In 2010, Indiana’s Butler University was “pleased to announce the inauguration of the Booth Tarkington Writer-in-Residence, a program designed to bring exciting emerging writers to the program as guest faculty.” Faculty member Robert Stapleton mentions that, “for this position, we’re creating an office with Tarkington’s actual desk.” And in November, the University received a $1 million gift to establish a new “Center for Creative Writing” to house and nurture writers and students in the MFA program. The first appointment as Tarkington Writer-in-Residence, last September, was made to award-winning writer Michael Dahlie.

He did eventually get back to writing, publishing The Flirt in 1913. It would end a six-year novel-writing drought and be the beginning of what might be called his most fruitful decade. But was the problem “writing plays”? Nah.

I honestly don’t know where folks come up with some of the pictures they do, but here’s one from Flickr: Tarkington’s passport photo from the trip abroad that he and Susanah were about to take… the trip that would inspire The Plutocrat.