In 1926, Benjamin DeCasseres collected the poems of his younger brother Walter and wrote the introduction to The Sublime Boy. According to the following newspaper item, James Oppenheim reviewed the book in the New York Evening Post and claimed that Walter had never existed. The Columbus Dispatch reported that a million-dollar libel suit followed.

Critic Sues Critic

Because the reviewer of a book said that its author never lived, the New York courts will have to decide on the merits of a $1,000,000 libel suit. The reviewer is James Oppenheim, poet, who, in reviewing “The Sublime Boy,” a collection of poems by Walter DeCasseres, in the New York Evening Post, declared that Walter DeCasseres never existed, and that Walter is a figment of the imagination of Benjamin DeCasseres, noted critic, who is attempting to hoax the American public.

In making announcement of the filing of the $1,000,000 libel suit, Ribman & Ribman, of New York city, attorneys for the plaintiffs, declared that this was one of the rare incidents in American literary history where one reviewer had occasion to sue another, as Benjamin DeCasseres and James Oppenheim had both been reviewing books for the New York Evening Post.

“Critic Sues Critic,” The Columbus Dispatch (Columbus, Ohio), January 2, 1927, p. 84.