But I tell you again, the crowd-work was the best we have done, and it certainly was pretty brutal. We had an excellent “shrieking harridan”, and the “Tyburn” stuff with Dysmas sounded more like Hogarth than I should have thought possible. Dr. Welch was quite shattered, poor dear! Said he hadn’t ever realised that the Crucifixion would have sounded like that, even though, in a sense, he knew it must have. (I don’t mean he wasn’t pleased – he was; but the fact is, we all succeeded in shocking ourselves.)
Golly! it was a strain. Poor Val at the end looked as if he’d been put through a wringer. And I was so exhausted that instead of trotting round to see Muriel as I’d promised, or going back to Witham, I fell into a taxi and returned to Shippie (with whom I was staying) and flung myself on the sofa in a state of coma! (I had warned Mac that I wasn’t returning, because I knew what it was going to be like.) All the actors were noble – there wasn’t one fluff or a mistake from beginning to end.
Meanwhile, I see that the Germans have just crucified fifty people in Jugo-Slavia – at least, they hung them up on posts to die, which is the same thing in all essentials. So there you are.
The Archbishop, it seems, didn’t agree with my Dysmas, but he was quite good and didn’t interfere. Dr. Welch said, maliciously, he was glad we’d upset his ideas about his “Three-Hours’ Devotion” sermons, that he’d been doing all his life! I said that if a man had been doing the Second Word in conventional lines all his life, he couldn’t possibly be pleased to have a new notion thrust on him at this time of day, but that I’d never been able to accept the moral interpretation, and had got to the point where I’d had to say: “Lord, I can make neither head nor tail of this – if you want it done, you’d better let me know what happened”: and that revelation had then come to me in my bath, and it seemed to me to be right, as also to you, when I communicated it to you in the grocer’s shop.…8
Well, dear, have a good term and come back at Christmas to pay us a nice long Eighteenth-Century visit.
I hope you’ll like the Resurrection play. It’s not as exciting as the others, but that isn’t really my fault altogether. The thing ends on a quiet note, and I think that is really right. But NINE supernatural appearances are a bit stiff, dramatically speaking – all in forty-five minutes!
Best love,
Dorothy
1 Marjorie Barber had missed hearing the eleventh play, “King of Sorrows”, through having to take a friend to hospital.
2 Benjamin Britten!
3 Robert Speaight.
4 See letter to Val Gielgud, 22 September 1942, note 2.
5 See letter to Val Gielgud, 22 September 1942, note 5.
6 Robert Adams had played the part of Balthazar in He That Should Come. See letter to the Editor, Glasgow Herald, 2 January 1939.
7 Arnold Ridley (1896–1984), producer, actor and playwright; he later played in Dad’s Army.
8 D. L. S. explains her interpretation of the words of Dysmas, the robber who says “Lord, remember me…” in her Notes on the play: “I have affronted all the preachers and commentators by making [these words] an act, not of faith, but of charity.” (Gollancz, p. 290.)
24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex
TO HER SON
22 September 1942
Dear John…
Sorry you find life so boring. Wars are, unfortunately, won by the side that (other things, such as armaments, being equal) best knows how to stand boredom and inconvenience. That is the real secret of the thing called “morale”. When one has seen two wars, one begins to know that. The English, on the whole, stand boredom and inconvenience rather well – always provided they are allowed to grumble when they feel like it. The great difficulty is to realise that by enduring boredom one is actually doing an important job of work. It is easier to feel that one’s work is important when it involves excitement – that’s why it’s such a problem to keep the U.S.A. and Canadian troops in good spirits – they are not used to “standing and waiting”, as we are.
By the way, I don’t think I do take a gloomy view of the war. I am inclined to take a gloomy view of the peace, largely because so many people have got it into their heads that it will somehow or other usher in the millennium. It won’t. Why should it? It will usher in a very hard, difficult, delicate, and strenuous period. It will require exactly the same qualities as the war, only more so. Which is all right if people make up their minds to it beforehand. But not if they are looking forward to a sort of Golden Age. There are too many people going about who think they can abolish human nature by disapproving of it, or passing Acts of Parliament about it. But they can’t. I only hope that before the War ends, they will have grasped this fundamental truth. If not, we are in for a bad time. I do think they are a bit nearer grasping it than they were in 1918.
Meanwhile, I’m glad you’re all set to make a job of this engineering business. It will be needed – the job, I mean. It’s frightfully important not to look on war as a sort of interruption to the business of life. It’s part of life, and the more one can take hold of it and do something with it the better.
I must now write letters to about twenty people, thanking them for the work they did in our last play. Bless their hearts, they did work, too! And of course my secretary is on holiday, so I shall have to toil through them with my own hand.
All the best,
Mother
I couldn’t write before because I was up in Town, and didn’t get your letter until last night.
