thanks for your very kind reply to my letter. I was very dis-
couraged when I wrote the letter, but only with respect to writing,
not anything else. I seem to require all of my time and energy to
keep my group going, to keep myself informed about what I need to know
at the moment, and to keep up my research, my teaching, and my various
other duties. Writing always gets pushed aside. My ow research
papers are so far behind, that I get more and more discouraged with
ever getting anything written. I write very slowly and revise re-
peatedly. When I realize how difficult it is for me to write a single
paper, I shudder at the idea of a book. Moreover, I feel very much as
you.do, that ten years from now I might have a sufficient grasp of the
field I wish to see included in the book, that I could undertake to
write it. But I do not feel up to it at present.

The three parts of the book you suggest would certainly be called
for. However, it was my impression that, after our discussions, we
had both agreed we wanted to write a cellular genetics rather than a
genetics of microorganism. I see no room, in the outline you propose,
for discussion of cellular genetics in materials other than micro-
organisms, Perhaps this was an oversight on your part, or you intended
to relegate all such material to the general section. I am not nearly
sufficiently well versed in those subjects to undertake writing on them
at the present time.

Something else now comes to mind. When I originally thought of
collaboration as a division of labor, this seemed to me like the only
present feasible arrangement, in view of the big gaps in my own knowledge.
However, when I try to visualize how things would proceed, if we ever
reached the time when our respective portions were written, then I
suspect that we would both want to be able to go critically and con-
structively over what each other had written. What this really means
is that we both must in effect be fairly familiar with the whole field.
The book then would be a real joint effort all the way through. In
any case, I have to become familiar with all the subject§in order to
present them to my class. This spring, for example, I shall have to
go in detail into the genetics of viruses and bacteria, ground over

which I have travelled only to a very limited degree in past courses.

It is not that I want to take this part out of your hands, but
that I must master this field and I should be able to make suggestions
Dr, Joshua Lederberg-~2

and evaluate conclusions in the part that you are going to write.
I would hope that you would give the same to me, in the parts that
I would write.

Now if this is the kind of thing you have in mind too, and I
suspect you do, then I don't see how either one of us can undertake
this book until we both are really much better acouainted with the
subjects than either one admits to being at present.

The most I could do now, if I had the time to do it, would be to
write a preliminary draft of the material covered by your subject No.
2, that is, on the protozoa and thallophytes, with preliminary notes,
perhaps, as to some of the general questionSto be dealt with in what
you proposed as section No. 1. I presume you would mean for the latter
to come near the end of the book rather than at the beginning.

As I write this letter to you,l feel again the urge and desire to
write, but I do not see when. I don't feel that I can put off much
longer the technical papers which are so long overdue from my laboratory.
There are really many of them which should have been published long ago
and haven't yet been brought to light. My students all complain bitter-
ly about the fact that so much of their own wrk follows from and depend
upon results of mine, which have remained unpublished for many years.
They have had access to my data, of course, and they know what I have;
but they can*t refer to it anywhere except as "Sonneborn unpublished."
This not only embarrasses me, but really causes some trouble, because
until the data are thoroughly worked out and in publication, one can
never be quite sure what will be specifically said about the data. This
is a heavy obligation on me and I am trying to do something about it,
in the little time available, from week to week. Also I have had on
my mind now for several years the obligation of writing for the National
Academy a biography.of Jennings. This weighs me down. I want to do a
good job of it and yet it means lots of study and reading in his diaries,
his letters, publications and the general field of science in his day.

Well, I have just really been talking out loud to you to give you
some idea of the difficulties I face with regard to the possibility of
any immediate progress on the book. By all means talk with Mr. Freeman
as freely as you wish when he visits you. I have a note that he will
be coming here early in November, and he will undoubtedly pump me. I
don't know what he'll drive me to say, but I do know that I cannot give
him any commitments as to time. I would like to do what I can on this
book and I would like to do it with you, but that is about as much as
I can say at the present. I don't want to keep you from going ahead
alone (or with some help from me) if you can do the job sooner.

I wish I could have answered your letter otherwise, but I just
can't and still be realistic.

As always, my very warmest personal regards to you and Esther and
to the Skaar's and my other friends at Wisconsin.

Cordially yours,

T. Me Sonrpborn

TMS: jb