[Grace Toll Hall, Scripps College, Claremont]
AnSheffield, Ada Eliot (TSE's sister);d3 American mail arrived this morning – lettersEliot, Henry Ware, Jr. (TSE's brother);b9 from Henry and Ada – so I thought I must look in at the club to see if there might be something from you – ICecil, Lord David;a3 was lunching with David Cecil at the Travellers’ Club nearby, so I popped in and there was the Porter ready for me with your letter of the 5th in his hand: isn’t that quick, 11 days? And very glad I was to have it, and this bit of information about yourself. Your previous letter was very nourishing, but I was beginning to be restless! WellHale, Emilyas teacher;w1requests year's leave from Scripps;b5, thisScripps College, Claremontyear's leave requested from;d7 is news, your leaving Scripps!1 I confess that my first feeling has been one of unqualified relief. You know I have been worried about it ever since I saw the conditions, and much more since I first heard about the neuritis and the arthritis. (I did not conceal the fact that I was fearful of some mental arthritis as well!) And now I gather that your health really has been worse than you allowed me to suspect: youMorrell, Lady Ottoline;c9 refer placidly enough to ‘sinus’ – I know people who have had it – Ottoline Morrell has had two or three operations – and I hope that you will never NEVER have an operation for it. Of course, my dear, I know that there is the other side to it; and that apart from not wanting to leave girls who are fond of you, and the dread of being unoccupied after being so busy, there is the apprehension of having nothing to do in 1935. But I know that one must not worry about anything so far ahead as that: you cannot foresee the circumstances of eighteen months hence, so don’t think about it. I know also very well, that the strain of accomodating [sic] oneself to very much older people is still greater than that of accomodating oneself to very much younger ones. Nevertheless my heart has been like a singing bird.2 Youtravels, trips and plansEH's 1934–5 year in Europe;b4TSE delighted at the prospect;a2 are to have a summer in England and I hope a winter in the South, in Southern France or in Italy perhaps; and it ought to do you a world of good. YouAmericaCalifornia;d3TSE's delight at EH leaving;b4 won’t know how much you have needed to get away from California and the whole West until you do. O I am so happy about it.
YouPerkinses, the;d6 speak as if the Perkins’s were to come to England ahead of you, and that you would join them here. Itravels, trips and plansEH's 1934–5 year in Europe;b4attempts to coordinate with TSE's 1934 summer plans;a3 hope you will give me exact news in due course. I had vaguely planned to be out of London most of the time in July, as the end of my pageant seems an appropriate moment for a holiday – I intended to go back to Surrey. Beyond that, and a week or so in Wales, andScotlandTSE hopes to visit again;a3 possibly another visit to Scotland, I have no plans. IFranceTSE dreams of travelling in;a2 [would] go somewhere in France if I could find a companion, but that would depend upon some congenial and unattached man turning up. What I mean is, that we need not meet at all if you prefer not, whilst you are in London, because I can be officially out of town; but we can cross that bridge when we get to it.
IRock, The;b9 do wish you could get to London in time to see my pageant! But that will be all over by the middle of June, so it’s impossible. Webb-OdellWebb-Odell, Revd Rosslynbullish on ticket-sales;a3 is very cheerful about it and believes that he may sell all the seats for the whole fortnight before the show opens, which would be a great feat; but I don’t suppose they would continue the run however well it did. It is too much of a business, keeping 400 amateurs from different parts of London together.
IRock, The;c1 have a good bit more to write, and must take a big bite off it over this weekend. I hope that I can keep the quality up to the end; because if I say it myself, what I have done so far is better and more actable than I had expected it would be.
