[No surviving envelope]
Your dear letter of June 13 arrived at a very welcome moment. I have stayed indoors all to-day, though a beautiful day, with a snuffling cold – the second I have had in this deceitful June, it seems to me I have never felt so chilly in June before – having put off two engagements I was glad to put off; taking cough medicine and'Broadcast appeal for the Testaccio Cemetery';a2 writingMallet, Victormakes Testaccio Cemetery appeal;a3 (1) an appeal for the Protestant Cemetary [sic] in Rome, to be broadcast; this at the request of Victor Mallet, our Ambassador – it’sKeats, JohnTestaccio Cemetery appeal;a7 theShelley, Percy Byssheappeal for Testaccio Cemetery;a5 cemetary of Keats and Shelley; andPoets' Theatre GuildTSE's presidential address to;a1 (2) aBrowne, Elliott Martinand the Poets' Theatre Guild;f1 shortAims of Poetic Drama: The Presidential Address to the Poets’ Theatre Guild, The;a1 discourse for the meeting of the Poets’ Theatre Guild, an affair of Martin’s of which I have to be the (honorary) president.1 SpeakingBrowne, Elliott Martinas director;d8 ofCocktail Party, The1949 Edinburgh Festival production;d1the Martin Browne collaboration;a4 Martin, you surprised me by voicing exactly my own views. I do think that the next time, if there is a next time, I might do better; and in any case I don’t think it’s good to be always produced by the same producer, any more than it is to have the same actor in the leading part. I fear there will always remain something amateurish about Martin. I knew that he had set his heart on doing this play; and I did make a sacrifice for him, as the Old Vic would have taken it, on condition that they used their own producer. ButBrowne, Henzie (née Raeburn)as actress;b6 what is deplorable is not so much the personal relationship with Martin, but the complication of Henzie. I suggest that loyalty to Henzie (and all the more because it must have been a mésalliance from the point of view of his family) impairs his taste and judgement. He first suggested her for the part of the ‘nurse-secretary’ (a very minor part indeed, which I could hardly have refused him, except that he added that she would be a useful understudy: I replied that I thought the nurse secretary should be someone who could understudy ‘Celia’ – you will understand what I am talking about when you get the text); then yesterday he proposed her (several possible actresses being occupied or engaged with films) for the part of ‘Julia’ – an elderly woman whose part I consider of the first importance. NowAshcroft, Peggyand The Cocktail Party;a4 I haven’t any racial objection whatever – thereJames, HenryWashington Square;b6;a1 is one part for which I should have been lucky to get Peggy Ashcroft but that she is going on indefinitely with the Henry James heiress:2 but the trouble is that Henzie isn’t a very good actress, and her looks are completely incongruous. So I had to tell him that I didn’t think Henzie looked at all right for this part, and I considered it myself the principal female part in the play. But it is really rather poor taste for a producer to try to put his wife into the play he is producing – unless, of course, she is an actress of unquestioned reputation. So I have my apprehensions about the forthcoming production. But it shows great insight on your part to have doubted the advantage of going on with Martin.
IHale, Emilyas director ('producer');v9The School for Scandal;c1 was glad to hear about the success of The School for Scandal: that is a great satisfaction – though it is exasperating not to find the programme enclosed. It was a very good choice for the girls, and they will have benefited by it, but it was courageous of you to venture it. You must be very tired now, and I am deeply sorry you cannot get well away, to Seattle, and must make your headquarters as before at Commonwealth Avenue, only taking the usual short visits in the neighbourhood, and a brief month at Grand Manan. Idogs'Rag Doll' (Scottish Terrier);c8TSE receives photo of;a2 like theHale, Emilyphotographs of;w7with Rag Doll;f3 snapshot of you and Rag Doll, though I do not quite understand the sort of cap you appear to be wearing. (Did I ever tell you of the man on the train to New York, busily reading ‘Time’, who turned and said ‘Is this Mr. T. S. Eliot?’ I said ‘yes, but why did you think so?’ He said ‘I have been looking at your photograph,’ and showed me a horrible photograph in ‘Time’ from which I should have confidently hoped no one would ever recognise me).
IHinkley, Eleanor Holmes (TSE's first cousin);d8 am glad to have yourPerkins, Dr John Carroll (EH's uncle);h6 news of Eleanor (from whom, of course, I never expect to hear directly) and of Uncle John. I will certainly take the occasion of the overlooked birthday to write to him. IPerkins, Edith (EH's aunt)TSE pitches her book to publishers;i9 had been hoping to have some news for Aunt Edith – you know she asked me to do something about her projected Garden photograph book – I have been dilatory, with so much on hand; but after I heard from New York people that this would be the sort of book they were more likely to import from London, I wrote to Batsford’s here – who publish that sort of book – and am still awaiting a reply.3
TwoNason, Margaret ('Meg') Geraldineamong the saved, a 'Cosy Pet';b8 days ago Meg Nason came in to see me. It was a pity that I was engaged to lunch with a man who was leaving England for some time; and she was up for a matinée and going back the same evening, so the only time we could meet was in the morning before lunch. I hardly recognised her at first: solely for the reason that she had got so thin! She says she has lost two stone since we saw her last. It is becoming; and so is her very grey hair; she looks now a handsome and distinguished middle-aged woman, instead of a plain and pleasant girl. Otherwise, her old dear self, full of affection, simplicity and goodness; and asking as affectionately and devotedly about you and the Perkins’s as ever. MegSwan, Ethela 'saved soul';b1, like our Miss Swan, is among the Saved; she is also a Cosy Pet, which is a rare thing to be – theVigodarzere, Countess Aurelia Cittadella;a1 only new Cosy Pet I have met lately (and there are not many) is the wife of the Italian Ambassador.4
‘TheCocktail Party, Thecopy to be sent to EH;d2 Cocktail Party’ will now go to Commonwealth Avenue for you. A few lines will come out (for instance, the one about falling out of a pram) and a few technical details may be adjusted; but it will remain substantially what you will read. It will not go to the publishers, London and New York, until after some rehearsals; I shall not feel sure of the final text until then.
