[No surviving envelope]
I got back from New York this morning, and your letter of the 29th arrived, after me, by the first post, and made me feel very glorified and humble. First, to account for myself, and for not having written for a week. I wrote to you on Thursday. OnLowes, John Livingstonremembers TSE's parents;a9 Friday I dined privately with Professor and Mrs. Lowes: both very sweet, and very reminiscent of the fact that when they went to St. Louis (Washington University) my father & mother were the first people who came to call on them; andLowes, John Livingstonassesses TSE's Norton tenure;b1 Lowes paid me this very pleasing compliment: he said that I was the first lecturer on the Norton foundation to do what Chauncey Stillman had meant the lecturers to do when he made the foundation. SoEliot House;b7 I felt rewarded for living in Eliot House and being at home to students and giving an extra course etc. OnAmericaKittery, Maine;f2described;a2 SaturdayMatthiessen, Francis Otto ('F. O.')sojourn in Maine with;a3 I was motored up to Kittery by (young) Ellery Sedgwick and his wife (Sally Cabot) and we stayed with F.O. Matthiessen (the senior tutor of Eliot House) and his friend Russell Cheney a painter1 who share a very attractive little house there: renewedAmericaGerrish Island, Maine;e7TSE revisits;a1 my acquaintance with Kittery and Gerrish Island where my family had been when I was 3 or 4 years old. OnAmericaPortsmouth, Maine;g8delights TSE;a1 Sunday Morning (PortsmouthAmericaNewburyport, Maine;g2delights TSE;a1 and Newburyport are beautiful old towns) toFoster, Maxwell;a1 Topsfield to the house of Maxwell Foster (Foster is a partner in Chase Hall & Stuart the Boston Lawyers, of whom Charles P. Curtis is acting for me) and had a very dispersed lunch of cold chicken etc. on a verandah afterbirdsLongbilled Marsh Wren;c5spotted in Maine;a1 whichbirdsBlue Heron;a5spotted in Maine;a1 IbirdsBaltimore Oriole;a3spotted in Maine;a1 hadbirdsChestnut-sided warbler;b1spotted in Maine;a1 a very happy afternoon with Foster in a canoe on the Ipswich River looking at Birds: we both spotted a longbilled marsh wren very close to, to say nothing of a blue heron, three Baltimore orioles, chestnutsided warbler etc. ItSedgwick, Professor William Elleryhas drunken highbrow dispute;a3 ended dully, as after supper Foster and Sedgwick drank too much and disputed about the relation of art and history, and Matthiessen and Cheney finally went back in their car to Kittery, but Sedgwick didn’t want to go home, though Mrs. Sedgwick went; and I am glad to say she got her own way and drove back (she has a withered left arm) and deposited me safely at Eliot House about three hours later than I wanted to get here. AndAmericaElizabeth, New Jersey;e4TSE on visiting;a1 IAnglo-Catholic Congress, Elizabeth, New JerseyTSE speaks at;a1 had to get up in the morning to take train to Elizabeth N.J. and arrived finally at the Elizabeth Carteret Hotel which was much too hot, had dinner, a Father Hoffmann came to see me; up betimes the next morning which was Memorial Day with Cadets and Veterans parading with bugles etc. and firecrackers in the square but we held the Mass nevertheless and lunch at the Elizabeth Carteret Hotel whereCampbell, Robert Erskine;a1 I sat at the high table next to the Bishop of Liberia2 (my neighbour on the left explained that the Bishop of Liberia HAD to wear a beard because the native negroes do not respect anyone in authority unless he has a beard) then speeches by one Fr. Lewis and myself the Hall Packed with at least 350 people some standing and I think I did pretty well they all Roared at my jokes and were very solemn when I spoke seriously about Pusey et caetera and a Number of folk came up both in and outside to Wring my Hand afterward and say Mr. Eliot thank you for being so helpful. Returned to the Elizabeth Carteret Hotel and had a shower bath andAmericaNew York (N.Y.C.);g1TSE's visits to;a2 entrained for New York, andWilson, Edmund 'Bunny'TSE's New York stay with;a2 spent the night with Edmund (Bunny) Wilson celebrated Communist writer for the New Republic.3 Bunny Wilson is a dear; but we met with misfortune in a bottle of white wine in a simple speakeasy which disturbed our digestions for the next day. HeBarry, GriffinBunny Wilson's cohabitant;a1 seems to share a house on 53d street with Barry Griffin or Griffin Barry a pleasant spoken middle aged man who is the father of Lady Russell’s 3d child.4 WeShakespeare, WilliamBunny Wilson and TSE discuss;a1 