[22 Paradise Rd., Northampton, Mass.]
Very little has happened in the last week. I get stronger slowly: this morning I got up at 9 o’clock and dressed, having breakfast at my table; and I have been out for an hour’s walk, up hill and down. So I slept soundly from lunch time till tea. I expect to be allowed to go up to London next week. The doctor here is very slow and cautious; and furthermore I have felt that it would be unfair to my hostess to run any risk of a relapse. MrsMirrlees, Emily Lina ('Mappie', née Moncrieff)concerns TSE;a9. MirrleesShamley Wood, Surreydramatis personae;a4 is on my mind a good deal, as I have suggested before being nearly eighty, incessantly active, and a Christian Scientist. BesidesMirrlees, Maj.-Gen. William Henry Buchanan ('Reay')with brigade in North Africa;a1 worrying about her son who is commanding a battalion somewhere in Africa, sheMoncrieff, Constance ('Cocky');a3 has her sister here, who is very delicate; the evacuees do not always get on with each other and have to be pacified; there is an Irishwoman who has been very ill in the house for some time – apparently her only claim on Mrs. M. is that she once worked here as a cook when the proper cook was recuperating from an operation, and now has nowhere to go; and being Irish, is very unreasonable. The cook-housekeeper has been nursing the Irishwoman and is now rather ill herself etc. etc. HopeMirrlees, Hopeto Mappie as Eleanor Hinkley to Aunt Susie;b7 isHinkley, Eleanor Holmes (TSE's first cousin)to Aunt Susie as Hope Mirrlees to Mappie;c4 of no more use in practical matters than my cousin Eleanor, and indeed her relation towards her mother is rather similar.
I shall be glad when I can get away regularly again; for, as I have said so often, I can’t stand any people the whole time. I am not having the typist from Guildford any more, for, although she was quite efficient, she came expensive; and'Towards a Christian Britain'perplexes TSE;a2 besidesBritish Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)'Towards a Christian Britain';b9, my chief job here at present (apart from such business as is sent down for me to deal with) is to prepare my broadcast talk on the Christianisation of England – a very difficult one.1 Did I tell you that two different departments of the B.B.C. (or so they seem to be, though in what they differ I cannot say) have asked me to do a talk for the U.S.A. programme, and that I have referred them to each other to decide? So, if you do not get the article for which you are clamouring, you should at least get one talk! and I shall certainly try to be plain, thank you! ItArchbishop of York's Conference, Malvern 1941;a6 is'Christian Conception of Education, The'charged with being dull;a2 true that my talk at Malvern was important but dull,2 butDemant, Revd Vigo Augustedull paper for Malvern 1941;b3 thereMacKinnon, Donald M.;a1 were several others (Demant and Mackinnon3) which were much more important and duller. Thespringat Shamley;b1 air is distinctly more springlike: thereflowers and florasnowdrops;c8at Shamley;a1 areflowers and floracrocuses;b3at Shamley;a1 snowdrops and crocus – theflowers and floraaconite;a1at Shamley;a1 aconiteflowers and floracatkins;a8at Shamley;a1 are over – catkins still hang on the trees, but the birches show a lively cloud of pink where the buds are about to burst. On my walk to-day I came across a dead fox by a pool: he had evidently been caught in a trap, poor thing, wrenched his leg out, limped to the pool for a drink, and fallen in and drowned. He lay stretched out in a posture of running, his tail floating on the surface. MemMirrlees, Emily Lina ('Mappie', née Moncrieff)her distress on animals' behalf;b1. not to tell Mrs. M. because the thought of animals being trapped causes her great distress.
I now have letters 74, 75 and 76: thedogs'Boerre' (Norwegian Elkhound);b7goes missing;d3 first telling of Boerre have [sc. having] gone on the loose that night, but the last referring to him again, so I suppose he turned up in the morning. I don’t know that hounds with an instinct for hunting can be prevented altogether from roaming: if he knows how to take care of himself in traffic and doesn’t maraud that is the best you can expect. I am glad to hear of the costume, which sounds most attractive, and I wish indeed that it could be seen and appreciated by a larger and more varied number of people. IJoyce, Jameshis death lamented;d5 was distressed by the death of Joyce,4 but of course he was not at all a close friend; and his work, I think, was done. I wish I could get news of his family who are said to be in Switzerland. WhatJoyce, Jamesinsufficiently commemorated;d6 upset me most was the very scant and grudging obituary in The Times,5 and the very poor appreciation in the Literary Supplement.6 I'Message to the Fish, A'provoked by The Times;a1 wrote a letter which The Times did not print, and have now sent it in an expanded form to Stephen Spender to print in his ‘Horizon’.7 MyLewis, Wyndhamone of TSE's 'group';b8 littlePound, Ezraone of TSE's 'group';c8 group of writers of the early days is well broken up: Lewis is in America, and Pound (with whose political opinions I of course have no sympathy whatever) is I believe still in Italy.
