[22 Paradise Rd., Northampton, Mass.]
Letter 115.
I am writing on Sunday, as I have to go to town a day earlier this week; the intimations from one of my remaining teeth sent me to the dentist on Friday, to be x-rayed, and I go to him again tomorrow to find whether it means another subtraction. Otherwise I have been quite well, but if you do not hear from me for several weeks it will mean that I have mumps! I hope not, as it is an unpleasant minor ailment for an adult, and as I have so much to do: myClassical AssociationPresidential Address for;a4 address to the Classical Association would have to be read for me, and another task which I was to undertake directly after that, and which, being of a semi-official nature, I cannot talk about until afterwards, will have to be abandoned. TheFaber, Ann;a7 culprit is Anne [sc. Ann] Faber, who was back from Oxford this week, and who complained of a swollen gland on Friday morning: it was not much of a swelling, and her temperature was normal, but I was in a car with her for a few minutes and walked down the street as her dentist is not far from mine. If this does happen, I shall try to get put into a nursing home; but I hope it won’t, and in the latter event you may get a mysterious cable ‘Re letter 22nd All Well’!
Your letter of the 13th February arrived at the beginning of the week and that of the 25th before I returned. IHale, Emilywritings;x4a note for S. P. C. A.;a7 congratulate you on the note in the local paper on the S.P.C.A.1 and hope that it impressed the college authorities. But I do hope that you can cut down some of these activities, especially the club for which you talk on French Migrations in the Middle West – however well you do it, and I am sure it will be well done, it is (as you rather admit) an obvious waste of your time and energy. The talk on Voice and Speech I do not disapprove. You should not, by the way, have sent me the cutting, or any cutting you want back, because you will have to wait for the end of the war to get it: we are not allowed to include printed matter in letters; and books have to be sent only by people holding licences to do so, such as publishers and most booksellers.
YourSecond World Warand America's response;b8 letters contained a deal of information – it is interesting incidentally to learn that you have daylight-saving time too, and have had also to get up in the dark: you will notice it more than we, both because it is new, and because in America people start earlier in the morning anyway. That time has now passed, and I am able to go to church in full daylight: in the winter it is just twilight as one is walking back. IFlanagan, Hallietaken on by Smith;b1 hopeSmith Collegeappoints Hallie Flanagan;c5 that Mrs. Flanagan will be satisfactory: myVassar Collegeand Hallie Flanagan's role at;a6 suspicion was that the effect on Vassar was that they made for too much of drama, to the possible detriment of other studies: 2 I believe that dramatic activities at that age out [sc. ought] to be undertaken (in moderation) outside of the regular work – the voice and speech training is quite another matter. I should not have thought her qualified to undertake a wider post, such as that of Dean. But the chief question is that you should find her easy to get on with.
I suppose that you are now nearing the end of the vacation, and return before Easter. I intend to take next week off for writing, (I have come to the end of that airmail paper) andde la Mares, thegive TSE wartime refuge;a6 go to the De la Mares the following week.
IHoellering, George M.pitches for Murder film rights;a1 haveMurder in the CathedralHoellering film;g1Hoellering's vision for;a2 been having conversations with a very intelligent film producer, a very intelligent Austrian refugee named Hoellering (not Jewish but Catholic) who wants to film Murder in the Cathedral. TheAmericaHollywood;e8TSE trusts Murder will be safe from;a4 project repelled me at first; but his ideas are very good, he shows real taste, and has no Hollywood tendencies at all. At least I felt that it was not right to turn the thing down without further examination. He would not introduce any text but my own words, but he wants a small sub-plot of humble folk – which is indeed something that I have always felt the play itself needed. But nothing can happen for some time to come, as I shall not have time to attend to it until some time in May, if then. I don’t believe that the idea will appeal to you: anyway, the scheme may prove too big for his resources, and too difficult to execute in these times.
Since I started this letter I have slipped out to consult the local doctor, and he says that mumps incubates for three weeks, and that it is extremely unlikely that I have caught them!
I shall think at Easter, that I have never yet been in your company either then or at Christmas.
1.Note not located.
2.Hallie Flanagan, who produced TSE’s Sweeney Agonistes at Vassar College (where she worked as a professor and directed the Experimental Theater, 1925–42), was to serve as Dean and Chair of the Drama Department at Smith College from 1942 until her retirement in 1955.
AnnFaber, Ann Faber (1922–78) was born and registered in Hampshire: her mother would teasingly refer to her as a ‘Hampshire hog’. She was a boarder at Downe House School, Berkshire, and read history at Somerville College, Oxford (where she became engaged to Alan Watt, who was to be killed at El Alamein). After Oxford, she spent time with the Wrens in Liverpool. Following her military service Ann was employed as secretary by the classical scholar Gilbert Murray in Oxford. She then moved to London where she worked for the family firm in editorial and publicity, as well as writing and publishing a novel of her own, The Imago. However, in Aug. 1952 she suffered a life-changing accident when she crashed her motorcycle, which resulted in the loss of the use of her left arm. (In the mid-1960s she was still doing a little freelance work for Faber, reading manuscripts for Charles Monteith and – in 1967 – arranging a lunch party at her home for the science fiction writers James Blish and Brian Aldiss and their wives.) In Apr. 1958 she married John Corlett, who had two children – Anthony and Brione – from his first marriage, which had ended in divorce. Ann and John did not have children of their own. In the early to mid-1960s Ann and John spent some weeks or months of most years in the West Indies. John had launched and Ann helped with a business called Inter-Continental Air Guides: their firm sold advertising space to hotels and other tourist destinations for inclusion in guidebooks which Ann compiled. In 1966 Ann and John moved from their flat in Highgate to Wiltshire. In the late 1960s or early 1970s John contracted polio while on a work trip to Hong Kong. He became a paraplegic and for the remainder of Ann’s life she was his primary carer, with financial assistance from her mother. During all the years that she had her own property, whether in London or in Wiltshire, Ann’s great love was her garden. Ann died of cancer in March 1978. John survived her by two or three years.
5.The directorFlanagan, Hallie Hallie Flanagan (1890–1969), a Professor at Vassar College, was planning to produce Sweeney Agonistes at the Experimental Theater that she had founded at Vassar.
3.GeorgeHoellering, George M. M. Hoellering (1898–1980), Austrian-born filmmaker and cinema manager: see Biographical Register.