[c/o Perkins, 90 Commonwealth Ave., Boston]
IChristian News-Letter (CNL)TSE's guest-editorship of;b8 am a very poor correspondent at present, and shall be for the next two weeks; and I have written no other private letters at all. A more practised journalist, no doubt, could turn out his weekly copy in much less time than I, and probably give the ten thousand odd readers as much or more satisfaction. But it is not simply that I am a very slow and difficult writer. When one is only running a paper for three weeks, what one writes in those three issues becomes rather conspicuous; a new editor is read with the critical attention of unfamiliarity; and one feels an obligation to make the best job of it one can. On Friday and Saturday I am brooding over what to write; on Sunday afternoon and evening I lash myself up to doing a draft; on Monday morning I go to the office in Dorset Square and go through the correspondence; onSmith, William Henry, 3rd Lord Hambledenand CNL;a3 Monday night I dine with Hambleden (the only member of the committee now in town) and discuss what I have written. Then I have three mornings in which to rewrite my draft and do any of the things which I should normally be doing in the morning. On Thursday I go to press; and by taking Friday morning at Russell Square, I spend the afternoon at Balcombe Street (Dorset Square), correcting my proof, dictating letters, and reading weekly periodicals. So the work is practically continuous. ItFaber and Faber (F&F);e4 has happened that I have also had three rather difficult books to deal with, with quite different problems connected with each, for F. & F.; which involves interviewing two authors, one translator, and two literary agents. GeoffreyFaber, Geoffreyand Purchase Tax exertions;h4, of course, is having atravels, trips and plansTSE's 1940 Faber summer holiday;e1;a4 well earned rest in Wales, soothing his boils. IFabers, the1940 summer holiday with;e7 go there by the way on the 30th for ten days or so; asChristian News-Letter (CNL)TSE gives talk for;b9 ISt. Mary Woolnoth, King William StreetTSE gives CNL talk at;a1 wind up my official duties for the News letter on the 29th by giving a short talk in a C.N.L. series at St. Mary Woolnoth, Lombard Street. To-daySaurat, Denis;a5 IBarrés, Philippe;a1 have Denis Saurat and Philippe Barrés [sc. Barrès] (sonBarrés, Maurice;a1 of Maurice Barrés)1 to lunch; but this week and next I am keeping clear of evening engagements. IEnglandLondon;h1TSE as air-raid warden in;d5 have passed my A R P test (not very brilliantly, I fear) and have received my card but not my kit. AndPurchase TaxTSE's efforts to exclude books from;a1 we are waiting anxiously to learn the result of the Supplementary Budget debate this afternoon, because of its importance to the survival of the publishing industry. ILang, William Cosmo Gordon, Archbishop of Canterbury (later Baron Lang of Lambeth)over which he proves industrious;a3 must say that the Archbishop of Canterbury has given a great deal of energy to helping us to get the book tax modified.2
Well, I am rather enjoying the extra work, but hope that I shall be able to regard it with satisfaction when it is over. I am so behind in writing that I have three of your letters, 50, 51 (I am allowing your numbers to creep up on me, and must make a spurt later) and an unnumbered one, written earlier from Saturday Cove. IAmericaMaine;f6its coast remembered by TSE;a1 don’t remember Northport, but Blue Hill I remember very clearly. That is all very favourite country of mine; and the South Shore has never appealed to me so much – thoughElsmiths, theseminal Woods Hole stay with;a1 indeed I have only the one particular visit to remember, and a very important one too, at the Elsmiths. I was glad of all the news of your visit there, as I have such a very abiding memory of the people and the place; Nantucket I know only from your description. IThorps, the;d4 am glad that you should stay with the Thorps, and you ought to find it stimulating though hardly restful. Margaret’sThorp, Margaret (née Farrand)an unsoothing presence;b7 odd wiry energy and restless high-intellectualism is not what one would choose for company if one was convalescing from a severe illness. I gather that America has been visited by the usual summer heat wave; and I fear lest your fortnight in Boston may coincide with the worst of it. MrsPerkins, Edith (EH's aunt);e6. Perkins ought not to be there, nor you to look after her. I like one of the photographs, but the ‘smiling’ one I destroyed after one good look.
It is strange to think that in another four or five weeks you will be starting again at Smith. If I felt sure that your summer was not being too broken to give you all the good you need from it, I should look forward to the autumn, because the autumn makes it possible to look forward to another, and perhaps brighter spring. Your letter 50 was a very fine one, and reassuring and fortifying to me. Thank you.
1.Philippe Barrès (1896–1975), right-wing French journalist. Son of Maurice Barrès (1862–1923), novelist, journalist and politician; associate of Charles Maurras and Action Française.
2.See ‘Newspapers and Books: Exemption from Tax’, The Times, 14 Aug. 1940, 4: ‘The Chancellor of the Exchequer announced in the House of Commons to-night, during a discussion on the Purchase Tax in Committee, that he would not persist in the proposal to tax newspapers, books, and periodicals.’
11.GeoffreyFaber, Geoffrey Faber (1889–1961), publisher and poet: see Biographical Register.
3.DenisSaurat, Denis Saurat (1890–1958), Anglo-French scholar, writer, broadcaster; Professor of French Language and Literature, King’s College London, 1926–50; Director of the Institut français du Royaume Uni, 1924–45; author of La Pensée de Milton (1920: Milton: Man and Thinker, 1925).
1.WilliamSmith, William Henry, 3rd Lord Hambleden Henry Smith, 3rd Lord Hambleden (1903–48), Governing Director of W. H. Smith.
16.MargaretThorp, Margaret (née Farrand) Farrand (1891–1970), author and journalist – see Margaret Thorp in Biographical Register.