TheEliot, Dr Martha May (TSE's cousin)sent to England on commission;a5 event of this week has been a visit from Martha, who came down for the day. She is here with a government commission, and was most interesting, telling of what she had been doing, and also on American politics. She gave us the first direct impression I have ever heard of Mrs. Roosevelt, whom she admires very much. I am very proud to have her here on such an important job. I hope that I shall see her again in London, but her stay is of uncertain length. IWood, Edward, 3rd Viscount Halifax (later 1st Earl of Halifax);a7 shallWood, Charles, 2nd Viscount Halifaxdisposes TSE favourably towards his son;a7 be interested to learn what people in the States think of Halifax: 8 as you know, I have only just met him, but I knew and liked his father.9
I am glad to hear of your skating – and skiing! You are a very sporting person, which is most endearing to me, except perhaps in re bulls: but I did not know what an athlete you had been in your nonage. WereAmericaFarmington, Connecticut;e5place of EH's schooling;a1 you on the Farmington Basket Ball and Track Teams – a Double Blue in fact. ISheffield, Ada Eliot (TSE's sister)has cancer;h8 think I did mention Ada’s cancer by name in one letter – I thought I had referred to Henry’s euphemism, as it was from Frank that I learned the truth. She does seem to have got on well; I had a letter last week typed – but with one hand, she said, but hopes to be able to use both arms soon. She of course says little about her operation: she was writing mostly about social thinking.
TheBrownes, the Martinand their Pilgrim Players;c1 MartinEnglandShamley Green, Surrey;i7Pilgrim Players due at;a3 Brownes are coming with their troupe to act in our local church – so I shall get them to write to you after they have seen me. My office did lose its window panes a couple of months ago – before the cold spell – and they have been replaced.
1.‘Towards a Christian Britain’ (radio talk), Listener 25 (10 Apr. 1941), 524–5; repr. in The Church Looks Ahead: Broadcast Talks, ed. J. H. Oldham (1941): CProse 6, 162–8.
2.The Archbishop of York’s Conference, held at Malvern College, Worcs., 7–10 Jan. 1941, sought to consider ‘how far the Christian faith and principles based upon it afford guidance for action in the world today’. Clements, Moot Papers, 341: ‘Initiated by the Industrial Christian Fellowship and chaired by William Temple, this was a gathering of some 400 Anglicans … to consider in the light of Christian faith the crisis facing civilization, and the need for reconstruction … There was a general impression that the conference was much stronger on input than outcomes but it was illustrative of the serious attention being given to underlying social and international issues in church circles.’ TSE spoke on the Fri. afternoon, on Section E, Document A, Question 2: his address ‘The Christian Conception of Education’ was included in Malvern, 1941: The Life of the Church and the Order of Society (1941), 201–13: CProse 6, 246–56.
3.DonaldMacKinnon, Donald M. M. MacKinnon (1913–94), Scottish theologian and philosopher; Fellow and Tutor at Keble College, Oxford, 1937–47; Regius Professor of Moral Philosophy, University of Aberdeen, 1947–60; Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity, Cambridge, 1960–78. Works include A Study in Ethical Theory (1957) and The Problem of Metaphysics, Gifford Lectures (1974).
4.James Joyce died on 13 Jan. 1941.
5.‘Mr James Joyce: Author of Ulysses’, The Times, 14 Jan. 1941, 7. ‘The extremes of opinion on Joyce’s work are represented by Sir Edmund Gosse, who wrote to the Revue des Deux Mondes on “the worthlessness and impudence of his writing”, and Arnold Bennett, who said of “Ulysses” “the best portions of the novel are immortal”; while the middle, puzzled state of mind is typified by A. E.’s remark on meeting the author: “I don’t know whether you are a fountain or a cistern.” It would seem, however, that the appreciation of the eternal and serene beauty of nature and the higher sides of human character was not granted to Joyce – or at least did not appear in his work.’
