[No surviving envelope]
IPerkins, Edith (EH's aunt);j6 got Aunt Edith’s cable, telephoned through by my secretary, justFabers, the;i2 before leaving for a weekend with the Fabers, and was able to cable an answer from the station. I have now written briefly on my return. IPerkins, Dr John Carroll (EH's uncle);i3 am terribly distressed though not at all surprised, at his age and in view of his increasing infirmity. I know that it will make matters especially difficult for you coming early in the summer term, when you are very busy with rehearsals, and I am very worried by this strain upon you. Are there other friends who can be of use to Aunt Edith, besides the nurses? I cannot imagine how she can run the flat; and I fear that she will be in a very helpless and dependent state.
Nowtravels, trips and plansEH's 1950 summer in England;h1TSE books EH's hotel room for;a2 you will need your holiday more than ever, and I hope that nothing will occur to interfere with it. I am thinking particularly of your aunt’s drain upon your vitality. I have reserved a room with bath for you at the Basil Street Hotel at the corner of Knightsbridge and Sloane Street. IEliot, Marion Cushing (TSE's sister)1949 visit to England with Dodo;g1Basil Street Hotel stay;b1 knowSmith, Theodora ('Dodo') Eliot (TSE's niece)1950 visit to England;d2;a1 it is good, because Marian and Theodora were there last year, and I have taken a room there for the latter for the month of July. It is convenient for both Chelsea and Kensington and for the centre of London, and I do not know of any good hotel nearer. I have taken this room from the night of the 12th, so that if you arrive early on the 13th it will be ready for you. I also hope you will arrange your plans so as to have two days there, because I think that after the tiring flight you should rest in comfort for at least that length of time before going to Broadway. Broadway should be restful when you are up to it; butNason, Margaret ('Meg') Geraldine;c2 I suspect that you will want to be helping Meg and Doreen, taking part in the ordinary household duties etc.
I am very sorry if my letter did not express pleasure in your coming: I suppose it was because there was a certain timidity, diffidence, in my feelings, and some awkwardness in my behaviour – surely you can understand that. It is getting on for two years since I last saw you, and you are never far from my thoughts.1 But I very much want to see you here, for the fugitive and also rather public meetings which are all that seem possible in America under modern conditions are very unsatisfactory. (If I can find any device by which I can in future visit America in any other way than as a public lecturer, that may be bettered).
TheNew Theatre, St. Martin's Lanehome to The Cocktail Party;a3 playCocktail Party, The1950 New Theatre production;e1preliminary week in Southsea;a1 is being rehearsed under great pressure: owingOld Vic, The;c2 to the fact that the Old Vic season at the New Theatre closed earlier than was expected, they have had to bring it on; and on Monday they open for a preliminary week at Southsea. IHarrison, Rexin The Cocktail Party;a1 cannot at this stage judge how good it will be, though I think Rex Harrison2 is much more promising than I had feared. Anyway, I hope it will still be running in June.3
1.SeeHinkley, Eleanor Holmes (TSE's first cousin)TSE attempts to lure to England;e5n too TSE to Eleanor Hinkley, 26 Mar. 1950: ‘I understand from Emily that she had almost persuaded you to come to England this summer. I am very sorry to think that you had thought of it and then changed your mind – it would have been great fun to have you here. I do wish you would come – and one never knows, nowadays, what another year will bring forth. However, I hope to see you in Cambridge in October.’
2.RexHarrison, Rex Harrison (1908–90): award-winning English actor of stage and screen; successful in comedies and musicals, but also in more serious roles, from the 1930s. He won a Tony award and an Oscar as Professor Higgins in versions of My Fair Lady.
3.TheCocktail Party, The1950 New Theatre production;e1its fate;a2n Cocktail Party, produced at the New Theatre, St Martin’s Lane, London, bySherek, Henry;a6n Henry Sherek (Sherek Players Ltd), and directed by E. Martin Browne, opened on Weds. 3 May 1950, and was to run for 325 performances – with Rex Harrison as the Unidentified Guest, andLeighton, Margaretas Celia;a2n Margaret Leighton as Celia. It won the Sunday Times literary award.
HenryHarrison, RexTSE's initial reaction to;a2n Sherek, Not in Front of the Children (1959), 156: ‘T. S. Eliot saw the London company for the first time at a rehearsal. After Rex Harrison, who was of course already then a famous international star, had played his first scene and gone off, Eliot turned to me and said:
‘“That young fellow’s very good. Tell me, where did you find him?”’
E. MartinBrowne, Elliott Martincompares Rex Harrison and Alec Guinness;f3n Browne, ‘From The Rock to The Confidential Clerk’, in T. S. Eliot: A Symposium for his Seventieth Birthday, ed. Neville Braybrooke (1958), 65–6: ‘The London production was more often in danger of slipping towards the purely naturalistic: Rex Harrison’s Reilly, a performance of brilliant polish, lacked that hieratic suggestion which Alec Guinness gave to the eccentricity of the modern Heracles, andBoot, Gladys;a2n Gladys Boot’s Julia was a little too comfortable. But the play still emerged, on the whole, convincingly.’
3.GladysBoot, Gladys Boot (1890–1964): stage and screen actor (a sometime student of TSE’s old collaborator Elsie Fogerty), emerged as a leading lady while at the Liverpool Playhouse.
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.
1.Marian/MarionEliot, Marion Cushing (TSE's sister) Cushing Eliot (1877–1964), fourth child of Henry Ware Eliot and Charlotte Eliot: see Biographical Register.
2.RexHarrison, Rex Harrison (1908–90): award-winning English actor of stage and screen; successful in comedies and musicals, but also in more serious roles, from the 1930s. He won a Tony award and an Oscar as Professor Higgins in versions of My Fair Lady.
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.
2.MargaretLeighton, Margaret Leighton (1922–76): British stage and film actor whose credits included roles in Henry IV (1946), with Laurence Olivier and Ralph Richardson; and The Winslow Boy (1948). For The Go-Between (1971), she was to win a BAFTA and an Academy Award. TSE to Polly Tandy, 10 Aug. 1953: ‘The rehearsals are going well: the females in the cast – Margaret Leighton, Isabel Jeans, and Alison Leggat – are all well cast for their parts, and I seem to be able to judge the female actresses more quickly than the male actors – partly, perhaps, because I seem for some reason to be better at writing the female roles than the male.’
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.
4.HenrySherek, Henry Sherek (1900–1967), theatre producer: see Biographical Register.
2.TheodoraSmith, Theodora ('Dodo') Eliot (TSE's niece) Eliot Smith (1904–92) – ‘Dodo’ – daughter of George Lawrence and Charlotte E. Smith: see Biographical Register. Theodora’sSmith, Charlotte ('Chardy') Stearns (TSE's niece) sister was Charlotte Stearns Smith (b. 1911), known as ‘Chardy’.