I have had a busy week, and this is the first evening free for a letter. OnRichardses, thetreat TSE to G. C. Coulton and Shakespeare;a6 Tuesday morning I went to Cambridge; theCoulton, George Gordoncharms TSE;a1 Richmonds’s [sc. Richards’s] had G. C. Coulton, the great mediaeval scholar, to lunch; whom I was very glad to meet, a charming old man with a prodigious memory for everything from an exact detailed account of a cricket match in 1879 to ecclesiastical history;3 andShakespeare, WilliamAntony and Cleopatra;b2 in the evening we went to the undergraduate performance (The Marlowe Society) of ‘Antony and Cleopatra’. It is a fearfully ambitious performance for immature undergraduates, the most difficult of all Shakespeare’s plays, I think. For the first time the female roles were taken by women, that is by girls from Newnham and Girton. CleopatraEeman, Berylas Cleopatra;a1 herself was amazingly good, considering her youth; her two women, Charmian and Iras, were dreadful. Antony and Octavius were excellent, but Cleopatra the best. I returned the next morning, andDoone, Rupertpitches the Group Theatre to TSE;a4 afterMedley, Robertand Doone pitch TSE the Group Theatre;a1 aGroup Theatreas pitched to TSE;a2 busy day dined with Rupert Doone and Robert Medley4 to discuss their Group Theatre plans for them. These adventurous young men hope to raise £500 on which about fifteen or twenty young people hope to live for six months in a house in Suffolk, practising and rehearsing and studying drama together; and then come forth and support themselves by touring repertory.5 It does sound Utopian, doesn’t it? TheyCompagnie des Quinzeits Don Juan recalled;a1 model the scheme on what was done by the Compagnie des Quinze in France; that company is certainly amazingly good, I saw them in Don Juan.6 It is hard to know what to advise, as some of them will be giving up jobs to undertake the risky venture. OnPower, William;a1 Thursday I lunched withBlake, George;a6 William Power, an elderly Scotch journalist7 introduced by George Blake, andRead, Herberthosts TSE in Hampstead;a9 in the evening went out to Hampstead to Herbert Read’s. WeDobrée, Bonamypromulgates Credit Reform;b1 hadMiles, Hamish;a1 a conference this afternoon with Bonamy and Hamish Miles8 and finally drafted our letter to The Times. ICecil, Lord Davidsignatory to Credit Reform letter;a4 think I can get Cecil to sign – I talked to him about it at lunch – andHuxley, Aldoussignatory to Credit Reform letter;a8 IDawson, Christophersignatory to Credit Reform letter;a3 must write tomorrow to Aldous and to Christopher Dawson, the two most important. ThenDawson, Geoffreyand Credit Reform letter to The Times;a1 the job will be to persuade Geoffrey Dawson (editor of The Times, no relation to Christopher)9 to print it. The weekend (tonight is Friday) I keep clear for pageant: butCongreve, WilliamLove for Love;a1 TuesdaySadler's Wells Theatrepresents Love for Love;a7 IMorley, Christina (née Innes)again to Love for Love;a4 take Christina Morley to ‘Love for Love’ at Sadlers’ Wells;10 onBottomley, GordonThe Acts of St. Peter;a2 WednesdayBrowne, Elliott Martinproducing Gordon Bottomley's play;a3 go by myself to Gordon Bottomley’s ‘Acts of St Peter’ at St. Margarets Westminster (I go because my producer Browne is producing it).11 AndChristianitythe Church Year;d8preserved from public engagements;c1 the following week is Holy Week, so I make no engagements, exceptUnderhill, Revd Francis, Bishop of Bath and Wellsconfession with;a4 to go down to Rochester for a night to make my confession.
O my dear Bird, I am happy to think of your travelling abroad again. I shall follow you everywhere in spirit. And after all, you may meet interesting people of your own age during your travels. I wonder where you will go. Thank you for your dear letter.
1.OnScripps College, Claremontyear's leave requested from;d7 19 Feburary, Emily Hale ‘asked President Jaqua for a year’s leave to go to England. Jaqua (who was regarded by his faculty as a difficult, rather devious man) would not guarantee her post, but she went all the same’ (Gordon, The Imperfect Life of T. S. Eliot, 257).
2.Christina Rossetti, ‘My heart is like a singing bird’ (1874); set to music by Hubert Parry.
3.GeorgeCoulton, George Gordon Gordon Coulton, FBA (1858–1947), historian of medieval history and religion; controversialist; vehement anti-Catholic. His many publications include Chaucer and His England (1908); Life in the Middle Ages (1910; revised in 4 vols, 1928); Papal Infallibility (1922); In Defence of the Reformation (1931); Five Centuries of Religion (4 vols, 1927–50).
4.RobertMedley, Robert Medley (1905–94): English artist and designer; co-founder with his partner Rupert Doone of the Group Theatre: see Biographical Register.