6.The first notice of Joyce’s demise in the TLS appeared in ‘News and Notes’, 18 Jan. 1941, 25: ‘It was said so often that the late James Joyce’s “Ulysses”, that vast and cloudy book with its flashes of strange light, exercised enormous influence on the English novel that it became a mere habit to say it, just as Joyce’s characters – if, the comic figure of Mr Bloom apart, they can be called characters – argued in pubs and got into and out of bed by mere habit. There will be argument for some time about this remarkable, prodigious, grotesque and significant work – for it was most decidedly significant. Among other things it was a symbol of an unstable society and the breaking up of the European tradition. An article on Joyce’s work will appear in our next issue.’ The following week brought ‘The Significance of James Joyce: “Ulysses” and Its Phantasmal Expedition: Tragic Sojourn in the Tower of Babel’, TLS, 26 Jan. 1941, 42, 45.
7.TSE, ‘A Message to the Fish’, Horizon 3: 15 (Mar., 1941), 173–5: CProse 6, 158–61.
8.Edward Wood, 3rd Viscount Halifax (1881–1959) was British Ambassador to Washington, 1941–6.
9.Charles Wood, 2nd Viscount Halifax (1839–1934), devout churchman. TSE had corresponded with him, and visited him at Hickleton Hall in Yorkshire.
4.RevdDemant, Revd Vigo Auguste Vigo Auguste Demant (1893–1983), Anglican clergyman; leading exponent of ‘Christian Sociology’; vicar of St John-the-Divine, Richmond, Surrey, 1933–42: see Biographical Register.
1.DrEliot, Dr Martha May (TSE's cousin) Martha May Eliot (1891–1978), pediatrician: see Biographical Register.
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.
1.JamesJoyce, James Joyce (1882–1941), Irish novelist, playwright, poet; author of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916), Ulysses (1922), Finnegans Wake (1939).
7.WyndhamLewis, Wyndham Lewis (1882–1957), painter, novelist, philosopher, critic: see Biographical Register.
3.DonaldMacKinnon, Donald M. M. MacKinnon (1913–94), Scottish theologian and philosopher; Fellow and Tutor at Keble College, Oxford, 1937–47; Regius Professor of Moral Philosophy, University of Aberdeen, 1947–60; Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity, Cambridge, 1960–78. Works include A Study in Ethical Theory (1957) and The Problem of Metaphysics, Gifford Lectures (1974).
3.HopeMirrlees, Emily Lina ('Mappie', née Moncrieff) Mirrlees’s mother was Emily Lina Mirrlees, née Moncrieff (1862–1948) – known as ‘Mappie’ or ‘Mappy’ – see Biographical Register.
2.HopeMirrlees, Hope Mirrlees (1887–1978), British poet, novelist, translator and biographer, was to become a close friend of TSE: see Biographical Register.
1.MajMirrlees, Maj.-Gen. William Henry Buchanan ('Reay').-Gen. William Henry Buchanan ‘Reay’ Mirrlees, DSO, CB, MC (1892–1964), served in the Royal Artillery. He was the only son of William Julius and Emily Lina Mirrlees, brother of Hope Mirrlees.
3.Ezra PoundPound, Ezra (1885–1972), American poet and 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.
4.C. L. WoodWood, Charles, 2nd Viscount Halifax, 2nd Viscount Halifax (1839–1934), Anglo-Catholic ecumenist: President of the English Church Union, 1868–1919, 1927–34 – lived at Hickleton Hall, Doncaster, S. Yorkshire, where TSE visited him in Oct. 1927. TSE to his mother, 5 Oct. 1927: ‘He is a very saintly man – he is already over 89 – much older than you – but leads a very busy and active life’ (Letters 3, 736). Lord Halifax wrote on 27 Feb., ‘I have read your pamphlet with the greatest interest, &, if I may say so without the great impertinence, or presumption, think it quite admirable.’ (This letter was evidently not sent to EH.)
5.EdwardWood, Edward, 3rd Viscount Halifax (later 1st Earl of Halifax) Wood, 3rd Viscount and later 1st Earl of Halifax (1881–1959), distinguished Conservative politician; Viceroy of India, 1926–31; Foreign Secretary, 1938–40; British Ambassador in Washington, 1941–6. See Andrew Roberts, The Holy Fox: The Life of Lord Halifax (1991, 2019).