1.TSE was President of the Poets’ Theatre Guild, 1949–50. See The Aims of Poetic Drama: The Presidential Address to the Poets’ Theatre Guild (1949): CProse 7, 356–60.
2.Peggy Ashcroft and Ralph Richardson were starring in The Heiress (1947), by Ruth and Augustus Goetz – adapted from the Henry James novel Washington Square (1880) – which ran for 644 performances at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket, London.
3.TSEPerkins, Edith (EH's aunt)TSE pitches her book to publishers;i9 wrote to Messrs. B. T. Batsford (publishers), 13 June 1949: ‘I am writing to enquire whether a projected book on English and Scottish gardens, a description of which you will find on the attached sheet, is likely to interest you. It is outside the area of my own firm, and I have no experience of this type of book. I first made enquiries in New York, and was told that this sort of book should certainly have its particular American public, but was the sort that an American publisher would be more likely to import in sheets.
‘The Mrs. John Carroll Perkins whose book it would be, is an old American lady resident in Boston. She is a Fellow of the Royal Horticultural Society. She had made a life-long study of great gardens in Europe, especially in this country; and formerly lectured on the subject in the United States. For her lectures, she had made under her supervision over 400 photographs and coloured slides. As she has now gone almost totally blind, she last year presented this set of slides to the Royal Horticultural Society; so that they are now in this country, and are I believe sent about by the Society for local exhibitions.
‘This would of course be a picture book. It would of course have to be an expensive book. Mrs. Perkins is an old friend of mine, and especially because of her infirmity, I should like to help her: therefore I have offered to write a preface, if it is desired, to put in order if necessary the short essay which she would dictate; and to do anything else in my power.
‘I can testify to the beauty of the photographs; and no doubt the Secretary of the Horticultural Society would give an opinion. I presented the slides to Lord Aberconway, as president of the Society, at a public meeting last year.’
4.Countess Aurelia Cittadella Vigodarzere (1895–1978): wife of Prince Tommaso Gallarati Scotti (1878–1966), scholar and diplomat; Ambassador to the UK, 1947–51.
3.PeggyAshcroft, Peggy Ashcroft (1907–91), celebrated British stage actor, was at this time married to the barrister Jeremy Hutchinson (son of TSE’s old friends St John and Mary Hutchinson).
4.E. MartinBrowne, Elliott Martin Browne (1900–80), English director and producer, was to direct the first production of Murder in the Cathedral: see Biographical Register.
5.EleanorHinkley, Eleanor Holmes (TSE's first cousin) Holmes Hinkley (1891–1971), playwright; TSE’s first cousin; daughter of Susan Heywood Stearns – TSE’s maternal aunt – and Holmes Hinkley: see Biographical Register.
4.VictorMallet, Victor Mallet (1893–1969), diplomat and author – who had served in Tehran, Buenos Aires, Brussels and Washington, DC – was Envoy to Sweden, 1940–5; later Ambassador to Spain, and to Italy; knighted, 1944; awarded GCMG, 1952. His wife was Christiana Jean Andreae.
1.MargaretNason, Margaret ('Meg') Geraldine (Meg) Geraldine Nason (1900–86), proprietor of the Bindery tea rooms, Broadway, Worcestershire, whom TSE and EH befriended on visits to Chipping Campden.
3.DrPerkins, Dr John Carroll (EH's uncle) John Carroll Perkins (1862–1950), Minister of King’s Chapel, Boston: see Biographical Register.
2.EthelSwan, Ethel Swan, a Faber & Gwyer ‘pioneer’, joined the firm on 12 Oct. 1925, as telephonist and receptionist, retiring in 1972 after 47 years. PeterSwan, EthelPeter du Sautoy's tribute to;a2n du Sautoy reported in 1971: ‘These duties she still performs with admirable skill and charm … SheJoyce, Jameson the phone to the F&F receptionist;c1n has an amazing memory for voices and it is certain that if James Joyce were to return to earth to telephone a complaint (he called us “Feebler and Fumbler”) she would say “Good morning, Mr Joyce” before he could introduce himself, as if he had previously been telephoning only yesterday. Many a visiting author or publisher from overseas has felt more kindly towards Faber & Faber as a result of Miss Swan’s friendly recognition’ (‘Farewell, Russell Square’, The Bookseller no. 3410 [1 May 1971], 2040).