So I Have Thought of You
Page 32
25 Almeric Road, sw11
22 June [1978]
This is just about Friday. We’re looking forward so much to seeing you, it is just my daughter and son-in-law who wd. so much like to meet you – you won’t mind this I know – the 49 is still the bus and overleaf is the place but not as recognisable as I should like – the 49 stops at Arding and Hobbs, the Mecca of South London, and if you could get out at the next request stop, quite soon after, in St John’s Rd, and walk on a bit, then turn left up Battersea Rise, and Almeric Road is first on right – at the bottom is a notice board of the Tulipean Brethren, a religious sect – don’t go in there – we are 25 with a laurel hedge – P
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
21 October [1978]
Dear Francis,
This is just to tell you, as the university entrance exams come in sight, what a marvellous help your book has been to the Forster specialists – I know you didn’t write it for their sake but it is just right for these bright students, they like something summed up with the expert touch. – I can assure you that it’s appreciated.
Joy Vines told me that she’d been to see you, but I wonder if Val Warner did – but she’s a poet and there’s no way of reckoning her comings and goings.
I put an ad. in the TLS for information about LPH, more to clear the ground than anything else, and was rather surprised at the number of replies I got. Drink was naturally referred to, but tactfully.
No answer to this needed – it was really just to congratulate on the Forster (see above) –
best wishes,
Penelope
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
3 November 1978
Dear Francis,
Thankyou so much for your kind letter, which I found very encouraging. How you manage to keep so cheerful, and also so generous to other writers, after so much experience in the literary world, I don’t know, as after 3 years of it I find it most harassing and puzzling. I was very pleased about the shortlist,* but couldn’t really believe it, and I thought Colin must have made a mistake, only it’s not the sort of mistake he makes. He tells me the winner doesn’t need the money (though it’s hard for me to imagine anyone who doesn’t need £10,000) and he’d asked whether all the runners up couldn’t have something, like the Miss World contest (£200 and a package holiday in Bulgaria &c) but the organisers were adamant. However I can honestly say I don’t mind this at all, and am delighted to be there with such a simple story.
I’m going along very slowly with LPH, and saving up to go to Venice to see Princess Clary (Aspern Papers again!) – Norah writes to say she had 3 champions this year from one litter, which doesn’t help me, but she is so nice. – I am sure Mary Wellesley is misty and forgetful rather than anything else: she wouldn’t see me because she said I was her ‘rival’, which is absurd, but she wrote again later, and if ever I get to the starting point I’m going to see if she won’t write something for me on LPH and the river, because she went out in the various boats more than anyone else.
Joy Vines came round the other day – she was full of energy, had written to Robert Liddell, was going to see the publican who served E. Taylor* with her gin and lime every day &c (I may have got the details wrong). On the whole, I think biographers are madder than novelists.
I do hope you’re better now. Illnesses contracted in Spain or even Catalonia are worse than any others and last longer, so you have to leave plenty of time for recovery,
best wishes,
Penelope
[postcard]
24 November [1978]
You were quite right about the Booker dinner of course only I enjoyed it because I hardly ever go to such things – we had to file up just like the school prize-giving – Colin gave his ticket to Anna and couldn’t get another one and was sadly missed – I couldn’t cheer Anna up, Caroline Blackwood also sunk in gloom, no wonder of course – I really wrote to say (what you certainly know already) that it was nice to hear the applause when The Trial was mentioned – best wishes Penelope
29 December [1978]
Please may I keep the LPH book a little longer? I expect you’ve been too busy to remember about it, but anyway, may I?
For some reason I don’t much like the idea of 1979 and expect worries of all kinds, but very best wishes and I hope you somehow get your necessary 6 months peace – Penelope
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
19 January [c.1979]
Dear Francis,
Thankyou so much for lending me this, and once again apologies for keeping it so long. It is very worthy and painstaking, though it’s a bit disconcerting to find Leslie’s novels all treated exactly the same, like Judgment Day – but Jones is a ‘theme’ man, I suppose, and that’s how he does it. And I can’t get used to U.S. academic language, I just can’t – it seems to get more and more distant from English – and yet he’s employed at the National Endowment for the Humanities and is a ‘frequent discussant for theatrical productions’ (as you are too, in a way, I suppose).
