The End of Me

Alfred Hayes

Contents ( 42)

CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
THE END OF ME
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ALFRED HAYES (1911–1985) was born into a Jewish family in Whitechapel, London, though his father, a barber, trained violinist, and sometime bookie, moved the family to New York when Hayes was three. After attending City College, Hayes worked as a reporter for the New York American and the Daily Mirror and began to publish poetry, including “Joe Hill,” about the legendary labor organizer, which was later set to music by the composer Earl Robinson and recorded by Joan Baez. During World War II, Hayes was assigned to a special services unit in Italy; after the war he stayed on in Rome, where he contributed to the story development and scripts of several classic Italian neorealist films, including Roberto Rossellini’s Paisan (1946) and Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves (1948), and gathered material for two popular novels, All Thy Conquests (1946) and The Girl on the Via Flaminia (1949), the latter the basis for the 1953 film Act of Love, starring Kirk Douglas. In the late 1940s Hayes went to work in Hollywood, writing the screenplays for Clash by Night, A Hatful of Rain, The Left Hand of God, Joy in the Morning, and Fritz Lang’s Human Desire, as well as scripts for television. He was the author of seven novels, a collection of stories, and three volumes of poetry.

PAUL BAILEY is the author of eleven novels, including At the Jerusalem (1967, winner of the Somerset Maugham Award); Peter Smart’s Confessions (1977) and Gabriel’s Lament (1986), which were both short-listed for the Booker Prize for Fiction; and, most recently, The Prince’s Boy (2014). Among his nonfiction works are two volumes of memoir; a tribute to Quentin Crisp, The Stately Homo (2000); and a collection of poetry, Inheritance (2019). Having begun his career as an actor, Bailey has also written plays for television and radio, including an adaption of J. R. Ackerley’s We Think the World of You (1980).

OTHER BOOKS BY ALFRED HAYES

PUBLISHED BY NYRB CLASSICS

In Love

Introduction by Frederic Raphael

My Face for the World to See

Introduction by David Thomson

THE END OF ME

ALFRED HAYES

Introduction by

PAUL BAILEY

NEW YORK REVIEW BOOKS

New York

THIS IS A NEW YORK REVIEW BOOK

PUBLISHED BY THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS

435 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014

www.nyrb.com

Cover design: Katy Homans

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Hayes, Alfred, 1911–1985, author.

Title: The end of me / by Alfred Hayes.

Description: New York : New York Review Books, [2020] | Series: New York Review Books classics

Identifiers: LCCN 2019039488 (print) | LCCN 2019039489 (ebook) | ISBN 9781681374338 (paperback) | ISBN 9781681374345 (ebook)

Classification: LCC PS3515.A9367 E53 2020 (print) | LCC PS3515.A9367 (ebook) | DDC 813/.52—dc23