A letter from Patrick McCarthy:

I seek either a proven writer, preferably, or an outstanding doctoral student whom I would consider a “generalist,” who engage multidisciplinary methods in their scholarly pursuits.

I have been involved for 35 years researching and publishing regarding how the image of the mountain man is depicted in 35 differing categories appearing in American Culture.

Example: Patrick McCarthy, “‘Westers,' Not Westerns’: Exteriorizing the ‘Wild Man Within,’” Journal of Popular Film & Television 23(3) (Fall 1995): 116-129.

I have terminal cancer, and there’s much to done to bring my efforts to full fruition, so it’s necessary to turn over my main project to a deserving, qualified, if accomplished, person.

This individual could be an historian, psychologist, folklorist, sociologist, anthropologist, feminist, men’s studies specialist, or, conceivably, a combo of all of the aforementioned.

Precisely, another scholar and I have accumulated enough information and materials to create a hefty, 26-chapter, two-volume book, which would be the definitive work about the mountain man’s depiction throughout American Culture (including historical literature) and would, ostensibly, be a bestseller.

Please bear in mind, the working title for the work is: “The Mountain Man Paradigm: A Psycho-Cultural Reader.” But once I turn the reins over to you, the project is yours to develop.

All you need to do is: (1) perform additional, required research about the modern mountain man rendezvous, updating what we have done; (2) further organize all existing information and materials; (3) and, finally, edit the entire manuscript and locate a publisher.

However, I have a book contract with the best epublisher in America. I would consider transferring that book contract, sans any exchange of monies, to the right person.

If you are the final candidate, you would have to undergo an on-site interview, at your expense, at my safe place of residence in Boise, Idaho.

If we mutually agree that you are the one person for the job then and there, that part of the deal is complete, with the epublisher option a second part of the agreement to be decided.

I will help you all I can for as long as I can, writing a psychological analysis of ultra-famous trapper Jedediah Strong Smith’s inner life, for one chapter, and, for another chapter, providing an overall psychological appraisal of the mountain man’s character in general.

The process for determining the likely person to assume my research and writing is completely transparent, and all queries will be promptly answered.

patrickmccarthy@cableone.net