I did just write to him to point out that The Hireling couldn’t possibly be about Charlie, who died 2 years later, not earlier, than Leadbitter – the original was the proprietor of Jack’s Car Hire in Brixton, I think.
I keep getting more material, and strange suggestions – I’ve just had a letter from Haifa to tell me that old Mr Hartley’s name was ‘really’ Hertz, but he changed it. Supposing it was? I’ll have to ask Paul Bloomfield, he is kind and I hope won’t be offended.
I’ve followed the advice you kindly gave me (after all it’s not much use asking for advice if you don’t take it) and changed publishers, I went to Collins who were very welcoming but said they’d have to have a T/S by mid-January to get it on the autumn list, so I had to sit down and write a novel and, worse still, type it although all the family type-writers are out of alignment after heavy duty on physiology theses &c. – and this is the real reason why I’ve taken so long reading your L. P. Hartley. I’m sure Colin will be glad to get rid of me, I’m only causing embarrassment there, for some reason.
Please may I say how much I enjoy your theatre column, when I can get it, it’s a real guide to what is worth seeing – I thought you were a little hard on Michael Bryant, I was struck by the way he held the whole theatre silent in Double Dealer although he was speaking in lower than mezza voce – ‘But that’s not it’ – Still I’m sure all your correspondents want to alter something you’ve said, we can’t help it – best wishes Penelope
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
2 March [c.1979]
Dear Francis,
I’m afraid it’s another LPH enquiry, but I’m hoping that you’ll help me once again – my LPH situation has got better and worse, (in a way) as Anthony Powell, whom I went to see, rang up Lord David, out of pure kindness of heart, and told him to come off it, as Leslie’s biography was sure to be written some time. Now Lord D. writes to say he has ‘withdrawn his objections’ and is at my disposal, as he puts it, meaning that I’m at his, as I’ll have to write what he says, and how to get round this I can’t think – meanwhile I haven’t heard from Norah for a while, and I fear she may be distressed by the frightful accusations of
[incomplete]
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
13 April [c.1979]
Dear Francis –
Thankyou so much for giving me the Bewleys’ address. David B. very kindly told me that he had sold the letters through Bertram Rota, & I’m trying to trace where they went to, as Rex L. is a valuable witness, having been at Oxford with Leslie. I’m sorry he didn’t think life worth going on with.
It was very kind of you, too, to say a word for me to the BBC, and although I can see from the producer’s suggestion of ‘coming to have a talk with you’ that he has no intention of paying anything – (I used to work at BH and I remember the desperation of getting to the end of the month and having to produce pr
ogrammes without any money) still it’s a great help to me to be identified as the LPH biographer and it was very good of you.
He added that Bookshelf was ‘for the kind of audience that is likely to be at home on Saturday afternoons’ – my heart bled for him. He also asked me where he could find ‘memorabilia’ of Leslie. I thought silently of the poor Radfords and their cherished bathmat ‘which Mr Hartley stepped on so often’. Apparently they’re going to ask Norah if they can go and look at the ‘memorabilia’ at Fletton Tower but I refuse to be responsible for this.
I’ve had a delightful, but cautious letter from Frank Magro at Montegufoni about his recollections of Leslie. I didn’t realise that he (LPH) was Osbert Sitwell’s trustee – trustee for what? – I didn’t know he had so much business sense, but I suppose he must have done or he couldn’t have managed all those PEN committees – Magro tells me that he had to be quite sure there was a bible at Leslie’s bedside ‘whenever he was Sir Osbert’s guest’ – his tone is half way between a steward and a naval petty officer – he’s a very interesting person.