returnedcommunismdiscussed with Bunny Wilson;a5 and spent the rest of the evening discussing Shakespeare’s later plays, Catholicism & communism; but felt poorly the next morning. HeSeldes, Gilbertat Bunny Wilson's tea;a1 and Mr. & Mrs. Gilbert Seldes,5 andMoore, Mariannescintillates at Bunny Wilson's;a1 especially Marianne Moore,6 to tea. Marianne Moore (who is a really good poet) is a Gem; I am sure you would like her: plain and pleasant, sharp as a razor, does all the talking, you can’t get a word in edgeways. ThenGershwin, GeorgeOf Thee I Sing;a1 we dined quietly and went to ‘Of Thee I Sing’.7 WhichHinkley, Barbara (TSE's first cousin)distinguished from husband;b5 isWolcott, Rogerdistinguished from Barbara;a4 quite worth seeing, and I took the midnight train for Boston. Today did various jobs, dined with Roger and Barbara at the Somerset Club (I believe Barbara is vulgar, Roger is only quaint & provincial) and to a play called ‘Dinner at Eight’:8 a sort of American version of the Noel Coward sort of thing. ThenMatthiessen, Francis Otto ('F. O.')retirement-party for;a4 out here to a party to Matthiessen (who is retiring from the position of senior tutor) atRobinson, Fred;a3 which I chatted with Fred Robinson (the Celtic professor, one of Eleanor’s swains) and so to myself.
Next, my programme. OnColumbia Universityconfers degree on TSE;a1 Monday, to New York for my Columbia Litt.D. OnAmericaRandolph, New Hampshire;g91933 Eliot family holiday in;a1 Wednesday, the 7th June, to the Mountain View House, Randolph, N.H. until I return here on the 16th. I leave for Montreal on the 22nd. Before that, address, c/o Mrs. Sheffield, 31 Madison Street, Gray Gardens, Cambridge; after. S.S. LAETITIA, sailing from Montreal, June 23d. (Cunard).
Nowtravels, trips and plansTSE's 1932–3 year in America;a7TSE's return from;b5 that I have got all this out of the way. First. IOxford and Cambridge Clubintended 1933 homecoming refuge;a6 expect to spend one night at the Oxford & Cambridge Club (71 Pall Mall S.W.1) andBird, ErnestTSE's consultations with;a2 see my solicitor Ernest Bird) thenPike's Farm;a2 to lodgings which the Morleys have secured for me quite near them. My address in England will be c/o F. V. Morley, Pike’s Farm, Lingfield, Surrey. I expect to be in London by short dashes (for the Albert Hall ceremonies etc.) and to visit: IUnderhill, Revd Francis, Bishop of Bath and Wellsand TSE's 1933 return;b6 mean to go as soon as I can to the Dean of Rochester (Francis Underhill) as I want to talk out some of my problems with him. I shall write to you twice a week, wherever I am, but I suggest that until I am settled, you do not write to me until you hear from me from England – after I sail on the 23d from Montreal.
I have not yet had any English mail this week. I had hoped for a letter from Bird. IFaber, Geoffreywhich he helps TSE over;c1 hadMorley, Frank Vigoracts for TSE during separation;b4 written to him to consult Geoffrey Faber first (Geoffrey and Frank Morley have been really good friends to me at this time) and then, atJames, Alfredto communicate TSE's wish to separate to VHE;a1 his discretion to consult Alfred James (whom he knows already) a dear old man who is the solicitor for the Haigh-Woods’. The question was whether James was to break the matter to V. and the Haigh-Woods. If I do not hear tomorrow I shall wire Bird. Have done so.9
IEliot, Vivien (TSE's first wife, née Haigh-Wood)the possibility of divorcing;f2in common and canon law;a5 wish, for myself, that a divorce were possible. Or rather, that an annulment were possible. In ordinary English divorce law, V. would have to divorce me; if she were unwilling to divorce me I should have to take steps (i.e. commit nominal adultery). But I could not compel her to divorce me; and I am quite sure that if she thought I wanted to marry anyone else she would not divorce me. In English law, the person who wants a divorce is at the mercy of the person who may not want it. This is merely the common law situation. InChristianitydivorce;b5in church law;a3 canon (church) law there is no divorce: and I doubt whether annulment (i.e. saying that there never was a real marriage) is possible. It is however not much consolation to me to think that even if the church allowed a divorce I could not get it. I shall talk these matters over with the Dean of Rochester: yet I am sure there is no way out. MyRead, Herberthis divorce;a6 friend Herbert Read (who is not a churchman) has persuaded his wife into divorcing him. But she is a reasonable person.
