[No surviving envelope]
Even without your letter of February 16, I was sorry that my letters have been so few and far apart. But my letter of the 14th will have thrown some light on the matter: though the main point is that with such difficult and peculiar transformations as I have been passing through, I find it impossible to pursue the subject without having first found, from your reply, how much I have managed to communicate, or how much I have conveyed the wrong impression, by my previous letter. I am more than ever tormented by the extreme difficulty of communicating anything to anybody. AndEnglandpost-war;b8 as for other matters which might enter into correspondence, I am so depressed – not by the cold weather and the fuel crisis in itself, but by the general situation of which the fuel crisis is only a symptom – that I can hardly express my views on these either. And theEuropeits post-war condition;a9 point of view, the emotions, of Americans over the calamity of civilisation must be inevitably very remote from those of intelligent Europeans. Materially, I think that the situation this winter is only the prelude to a much more desperate period of poverty and perhaps chaos in a year’s time; and I have the gravest apprehension for the future of Europe and of England. This is undoubtedly the most serious situation that has ever been, in English history. AndWavell, General Archibalddismissed as Viceroy of India;a6 the recent news about India, and the dismissal of Lord Wavell1 (for whom I have a great respect) deepens the gloom. Here certainly we now know that there is no abiding city.2 I am better in health, and hope this week to be able to resume going to early masses, especially as it is Lent. Until now it would have been imprudent, in this weather, to be out for an hour and a half in the morning before breakfast.
IShakespeare, WilliamRichard II;c6 am much pleased to see theHale, Emilyas director ('producer');v9Richard II;b3 useful advance notice of Richard II.3 It would seem that you have been at immense pains to get the right scenery and costume. I hope that there will be photographs of some of the scenes for me to see.
ByKinchin Smith, F.;a7 the way, I ran into Kinchin-Smith in the Tube the other day, and he told me he had not yet heard from you about the prospects of your using the Trojan Women. I told him that I understood from you that the alterations in the school programme made it seem probably [probable] that you would not be able to produce any play at all at the time for which you had wanted it, but I expected that he would be hearing from you. He is now busily translating the Antigone.
It would seem that I have for some time been writing to 60 instead of 6 Hubbard Street. The letters seem to have reached you. 60, I now remember, is the telephone.
1.Field Marshal Wavell served as Viceroy of India from 1943 until 20 Feb. 1947, when he was dismissed by Prime Minister Clement Attlee and replaced by Admiral Lord Mountbatten. (During the war Mountbatten had been Chief of Combined Operations and a member of the British Chiefs of Staff Committee, and later Supreme Allied Commander, South-East Asia.)
2.13: 14: ‘For here we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come.
3.The Chameleon, Feb. 1947, 4: ‘Early in November rumors and conjectures arose over the subject of the school play. Miss Hale managed to keep us in the dark until the morning when she announced in assembly that the play would be Shakespeare’s Richard II. This will be a difficult one to produce and will involve elaborate costuming, settings, and lighting, as well as our best acting. However, we feel inspired by the tremendous success of last year’s play, Hay Fever, and Miss Hale’s indispensable help and guidance as production manager and over-all director.’ The play was to be produced on 6 and 7 Mar. 1947.
2.F. KinchinKinchin Smith, F. Smith (1895–1958), classicist, taught from 1934 in the Institute of Education, University of London; from 1936, he was Hon. Secretary of the Joint Committee of the Classical and English Associations. Best known for his Teach Yourself volumes on Greek and Latin, he also produced versions of The Trojan Women of Euripides (a work that was to be offered to F&F later in 1946 – and turned down) and the Antigone of Sophocles.
5.GeneralWavell, General Archibald Archibald Wavell, 1st Earl Wavell (1883–1950), Commander-in-Chief Middle East in the early phase of WW2. He was later Commander-in-Chief in India and finally Viceroy of India until not long before Partition.