I miss Colin* very much, he was so clever, and always knew what you were going to say before you said it, so it wasn’t necessary to finish the sentence – a family characteristic, perhaps? – he was also so persuasive that after half an hour on the telephone I was almost persuaded I had been in the wrong – e pur si muove – or rather he certainly did tell me to move on, and I was somewhat disappointed as I thought I could write a rather better novel next time – but I suppose everyone always thinks this! However, he’s quite certainly forgotten about the whole matter by now, he has a most enviable ability to do this, necessary, as he told me, if you’re an optimist married to a pessimist. – If I really get anywhere near finishing LPH I shall have to ask him if he still wants the book, and brace myself for a possible cutting reply, or none at all. – I still have to see a number of people, including Derek Hill, who flits about rather, and Ralph Ricketts, who tells me he has another 100 letters, not to speak of Lord D.
I can’t imagine why I’m going to Texas, I hate hot weather and it is just getting so nice here, and my grapefruit tree has come into flower –
I can’t agree about the Tempest but I was very interested in your notice of Pericles – and yet I don’t know that it ought to be done on a bare stage – surely it was a great relief for Sh. to have stage effects, trick scenery &c, at last in the late plays – you can’t grudge him those at the end of such a career –
best wishes
Penelope
I hope that you’ll do what you say and start a new novel, no matter what.
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
29 April [c.1979]
Dear Francis,
Thankyou very much for your letter – it was nice to hear your voice on Bookshelf which the children put on tape for me. Frank Delaney is a real Tipperary boy, of a good catholic family as he didn’t need to tell me, and I’m sure will get on well in life and cause much pride at home, but as to his devotion to Anglo-Irish novelists – well, I can’t feel that he really understands The Real Charlotte. – I couldn’t approve of the way he cut the programme (but then of course no-one ever does) leaving in scarcely anything about the novels themselves and nothing about Leslie’s sympathy and kindness, that nice story you told in the RadioT., for instance, about the carpet-slippers – however I’ve had a letter from Norah since, offering to take me to see Leslie’s mysterious farming cousin, that he lent the money to, and she made no complaints, and indeed didn’t mention the programme at all – someone who did was Ralph Ricketts, who was at Leslie’s deathbed, but I’ve written to him diplomatically (I hope). I felt you talked so well and gave the programme authority.
If you go to Italy this year I am sure Frank Magro would be delighted if you called, his one ambition is to talk to literary people, to have the opportunity to ‘converse on many matters’ as he calls it – I understand that he is not popular in the village and must lead a lonely life in the castello.
What a business it all is, I feel on the verge of giving up on LPH and starting on Shakespeare – there’s something to do there, the Stratford man obviously being the wrong one. – Lord David writes, too, that his memory is failing him, and Hamish Hamilton that his correspondence is in a dusty warehouse, but they’ll both have to make an effort, in the cause of literature. I’m looking forward very much to your lecture, and I certainly shan’t ask any questions –
best wishes
Penelope
I really enjoyed myself in Texas, and what a collection! Vast reserves of everything – even Constantine Fitzgibbons’ telephone bills are there.
17 June [1979]
Dear Francis –
This is just to congratulate you on what must surely be a recognition* not only of your public career, so to speak, as a poet, novelist, organiser and president, but of all the groundwork you must have done, things people say must and ought to be done, but are strangely unwilling to undertake themselves. – I don’t suppose there are any honours for listening and giving good advice, otherwise they might be added in too.
Congratulations and best wishes for your Brazilian tour – Penelope
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
29 October [1979]
My dear Francis –
I was just going to write to you anyway, on the subject of the continuing saga of LPH, which you’ve so kindly listened to through the years, but first of all thankyou very much for your congratulations,* I do value them. In the stories I used to read when I was a little girl cabhorses used to win the National and everyone seemed to cheer, but you can’t expect this in real life, and I know I was an outsider – however Asa Briggs explained to me that they’d ruled out novels evidently written with one eye on the film rights as they’d been looking for le roman pur, and I (naturally) agreed with him. – When I got to the Book Programme, soaking wet because I’d had to be photographed on a bale of rope on the Embankment, R. Robinson** was in a very bad temper and complained to his programme executive ‘who are these people, you promised me they were going to be the losers’. – I couldn’t help enjoying the dinner, though the Evening Standard man told me frankly that they’d all written their pieces about Naipaul and felt they were free to get drunk, wh: he certainly was; I did notice the Spectator man, but thought he was perhaps dead. Even so I had a lot of happy moments, and the best was when the editor of the Financial Times, who was at my table, looked at the cheque and said to the Booker McC Chairman ‘Hmph, I see you’ve changed your chief cashier.’ Both their faces were alight with interest. – I’m afraid Booker McC rather wish they’d decided to patronise show-jumping, or snooker – the novelists are so difficult and odd, not appreciating their surprise announcements and little treats.