AllEliot, Vivien (TSE's first wife, née Haigh-Wood)the possibility of divorcing;f2TSE's objections to;a1 this seems very beastly and sordid; and when I think of these things I feel like a contaminated person, who ought to keep out of your way altogether. This sort of horror does not seem to belong in the same world with You. But, furthermore, reason as well as Church tells me that divorce is wrong. I see the absolute opposition between the Church and the World; and I see the question of divorce as one stone in the structure of the Church, and if the Church is shattered, the distinction between men and beasts will have gone. And I can see that the guilty must suffer, and for my part I am willing to take my medicine: but I cannot yet see why the innocent should suffer because of the guilty, any more than I can see why the child should suffer for the sins of its parents; yet every child suffers for the sins of its parents. So it is all a mystery. ButChristianityChristendom;b2TSE ponders the decline of;a1 have you ever thought what the world would be like if there were no Church? The Protestant Churches are crumbling so rapidly that you can hear the stones slide; Unitarianism is gone; in America Catholicism is almost confined to illiterates, and only a handful of the rest believe in anything except present happiness and material success. The task of the people in England who believe as I do is to work for eventual reunion with Rome, though we shall never see it in our lifetime. I am not resigned, I am not happy, and I shall always rage until old age10 deadens sensibility; but Ianti-Semitismwithin TSE's racial hierarchy;a6 am in horror of the way the World lives, and I see that I can make no compromise with it. At the same time I have to struggle with myself to keep on reasonable terms with it. ItEnglandthe English;c1considered racially superior;b1 isFrancethe French;b6as compared to various other races;a3Paris
ButHale, Emilyrelationship with TSE;w9EH offered manumission from;c2 I realise that this must be still harder for you than for me. SoHale, Emilycorrespondence with TSE;w3TSE offers to cease;e8 that, if you ever come to feel that the strain is too much, and that [you] had rather I never wrote to you again, I beg that you will say so at once and without trying to spare my feelings. I could understand that too. It would leave a terrifying emptiness in my life, perhaps you can imagine how terrible: but that would be better than coming to recognise that I was only pernicious for you. For the present, at all events, don’t write to me when you don’t want to write – except just to let me know that you are alive and not ill. Your last two letters quite made up to me and more, for a period of aridity. And I began, longer ago than you think, to learn to read between the lines.
TheHale, EmilyTSE's love for;x2shows TSE true meaning of tenderness;c4 word ‘tenderness’ has I think more meaning to me than for most people. It doesn’t mean to me something common and commonly known, but something very wonderful and strange. Just for one second – I wonder if you can know which – I looked into this terrifying abyss; the rest of the time I have by an instinct of self-preservation succeeded in obnubilating my own feelings from myself, partly.
You will, I hope, understand what I mean when I say that I am aware that this letter is not something which I am giving to you – I don’t suppose it is ‘helpful’: it is something which you have given me.
IHale, Emilyrelationship with TSE;w9if TSE were not married;c3 am very, very keenly aware of all that I believe we might give each other in different circumstances than these. What you could give me, I know but dare not think of; and it seems to me far beyond what I have to give – though I am quite sure that all the tenderness and solicitude that I give are only the shadow of a possible reality, in giving which I might be so much more real than I ever can be. I find it hard to face the things which it seems to me I might give you, or rather help to give you, the absence of which I feel so keenly in your present life. I think of the world in which you have to live, and I think of the happiness I should have in arranging a sort of world fit for you to play your part in – and I think that now I could really provide such a world. I could not live if I had to face the fullness of my own feelings; keeping nearer the surface, I know that we have a certain dramatic sense in common.
I understand your feelings about Marie: but you and I depend more upon the Maries’ than they do upon us. And I am gradually learning to understand you; I compare my knowledge of you with my knowledge three years ago. ItHale, Emilyrelationship with TSE;w9as perpetual progress and revelation;c1 is very wonderful to have increasing understanding enrich, without in any way altering, one’s feelings. It is not perhaps odd that I should love you the more for understanding and sympathising with your weaknesses; but it is interesting (to me at least) that the more I come to know you and understand you as another human being, the more I worship you as something superior to myself.
TheHale, Emilyphotographs of;w7;b7 little photograph is delightful and tantalising; it is you certainly, but I wish it could have been a close-up.
No, this is not a full answer to your letter of the 29th: merely a response.
