Emily Hale to T. S. Eliot
Concord,
Massachusetts
I had hoped after your tiny note of March 9th [sc. 8th] that the promised letter of last Friday might come to-day, but as it has not, (you were probably interrupted again) I want to send off my own greetings to you in time to reach you by Easter Sunday. I had thought I might get away for part of the Abbot Academy vacation, which began this week and continues until the end of March, butAmericaNew Bedford, Massachusetts;f8;a3 both places where I asked for hospitality – one, New Bedford, one, Milton – are closed to me because of other guests, so I shall stay here in my treasured rooms until next Thursday, whenHale, Emilyspends Easter in Boston;r7 I shall go to Boston for the Easter Day week-end special services etc, toPerkins, Edith (EH's aunt)on EH and TSE's relationship;i2 which Aunt Edith will probably go. MyPerkins, Dr John Carroll (EH's uncle);g7 uncle may attempt Easter Day service, but such an effort now uses him up very much. I shall enjoy being here with no demands upon me, and may take my dinners ‘out’ in order to give myself that tiny domestic holiday. The snow is disappearing in an extraordinary way, considering the vast masses of it which have been lying around until recently. I understand you are – or were – having an unusually lovely early Spring, which is good news indeed. TheEuropeits post-war condition;a9 state of European affairs is so grave and I am so much interested in it as never before, tho’ [?thro’] very small participation in a local group here of the World Federalists (as opposed to a divided world – East vs West) that, after attending a meeting the other evening, I kept [illegible] that the right feeling I, as well as the world, was really facing extinction, and not liking it very much, I must confess. I have been trying to establish a right attitude towards a future life this winter especially with not much success, as my life seems fuller and richer than it has until this year – and I should honestly like to live a little longer to be of some use to the small sphere in which I move.
MyCold War, TheEH on nuclear proliferation;a2 family’s condition, plus age, plus my own nearing to sixty – add their weight to my realization that my life is half over, and I’d rather not finish it, or have my friends finished, by a burst of atomic fire. I think the U.S.A. is much at fault in many ways – and she seems so little conscious of it – among the leaders, and thousands of its citizens. I realize you must be more than disturbed and depressed by all these events – climaxedMasaryk, Jan;a1 by Masaryk’s tragic death.1
I am enclosing several clippings of varying interest – youThorp, Margaret (née Farrand);b9 need only return Margaret Thorp’s letter. WillardThorp, Willarddue to teach at Harvard;c3 is to teach at Harvard this coming summer, and they have taken a house on Francis Ave. TheAbbot Academy, Andover, Massachusetts;a4 Abbot venture is a very happy, if very exhausting one. The response to me and my work has been overwhelmingly impressive. Molnar’sMolnár, FerencThe Swan;a1 ‘SwanHale, Emilyas director ('producer');v9Molnár's The Swan;b8’ is to be the Commencement play the end of May – rather a brilliant parody on a now extinct royalty, but very fussy.2 TomHale, Emilycorrespondence with TSE;w3TSE criticised for following monthly injunction;i6, do you not realize that to wait to the letter of the day of the month when you time to write me, is completed, is killing the spirit of friendship – rather than recognizing it? I feel so sorry you take this suggestion of our correspondence interludes, so literally. I have never heard a word from you of your investiture, and, of course, of March 24 [sc. 2] only thro’ your prompt, and much appreciated letter to my aunt. I thought I had made it clear that if you wanted to write about something special at any time, I was of course very happy to hear from you, and in your own last letter you spoke yourself of the chance you would write before the ‘appointed’ hour. You found time to write your family, my dear, before you wrote the woman who has watched you for years, with pride, and pleasure in your achievements, and who still cares what happens to you, naturally. Don’t you realize this, my dear. If your sense of chivalry – as I suppose it must be – you have leant so strictly to the letter of the ‘law’. I can say no more, for I suppose you are probably confused enough as it is. I speak of it in this instance, in case there should be something similar in the future, and, reversely, I would do the same by you.
I hope your Holy Week will bring you some degree of strength and peace.
MauraGwynne, M. Brookepresent at RHS bequest;b6 [sc. Moira] was at the R.H.S. at my suggestion, to report the proceedings, which she did remarkably – you and she evidently did not meet. The Ps, of course, have thought of nothing else, nor talked of nothing else but this event, for weeks, and it has been a great diversion. I fear my aunt’s sight is growing worse. Maura reported your presentation remarks as very delightful. I knew they would be.
1.JanMasaryk, Jan Masaryk, a Czechoslovakian politician opposed to the postwar Soviet domination of his country, had been found dead on 10 Mar. 1948 on the ground outside a government building in Prague, below an open window on an upper floor. Many in the West suspected he had been murdered by the Soviets but the circumstances have never been clarified and it is possible that he fell accidentally or took his own life.
2.The Swan (1920) by Ferenc Molnár (1878–1952), Hungarian (later American) playwright and novelist.
4.M. BrookeGwynne, M. Brooke Gwynne, University of London Institute of Education – ‘a Training College for Graduate students’ – invited TSE on 19 Jan. to participate in their Weds.-morning seminar: ‘Emily Hale suggested that you might possibly consent to come to the Institute to talk to our students; otherwise I should have not felt justified in asking you … The teaching of poetry is the subject most hotly discussed & the subject we should like you to choose if possible.’
1.JanMasaryk, Jan Masaryk, a Czechoslovakian politician opposed to the postwar Soviet domination of his country, had been found dead on 10 Mar. 1948 on the ground outside a government building in Prague, below an open window on an upper floor. Many in the West suspected he had been murdered by the Soviets but the circumstances have never been clarified and it is possible that he fell accidentally or took his own life.
3.DrPerkins, Dr John Carroll (EH's uncle) John Carroll Perkins (1862–1950), Minister of King’s Chapel, Boston: see Biographical Register.
16.MargaretThorp, Margaret (née Farrand) Farrand (1891–1970), author and journalist – see Margaret Thorp in Biographical Register.
1.Margaret Thorp, née Farrand (1891–1970), contemporary and close friend of EH; noted author and biographer. WillardThorp, Willard Thorp (1899–1990) was a Professor of English at Princeton University. See Biographical Register. See further Lyndall Gordon, Hyacinth Girl, 126–8, 158–9.