[24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex]
TO DR JAMES WELCH
30 September 1942
Dear James,
I am sending along The Man Born to be King fan-mail for you to have a look at. I have destroyed some of the more abusive anonymous letters, including the postcard which began “You nasty old sour-puss” (I’m rather sorry I did that!), but I think most of the rest are here, with the possible exception of one or two letters from personal friends. I haven’t made any effort to sort them, but I am sending two or three sheets, on which we collected a few of the more interesting testimonies, about the effect on children and on people who have found the plays more stimulating than the conventional presentations of the story. I hope you may find them of some use.
By the way, as you have made no objection to the use of Mary Cleophas1 in the Emmaus story, I take it that it is o.k. by you and I shouldn’t think the Archbishop would have any serious objection if you have none. How about that confounded sailing boat?2 Will it do?
Yours ever,
[Dorothy]
1 In her Notes on the characters in play 12 D. L. S. says concerning Mary Cleophas: “The suggestion that she was the ‘other disciple’ in the Emmaus story comes from the Bishop of Ripon.” (The Rt Rev. Geoffrey Charles Lester Lunt.) See published version of the plays, p. 320.
2 In play 12, “The King Comes to his Own”, scene 3, ‘The Sea of Galilee’, the disciples, who are fishing, hear a voice from the shore telling them to cast the net on the right side of the boat. They tow in a full net.
Dr Welch replied on 14 October:
My nautical friend says that all the details about this sailing boat and the fishing are correct, except that he does not believe it would have been possible to tow ashore at the stern of the dinghy a catch of fish which it was impossible to haul on board the larger vessel. But I think we must blame the Gospel record and not D. L. S. for this!
The last play was broadcast on 18 October 1942. Mr B. E. Nicolls, Controller of Programmes, wrote as follows:
I feel I must seize the occasion of the final broadcast of your plays of the Life of Christ to write and make some attempt to express our gratitude to you for providing one of the great landmarks of broadcasting. I don’t know about the ranks of Tuscany1, as we have seen nothing and heard little of the protestants since the initial controversy, but I do know that everyone who has heard the plays has been genuinely convinced of their value from the religious poi
nt of view as well as of their place as a great broadcasting achievement. We all want to repeat the plays, and I very much hope that we shall be able to arrange to do so at satisfactory intervals somewhere between Christmas and Easter.
D. L. S. replied:
[24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex]
22 October 1942
Dear Mr Nicolls,
Thank you very much for your kind letter about The Man Born to be King. Let me hasten to say that I am deeply grateful to the B.B.C. for having entrusted me with this important and enthralling job of work. To do it was a delight as well as a great honour, and I am very glad to know that you were not dissatisfied with the work, and that it was well enough received by the listeners to justify this rather bold undertaking. And I am also full of gratitude for the encouragement and cooperation I received from the Corporation – from those “at the top” who sanctioned the production, as well as from the Religious and Dramatic Departments, with whom my relations were extraordinarily happy throughout.
The ranks of Tuscany, though perhaps forbearing to cheer, have mostly fallen silent. A few abusive letters still arrive, but the majority of them are anonymous – and one need not pay much attention to the opinion of anyone who hasn’t the courage to put his name to it. One of these letters arrived yesterday – apparently from Jesus Christ in person; but since he, too, omitted his signature, preferring to address me through an anonymous “prophetess”, I am inclined to believe that the communication cannot really have come from that exalted quarter – one in which courage, as a rule, was not lacking.
One thing that I thought very encouraging was that appreciative letters came from people of all ages and professions – septuagenarians and parents speaking for their young children, clergy of all denominations, school-teachers, and factory workers.
It is most good of you to send me such a generous gift of all the records. I shall prize them most deeply, as a memory of the happiest production with which I have ever been associated. You cannot think how I shall miss the broadcasts. And I do most tremendously appreciate the lavish generosity which gave us so free a hand as regards big casts and distinguished actors.
I do hope the repeat performance will go through all right.2 I am continually getting letters asking for a replay at a more convenient hour for adults, and I judge that there is a good public for it. And I think the series will be more impressive when the plays are given at closer intervals, so as to produce a cumulative effect – though it is just as well that we had a four-weeks’ interval between them in the first instance, otherwise we should have fallen dead with exhaustion!
Again thanking you very much,
Yours sincerely,
[Dorothy L. Sayers]
1 An echo of the lines from Macaulay’s “Horatius”, Lays of Ancient Rome, stanza 60: “And even the ranks of Tuscany Could scarce forbear to cheer.”
2 In 1943 a repeat, recorded performance of the original production was broadcast. The last five plays in a new production by Val Gielgud were re-broadcast during Passion Week in 1944, 1945 and 1946. In 1947 a totally new production, under Noel Iliff, was put in hand. A further production by Peter Watts was broadcast in 1951. This was followed by two more, in 1965 and 1975.
