John Cheever's Ossining house for sale; exclusive tour

• House where Cheever wrote "The Swimmer" and "Falconer"
• Rebuilt and redesigned in the 1920s by the prominent architect Eric Gugler
• Cheever's widow, Mary, died in the house in April

As you stroll around the grounds of John Cheever's historic house in Ossining, it's easy to imagine the picturesque parties on the lawn and hear the literary chatter and gossip, perhaps with his friends Saul Bellow and Philip Roth in nearby chairs. The Cheevers' signature retrievers lie at your feet, and soon the afternoon gin-and-tonics will drift into five-to-one martinis.

Known as "Afterwhiles" — Cheever liked to call it "Meanwhiles" — the 5-acre hilly property on Cedar Lane, right off and below busy Route 9A, has just come on the market. It's listed with Bitsy Maraynes, of Houlihan Lawrence's Chappaqua office, for $525,000.

Mary Cheever, John's 95-year-old widow, died in the three-bedroom house in April and their three children, Susan, Ben and Fred, have decided to sell it, as is.

"That house was the center of our family for the last 50, 60 years," says Susan Cheever, who lives in New York. "None of us want to live in it. After my mother died, there it was. I think we knew right away we would sell it."

It will likely be a tough sell. For people looking for houses in that price range, an annual tax bill of $25,000 may be a deal killer. And the property needs a quick and large infusion of cash to bring it up to snuff.

"I try to forewarn people: it needs a lot of work, it needs a lot of work," Maraynes says.

Still, though, the cachet of owning an old house with wonderfully strong ties to John Cheever, dubbed "the Chekhov of the suburbs," has a certain allure for some of his fans. (He was "Ovid in Ossining" on a Time magazine cover.)

"We've had tons of Internet inquiries," Maraynes says. "I think it's a combination of the name and people who love old houses."

This is where Cheever, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his 1978 collection of short stories, wrote some of his best-known work, including "The Swimmer," later a Burt Lancaster movie, and the novel "Falconer." He wrote five to six hours a day and as the children grew up and moved out, he shifted his workplace to their abandoned rooms, according to Scott Donaldson's 1988 book, "John Cheever: A Biography."

Right now, the 2,688-square-foot house is filled with old books, family memorabilia and clutter. Many of the possessions — paintings, photographs, china, pieces of furniture — are tagged with colored Post-its listing which children get what.

But some of the rooms, particularly the wood-paneled library/living room and the second-floor master bedroom, retain their architectural details and historic charm.

In the library, your eyes go right to the portrait of Cheever as a boy, which is hung over a handsome wood writing desk. It was painted by his Aunt Florence, Susan explains. "He never liked it — he thought it was pretentious. When he was alive, it stayed in the attic. As soon as he died, my mother brought it down and hung it in the library."

The whole house, which dates to 1795, has a quirky charm, with widely different ceiling heights, Dutch doors, pegged floors, stone terraces and patios, old windows and lots of small steps up and down that connect the eight rooms on three levels.

Yes, the house needs work, Susan says, but it's got good bones and good mechanics. "About five years ago, I had the whole thing rewired. There must be 2 miles of copper under the grass. So the electricity is gorgeous, the roof is OK, the chimneys are clean, the oil burners are fine."

"I'd like them to get an engineer in here, for an assessment, so we know what we've got," Bitsy Maraynes adds.

Outdoors, you can clearly see the remnants of some very good gardens, with irises, yarrow, astilbe, dogwood, lilies, catmint and ornamental grasses.

"My mother loved to garden," Susan Cheever says. "Every year my brother Ben would take her to Pound Ridge Nurseries and let her buy whatever she wanted. She bought a lot."

A brook runs through the front of the property, near the shared driveway. A black chain-link fence keeps the deer out.

The house has no formal entry. You walk right into the former dining room, now without table or chairs. The kitchen, with orange Formica counters and a laminate floor, sits to the right, past a small butler's pantry. The book-lined library is up a few steps from this first floor. An incongruous artist's studio, for Mary, was added in 1981, with access from a second-floor walkway off the master bedroom.

The house was rebuilt and redesigned in the 1920s by the prominent architect Eric Gugler, a favorite of President Franklin Roosevelt who also designed grand homes across the river in Snedens Landing.

The Cheevers bought Afterwhiles in 1961, and John lived here until he died of cancer in 1982.

"My parents entertained quite a bit, especially in the 1960s and '70s," Susan says. "They had a couple of really glorious parties. And lots of people over for dinner."

The writer Ralph Ellison was a frequent guest, she remembers. "Every writer of the 20th century went through there at one time or another."

Mary Cheever was a writer, too, as are Susan and Ben. Mary's history of the Briarcliff Manor-Scarborough area, "The Changing Landscape," was published in 1990. In her 1984 memoir, "Home Before Dark: A Biographical Memoir of John Cheever," Susan writes in searing detail about her father's lifelong struggle with alcoholism and depression. Her 1999 book, "Note Found in a Bottle: My Life as a Drinker," describes her own struggles with alcohol.

John wrote of the strong hold the house had on him, well beyond the worrisome mortgage to the bank. His ties to Afterwhiles were made "of turf and house paint," a confinement he both liked and resented, according to Donaldson.

"My father loved that house so much," Susan says. "It's just a beautiful, beautiful house."

In Ossining and nearby communities, Cheever, an outdoorsy sort, enjoyed hiking, biking, skating and skiing — and swimming, of course. "As a landowner he enthusiastically did the outdoor work around his place," Donaldson writes. "He cut wood, both with an ax and a chain saw, and scythed the underbrush in the woods. Yet the ground was never entirely cleared until after his death."

One of the best views of those grounds is from the delightful second-floor screened porch that runs the entire length of the front of the house. It was a favorite spot of her father's, Susan says, along with the library. It's easy to hear and identify the bird songs drifting up from the lawns and borders below — along with the steady whirr of traffic going by on 9A.

JOHN CHEEVER'S HOUSE

Address: 197 Cedar Lane, Ossining

Price: $525,000, with estimated annual taxes of $25,019

School district: Ossining

MLS No.: 4420339

Contact: Bitsy Maraynes, Houlihan Lawrence — Chappaqua office, 914-238-4766, ext. 334, 914-522-3290