IHale, Emilyhealth, physical and mental;w6then neuralgia;a5 wish you would tell me more about this neuralgia. I am terribly afraid of your having arthritis – and I cannot stand your hands & feet being spoiled by this malady.11
1.Russell Cheney (1881–1945), American painter; Matthiessen’s partner. See further F. O. Matthiessen, Russell Cheney, 1881–1945: A Record of His Work (1947): Rat & the Devil: Journal Letters of F. O. Matthiessen and Russell Cheney, ed. Louis Hyde (1978).
2.RobertCampbell, Robert Erskine Erskine Campbell (1884–1977), a monk of the Order of the Holy Cross, was Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Liberia (West Africa), 1925–36.
3.EdmundWilson, Edmund 'Bunny' ‘Bunny’ Wilson (1895–1972), influential literary critic, cultural commentator and memoirist, worked in the 1920s as managing editor of Vanity Fair; later as associate editor of The New Republic and as a prolific book reviewer. Works include Axel’s Castle: A Study in the Imaginative Literature of 1870–1930 (1931) – which includes a chapter on TSE – The Wound and the Bow: Seven Studies in Literature (1941); and the posthumous Letters on Literature and Politics 1912–1972 (ed. Elena Wilson, 1977).
TSEWilson, Edmund 'Bunny'TSE on;a3n to Geoffrey Curtis, 20 Oct. 1943: ‘Edmund Wilson is a very good critic except that, like most of his generation in America, he has mixed his literary criticism with too much political ideology of a Trotskyite variety and perhaps he is also too psychological, but I have a great respect for him as a writer and like him as a man.’ See too Wilson, ‘T. S. Eliot and the Church of England’, The New Republic, 24 Apr. 1929, 283–4; ‘T. S. Eliot’, The New Republic, 13 Nov. 1929, 341–9.
4.TheBarry, Griffin American journalist Griffin Barry (1884–1957) fathered two children, Harriet (b. 1930) and Roderick (b. 1932), with the gifted radical feminist and experimental educator Dora Russell (1894–1986), second wife of Bertrand Russell. See Harriet Ward, A Man of Small Importance: My Father Griffin Barry (Debenham, Surrey, 2003).
5.GilbertSeldes, Gilbert Seldes (1893–1970), journalist, critic, was a war correspondent before editing The Dial, 1920–3. He wrote a number of ‘New York Chronicles’ for the Criterion. In later years he was a prolific essayist; he wrote for the Broadway theatre; and he was the first director of TV programmes for CBS News, and founding Dean of the Annenburg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania. His works include The Seven Lively Arts (1924), an influential study of popular arts. See Michael Kammen, The Lively Arts: Gilbert Seldes and the Transformation of Cultural Criticism in the United States (1996).
6.MarianneMoore, Marianne Moore (1887–1972) contributed to The Egoist from 1915. She went on to become in 1925 acting editor of The Dial, editor, 1927–9, and an influential modern poet. Eliot found her ‘an extremely intelligent person, very shy … One of the most observant people I have ever met.’ Writing to her on 3 April 1921, he said her verse interested him ‘more than that of anyone now writing in America’. And in his introduction to Selected Poems (1935), which he brought out from Faber & Faber, he stated that her ‘poems form part of the small body of durable poetry written in our time’. TSE told Marion Dorn, 3 Jan. 1944, that he met Marianne Moore ‘once … in New York, but I took a great fancy to her: she and Bunny Wilson were the two people I liked best of those whom I met in New York in 1933. She is a very unusual person, as well as a good poet.’
CharlesMoore, Marianneon meeting TSE;a2n Molesworth, Marianne Moore: A Literary Life (1990), 262: ‘She was also able to confess to [her brother] Warner that she had met T. S. Eliot at a party, but she felt somewhat abashed, since their conversation was trivial and discreditable. She had had plans to meet Eliot and Wilson for dinner, but Wilson called at the last minute to say they couldn’t come and would she attend a party with Eliot instead. Mrs Moore objected to what she called such rudeness, but Moore went anyway, drawn by Eliot’s reputation, but finally was unable to say much to him beyond small talk.’
7.Of Thee I Sing (1931): musical by George Gershwin which opened on Broadway in 1931 and ran for 441 performances, winning the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, 1932; revived in 1933.
8.Dinner at Eight: play by George S. Kaufman and Edna Ferber (1932); adapted for the screen with Jean Harlow and John Barrymore; directed by George Cukor; prod. by David O. Selznick.
9.Sentence added by hand.
10.Cf. W. B. Yeats, ‘The Spur’ (1938), 1–2:
You think it horrible that lust and rage
Should dance attention upon my old age
11.Postscript added by hand.