I worked really hard this year on LPH, but I’m going forward and backward at the same time, as I know I’ll never be allowed to publish – Norah has now won her law case against the mysterious claimant, is in splendid form and has celebrated by extending the kennels and breeding numerous more setters, also by writing fierce letters to Frank Delaney (the Bookshelf man, who’s now reappeared as literary critic of the Universe; he tells me I deserved to win because my book was free of objectionable matter and suitable for family reading). She’s also offered to drive me across the fens to see Leslie’s paralysed cousin; who lives in a lonely farmhouse – the one Leslie lent the money to. But I know she won’t at all like what I want to say, even though I did love Leslie, and am suitable for family reading.
It’s the shades of snobbery and affection that interest me. Jimmy Smith (at tea on his lawn in Cadogan Lane) said ‘but you can’t mean that Leslie was a snob – why, he was accepted immediately’. He doesn’t seem to see the force of that word ‘accepted’, nice as he is. And then Lord D. insists that Leslie’s life was completely happy. He added that his life was completely happy, and that he can’t remember ever being unhappy. I asked him whether LPH wasn’t heartbroken when he
got married and he said, well he did seem upset, but I asked him to be best man – as though that made up for it! But he’d never seen Leslie unhappy, he repeated. I said, has it struck you that Leslie was happy when you were there, and not when you weren’t, like sunshine and shadow? Lord D. looked rather taken aback. I don’t know how he can sit there under his portraits by Aug. John, &c, of himself as a pastorally handsome young man. – I couldn’t get a look at his letters, he kept putting them back in the desk. ‘nothing, just literary matters’. As a matter of fact, they quite likely were, I think. LPH certainly wanted to marry Lord D’s cousin Mollie Berwick, that does seem clear, but what a time it all takes.
The Cecils were the only people I’ve ever known who have toast at tea in a toast-rack. Perhaps aristocratic.
You’ll be relieved that I’ve got to the end of this piece of paper. – Thankyou so much for telling me about Anne Wignall, indeed I’d love to meet her. But I expect to go down to the grave without bringing this book out. It’s just a kind of feeble obstinacy that keeps me going on. ‘Call it going, call it on’ as Beckett says. Meanwhile Collins declare that they must have another novel and it ought to be longer, although I was trained at Duckworths to write short ones. But I deeply believe that ‘less is more’. I like Daisy Miller better than Wings of a Dove and even Master and Man better than War and Peace. Now I really have got to the end – best wishes Penelope
I just must add one more thing – I managed at last to get into Hamish Hamiltons – HH of course was very suave and charming but I also went through Leslie’s files, and couldn’t resist having a look at one or two other ones and when I saw what publishers really think about their authors, and their staff memos, I wondered if it was really worth going on.
25 Almeric Road
London, sw11
2 February 1980
My dear Francis – Thankyou so much for forwarding Anne Wignall’s letter, and indeed for continuing to help me with the LPH biography, which seems to go on forever, and in a sense gets more difficult, because even after walking all over the Brickfields with Norah (and with a curious feeling of how easy it would be to shove somebody or be shoved into one of the ruined furnaces, now all overgrown with brushwood, and never be heard of again) I still can’t tell how much she knows or guesses about Leslie – and I’m so fond of her. – But it would be a great relief, apart from any thing else, to get back to the general list, I don’t think I’m tough enough to make a novelist really. – I have written to Anne Wignall of course and hope to go down there in the spring, bearing in mind your warnings. The trouble is that I’ve got no grand connections at all; Hamish Hamilton kept saying ‘You’ll be related to the Knight of Kerry’ and even ‘surely you must be related to the Knight of Kerry’ but I’m not –