The Atlantic

The Atlantic’s documented role in Thomas Savage’s early career was formative: its editor’s response to a short story redirected Savage toward the novel that became The Pass.

Role in Savage’s Early Career

As a young man at Colby College, Savage wrote a short story about the railroad’s importance to a ranching community isolated from the outside world by a high pass and severe Montana winters. He sent the story to Ed Weeks, then editor of The Atlantic, seeking a response from a major literary publication.

Editorial Response

Weeks returned the story with the criticism that it contained no human beings. Rather than dismissing the material, he proposed a different form: Savage should make it into a novel. The response identified a gap in the story while recognizing that its setting and premise could sustain a larger work.

Consequence

Savage took up the suggestion and wrote the first draft of The Pass at Colby. The Atlantic’s contribution, on the evidence available, was therefore not publication of the story but an editorial intervention that helped turn an account of an isolated community and its railroad into the foundation for Savage’s first novel.