4.TheBarry, Griffin American journalist Griffin Barry (1884–1957) fathered two children, Harriet (b. 1930) and Roderick (b. 1932), with the gifted radical feminist and experimental educator Dora Russell (1894–1986), second wife of Bertrand Russell. See Harriet Ward, A Man of Small Importance: My Father Griffin Barry (Debenham, Surrey, 2003).
2.RobertCampbell, Robert Erskine Erskine Campbell (1884–1977), a monk of the Order of the Holy Cross, was Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Liberia (West Africa), 1925–36.
11.GeoffreyFaber, Geoffrey Faber (1889–1961), publisher and poet: see Biographical Register.
6.BarbaraHinkley, Barbara (TSE's first cousin) Hinkley (1889–1958) was married in July 1928 to Roger Wolcott (1877–1965), an attorney; they lived at 125 Beacon Hill, Boston, and at 1733 Canton Avenue, Milton, Mass.
10.AldousHuxley, Aldous Huxley (1894–1963), novelist, poet, essayist: see Biographical Register.
1.JohnLowes, John Livingston Livingston Lowes (1867–1945), American scholar of English literature – author of the seminal study of Coleridge’s sources, The Road to Xanadu: A Study in the Ways of the Imagination (1927) – taught for some years, 1909–18, at Washington University, St. Louis, where he was known to TSE’s family. He later taught at Harvard, 1918–39.
7.F. O. MatthiessenMatthiessen, Francis Otto ('F. O.') (1902–50) taught for 21 years in the English Department at Harvard, where he specialised in American literature and Shakespeare, becoming Professor of History and Literature in 1942. The first Senior Tutor at Eliot House, he was a Resident Tutor, 1933–9. Works include The Achievement of T. S. Eliot (1935) and American Renaissance (1941).
6.MarianneMoore, Marianne Moore (1887–1972) contributed to The Egoist from 1915. She went on to become in 1925 acting editor of The Dial, editor, 1927–9, and an influential modern poet. Eliot found her ‘an extremely intelligent person, very shy … One of the most observant people I have ever met.’ Writing to her on 3 April 1921, he said her verse interested him ‘more than that of anyone now writing in America’. And in his introduction to Selected Poems (1935), which he brought out from Faber & Faber, he stated that her ‘poems form part of the small body of durable poetry written in our time’. TSE told Marion Dorn, 3 Jan. 1944, that he met Marianne Moore ‘once … in New York, but I took a great fancy to her: she and Bunny Wilson were the two people I liked best of those whom I met in New York in 1933. She is a very unusual person, as well as a good poet.’
4.FrankMorley, Frank Vigor Vigor Morley (1899–1980), American publisher and author; a founding editor of F&F, 1929–39: see Biographical Register.
3.Herbert ReadRead, Herbert (1893–1968), English poet and literary critic: see Biographical Register.
7.FredRobinson, Fred Robinson (1871–1966), distinguished Celticist and scholar of Chaucer – his invaluable edition of The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer was to appear in 1933 – Gurney Professor of English, Harvard.
3.ProfessorSedgwick, Professor William Ellery William Ellery Sedgwick (1899–1942) taught English at Harvard, 1926–38, before joining Bennington College, Vermont. His widow was the former Sarah F. Cabot of Boston; and his brother was O. Sedgwick, foreign correspondent of the New York Times.
5.GilbertSeldes, Gilbert Seldes (1893–1970), journalist, critic, was a war correspondent before editing The Dial, 1920–3. He wrote a number of ‘New York Chronicles’ for the Criterion. In later years he was a prolific essayist; he wrote for the Broadway theatre; and he was the first director of TV programmes for CBS News, and founding Dean of the Annenburg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania. His works include The Seven Lively Arts (1924), an influential study of popular arts. See Michael Kammen, The Lively Arts: Gilbert Seldes and the Transformation of Cultural Criticism in the United States (1996).
2.Revd Francis UnderhillUnderhill, Revd Francis, Bishop of Bath and Wells, DD (1878–1943), TSE’s spiritual counsellor: see Biographical Register.
3.EdmundWilson, Edmund 'Bunny' ‘Bunny’ Wilson (1895–1972), influential literary critic, cultural commentator and memoirist, worked in the 1920s as managing editor of Vanity Fair; later as associate editor of The New Republic and as a prolific book reviewer. Works include Axel’s Castle: A Study in the Imaginative Literature of 1870–1930 (1931) – which includes a chapter on TSE – The Wound and the Bow: Seven Studies in Literature (1941); and the posthumous Letters on Literature and Politics 1912–1972 (ed. Elena Wilson, 1977).
1.VirginiaWoolf, Virginia Woolf (1882–1941), novelist, essayist and critic: see Biographical Register.