[240 Crescent St., Northampton, Mass.]

T. S.Eliot
EmilyHale
TS
The Criterion
18 January 1937
Dearest Girl,

I must write you a line tonight, though there is no boat for three days – butShakespeare, WilliamHamlet;b6 IOld Vic, TheOlivier's (complete) Hamlet;a8 am going to Hamlet complete tomorrow night, and if I can write on Wednesday, as I probably can, there will be other things to say – to thank you for your letter of the 6th, andWare, Mary Leesuffers stroke;c5 to say how sorry I am to have your news about Miss Ware.1 It also goes to explain why you did not get away, and gives another reason besides those I know of, why your Christmas holiday was not a period of complete rest and refreshment. She is, I imagine, a person of great vitality, and so may recover from this attack: on the other hand it is sometimes more painful to see people of strong vitality attacked beyond their strength. I can understand your affection for her, and I know that she has had a useful part in your life that no other relative could have played. So I shall pray, unknowing what is happening, for her recovery.

ISmith CollegeEH unhappy with work at;b5 can also understand your despondency about your work; but dear, remember that this kind of despondency is caused by something quite outside your work, and is not a rational criticism of what you have done, and so you must struggle against it, not so much by thinking against despondency, and trying to surpass yourself in order to satisfy yourself – but by quietly forgetting all about your doubts, so far as you can, and thinking of the work and the girls for whom you are working, rather than how well or badly you are doing it. Often, at such times, other people may judge that you are doing better than ever. It is not always when one feels most sure of oneself that one is doing one’s best. If I could talk to you tonight I am sure I could persuade you and encourage you: let me feel that I can do something even with the typewriter and at ten days remove.

Emilie’s loving
Tom

1.Mary Lee Ware, EH’s host at Brimmer Street, had suffered a paralysing stroke on 5 Jan.

Old Vic, The, relationship to Sadler's Wells, presents Laughton's Macbeth, presents Othello, presents Henry IV, Part II, presents The Witch of Edmonton, Olivier's (complete) Hamlet, presents Murder, Guthrie's Measure for Measure, Emlyn Williams's Richard III, Alec Guinness's Hamlet, considers Family Reunion, presents Midsummer Night's Dream, TSE's fellow air-warden involved with, Hamlet starring Robert Helpmann at, engages Martin Browne to produce Coriolanus, Wolfit's Tamburlaine, wants to revive Murder, to produce The Confidential Clerk,
Shakespeare, William, Bunny Wilson and TSE discuss, writing Murder increases TSE's admiration for, but equally wariness of, spiritually 'helpful', preferable in modern dress, EH imagined as Lady Macbeth, later as Hermione, All's Well that Ends Well, Antony and Cleopatra, As You Like It, Coriolanus, Cymbeline, Hamlet, Henry VIII, Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Measure for Measure, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Midsummer Night's Dream, Much Ado About Nothing, Othello, Richard II, Richard III, 'Sonnet CXXXII', The Tempest, Timon of Athens, Troilus and Cressida, Twelfth Night, The Winter's Tale,
Smith College, TSE's speaking engagement at, which proves luxurious, EH considers matronship at, offers EH job, appoints EH assistant professor, in TSE's recollection, EH installed at, TSE's response to EH's initial response, EH unhappy with work at, reappoints EH, reappoints EH again for two years, compared to Scripps, EH encouraged to stick at, despite feeling unsettled, reappoints and promotes EH again, EH's employment insecurities at, EH considers leaving for war-work, appoints Hallie Flanagan, places staff under assessment, does not renew EH's contract, TSE reflects on EH's time at, EH visits, EH invites TSE to speak at, which TSE declines, EH approaches Marianne Moore for,
Ware, Mary Lee, in TSE's recollection, confidant of EH, at West Rindge, travels to Italy, disparaged by TSE, for gilded unworldliness, but TSE repents of disparaging, possibly in Florence, TSE moderates his opinion of, antipathetic to TSE, visited at Rindge, TSE disclaims dislike for, TSE detained from visiting, suffers stroke, dies of second stroke, her will sent to TSE, EH sends memorial for, includes EH in will, and 'the vanished Rindge', her collection of glass flowers,

3.MaryWare, Mary Lee Lee Ware (1858–1937), independently wealthy Bostonian, friend and landlady of EH at 41 Brimmer Street: see Biographical Register.