5.See further TSE to Ormerod Greenwood, 22 Mar. 1934 (Letters 7, 120–1).
6.The Compagnie des Quinze: theatre company organised by Michel Saint-Denis (nephew of Jacques Copeau), along with the playwright André Obey, at the Théatre du Vieux-Colombier, Paris, 1929–34; influential upon British theatre in the succeeding years.
7.WilliamPower, William Power (1873–1951), journalist and literary critic; President of the Scottish Centre of PEN, 1934–8; Chair of the Scottish National Party, 1940–2. Author of Literature and Oatmeal (1935) and Should Auld Acquaintance (autobiography, 1937).
8.HamishMiles, Hamish Miles (1894–1937), author; publisher’s editor (Jonathan Cape).
9.GeoffreyDawson, Geoffrey Dawson (1874–1944), editor of The Times, 1912–19, 1922–41.
10.William Congreve’s Love for Love, dir. Tyrone Guthrie at the Sadler’s Wells Theatre, featured James Mason, Charles Laughton, Athene Seyler, Flora Robson and Elsa Lanchester.
11.Gordon Bottomley’s The Acts of St Peter: A Cathedral Festival Play (1933) – written for the octocentenary of Exeter Cathedral – was presented by the Religious Drama Society (dir. Martin Browne), with the assistance of the London Verse Speaking Choir, at St Margaret’s, Westminster, for four days from 20 Mar. See Poems and Plays, ed. C. C. Abbott (1951).
10.GeorgeBlake, George Blake (1893–1961), novelist, journalist, publisher: see Biographical Register.
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.LordCecil, Lord David David Cecil (1902–86), historian, critic, biographer; Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford, 1924–30; Fellow of New College, Oxford, 1939–69; Professor of English, Oxford, 1948–70; author of The Stricken Deer (1929), Early Victorian Novelists: Essays in Revaluation (1934), Jane Austen (1936) and studies of other writers including Hardy, Shakespeare, Scott.
3.GeorgeCoulton, George Gordon Gordon Coulton, FBA (1858–1947), historian of medieval history and religion; controversialist; vehement anti-Catholic. His many publications include Chaucer and His England (1908); Life in the Middle Ages (1910; revised in 4 vols, 1928); Papal Infallibility (1922); In Defence of the Reformation (1931); Five Centuries of Religion (4 vols, 1927–50).
2.ChristopherDawson, Christopher Dawson (1889–1970), cultural historian: see Biographical Register.
9.GeoffreyDawson, Geoffrey Dawson (1874–1944), editor of The Times, 1912–19, 1922–41.
3.Bonamy DobréeDobrée, Bonamy (1891–1974), scholar and editor: see Biographical Register.
2.RupertDoone, Rupert Doone (1903–66), dancer, choreographer and producer, founded the Group Theatre, London, in 1932: see Biographical Register.
6.‘Some girl from Newnham’ was BerylEeman, Beryl Eeman (1916–92), who was to become, in 1937, the fiancée of the American poet John Berryman (who held a scholarship at Clare College).
3.HenryEliot, Henry Ware, Jr. (TSE's brother) Ware Eliot (1879–1947), TSE’s older brother: see Biographical Register.
10.AldousHuxley, Aldous Huxley (1894–1963), novelist, poet, essayist: see Biographical Register.
4.RobertMedley, Robert Medley (1905–94): English artist and designer; co-founder with his partner Rupert Doone of the Group Theatre: see Biographical Register.
4.LadyMorrell, Lady Ottoline Ottoline Morrell (1873–1938), hostess and patron: see Biographical Register.
7.WilliamPower, William Power (1873–1951), journalist and literary critic; President of the Scottish Centre of PEN, 1934–8; Chair of the Scottish National Party, 1940–2. Author of Literature and Oatmeal (1935) and Should Auld Acquaintance (autobiography, 1937).
3.Herbert ReadRead, Herbert (1893–1968), English poet and literary critic: see Biographical Register.
2.AdaSheffield, Ada Eliot (TSE's sister) Eliot Sheffield (1869–1943), eldest of the seven Eliot children; author of The Social Case History: Its Construction and Content (1920) and Social Insight in Case Situations (1937): see Biographical Register.