[Hayfords-in-the-Field, ChocuruaAmericaChocurua, New Hampshire;d9EH stays in;a1, New Hampshire]
Thank you for your letter of June 27, giving me this very English-sounding address (I mean the house, not the place). IFoss, MaryEH's holidays with;a7 hope that you are having a very peaceful and restful time with Mary Foss, after the very trying times you must have had in Commonwealth Avenue. But I am disappointed that you cannot go to Campobello or Grand Manan, since I think the very remoteness, as well as the sea air, does you good. IHale, Emilyfinances;w5;b3 have been very concerned about all of you on account of taxes: it is alarming indeed that people with such small incomes should have to suffer still further abatement. It seems to me that when one takes both taxes and high prices into account, single women are worse off in America than they are here, though our taxes are terrific. (Thefinances (TSE's)and retirement;b9 discouraging thing here is, that it is now hopeless to accumulate enough capital to retire on. One can have a good income, but one cannot save. For two years I shall have had what seems to me a vast income, but I think I have about £25,000 to pay in income tax – enough to have retired on within fairly recent memory;1 and next year I shall go back to the same income I had before, with increasing prices and taxes. And I don’t want to think of financial success when I write a play. IConfidential Clerk, Thebeing written;a4 have drafted half of a third scene yesterday.
IRichmonds, theTSE's Netherhampton weekends with;a7 had a very pleasant weekend with the Richmonds, with three days of perfect weather. Since then, cloudy, but not cold. ICokers, the;a2Coker, Lewis Aubrey ('Bolo')
TheodoraSmith, Theodora ('Dodo') Eliot (TSE's niece)recovering from operation;d4 seems to have recovered very well from a very major operation, as she says she has to go home (to her father’s in Windsor) very soon afterwards; and she found the hospital in Hanover very good. IEliot, Theresa Garrett (TSE's sister-in-law);f6 am so glad you had lunch with Theresa. I have been rather worried about her ears. IHinkley, Eleanor Holmes (TSE's first cousin)her impersonality;e6 do not know what is the cause of Eleanor’s impersonality. You remember how unsatisfactory I found the little party she gave: I had to talk so much with strangers, and hardly at all with old friends. Perhaps she is in a way frightened of intimate conversations.
1.TSEfinances (TSE's)apropos of The Cocktail Party;c1n to Sir George Bolton (1900–82) – Executive Director of the Bank of England; Executive Director (UK) of the International Monetary Fund – 31 Dec. 1951: ‘The figures given for my American royalties in the enclosed letter of 22nd March 1950 are small in comparison to what I could quote now: my latest play, The Cocktail Party had been running in New York for only four weeks. The run continued successfully for a year, and the play has lately been on tour; also, the book of the play has been sold to figures of over 40,000 by my New York publishers, and there is a cautious demand for my other works. I could supply exact figures if they were considered relevant. My accountants, Messrs. Baker, Todman & Co. have warned me to be prepared for income tax demands of somewhere in the neighbourhood of £25,000.’
1.TSE was mistaken here. EnidFaber, Enid Eleanor Eleanor Faber (1901–95) was the daughter of Sir Henry Erle Richards (1861–1922), Fellow of All Souls College and Chichele Professor of International Law and Diplomacy at Oxford University, and Mary Isabel Butler (1868–1945).
1.MaryFoss, Mary Foss was an old friend of EH: they were contemporaries at Miss Porter’s School, Farmington, CT, where they acted in plays and were members of a Shakespeare club. EH would often visit the Fosses at their home in Concord, and she taught the daughter, Sally Foss, while at Concord Academy.
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.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’.