24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex
TO MARJORIE BARBER
26 October 1942
Dearest Bar,
Thank you so much for your letter. It is, as you say, “curious” to be done with The Man Born to be King – which has been a major, and increasing, preoccupation for exactly three years from the moment it was first suggested.1 But there is a sense of triumph at having actually got through to the end without interruption, internal row, or major catastrophe! We had a small party after the last show, at which I made an incoherent speech of thanks and presented Val with a stop-watch. This seemed an appropriate gift, since we had not only lived in mortal terror of the stop-watch all the way through, but had actually undermined and ruined the constitution of one of these instruments in the process! (At any rate, it gave up the ghost during rehearsal of the trial-scene, and passed out quietly.) And one of Val’s major causes of pride was that we had never, in fact, once over-run the time, despite many narrow squeaks. So he was pleased and Dr. Welch was pleased, and the company was pleased, and I was pleased, and an orgy of embraces was enjoyed by all.
I didn’t think there was anything very much wrong with the production last time – it may have been the set. Most of the cast were the same – Hermione Gingold was playing Magdalen again (you didn’t hear her in the Crucifixion), and there was a new Nicodemus – but I don’t think we’ve ever had the same Nicodemus twice! – and a new Philip; on the other hand, we had our original James back. And Mabel Constanduros2 was playing Mary Cleophas in place of Molly Rankin – but that wouldn’t affect you, because you didn’t hear the Crucifixion. All the other principals were the same – Jesus and John and Peter and Caiaphas and Matthew and Thomas and the Pilate family and Eunice, and, of course, the Evangelist. Did you recognise Henry Ainley as Gabriel?3 He was perfectly sweet – very much the old actor, lion-like, courteous and full of airs and graces, and many compliments flowed elegantly. We apologised for offering him so small a part, saying that we should not have dreamed of doing so, had it been anything less than an Archangel; to which he replied, (“the affable Archangel”) that the honour was his to be included in so beautiful and notable a production; and he clasped my hand in both of his, wishing me success in the traditional manner, and we all felt as though we had been laid away in lavender.
My Mrs. Rice (the daily woman) is intelligent. She told me that she and the children had listened to the plays and thought them beautiful. Her little girl (age not stated) had said at the Crucifixion: “Mummy, it’s very cruel”, and Mummy had said, “Well, you don’t realize – that’s how it was when they used to have public executions” – and off her own bat she made the connection with Tyburn and the way they did things in “those old days”. She said she found the whole story “hard to believe” – for which I didn’t blame her. She also said that she had never cared much for the New Testament – the Psalms and bits of the O.T. were so beautiful, weren’t they, madam, but the N.T. was rather dull and dry. (I don’t know if she used those words exactly, but I gathered she meant it was just straightforward narration of facts, without any purple passages of poetry.) But she liked the plays, which made it seem real and exciting. Also she said, “There was one thing I never liked about Him – He was meek; I don’t like people to be meek – I always felt, couldn’t He do something, stand up and fight for Himself? But the play (the Crucifixion) made me see that what He did was really braver, wasn’t it?” Apparently Baruch and the “shrieking harridan” got home all right. I’ve always thought that “gentle Jesus meek and mild”4 was a most disastrous hymn – one of the half-truths that are far more damaging than any open lie.…
Mac is distressed and aggrieved. He hoped to get some things shown at an exhibition of the National Artists’ something or other, and to be elected a member; but he and a lot of others were crowded out for lack of space on the walls. This has upset him quite a lot. He had done a big study of you – a variant of the one you had before – which he was very proud of. He was holding up sending it to you, in hopes that he could announce that it was being exhibited, and it was all a great disappointment. But I hope he has now sent, or is sending it.
My name is mud to-day. I had to speak yesterday at a W.E.A.5 one-day school at Maldon, and was an hour late for dinner. I can’t think how it happened, because the Chairman said: “Now, I faithfully promised to get Miss Sayers home by eight, so we must stop now”. So we stopped almost immediately, and came home with very little delay. I think he must have mistaken the time on his watch and thought it was 7.20 when it was actually 8.20. If so, I must have been more interesting than I thought! However, Mac would listen to no explanations and punished himself by refusing to eat his dinner – a kind of behav
iour which I think, and have always thought, quite silly. It was a good meeting, and the discussion was very lively; I rode all my old hobby-horses, and got in a good strong passage about the place of Women in the State, which was received with applause from the strong female contingent present.
Going back to the plays – one of the actors came up to me during rehearsal, just after we’d been doing the “my Lord and my God” bit,6 and said, “That’s the first time I’ve ever heard the Atonement explained – so as to mean anything, that is”. Which shows the advantage of putting things in words of one syllable, without technical theological terms, and linking them up to the action of the story. I admit that it’s not a complete explanation, but so long as one can persuade people that it has a meaning of some kind one does at least save the thing from appearing completely irrational. In the manner of my friend Mrs. Rice’s grand mamma, who, apparently, always told the children that one must just accept these things and not ask questions about them. “Whatever you do, Mrs. Rice”, said I, “never tell your children they mustn’t ask questions.” She assured me she would never dream of doing so. “Tell them,” said I, “that you don’t know, if you like, and that they must read books about it, or ask somebody who does know. But don’t give them the idea that the whole thing will fall to pieces if one starts asking questions.” The Church has suffered a good deal, I think, from the sinister figure of Mrs. Rice’s grand mamma. I see her, deeply reverent in black bombazine, standing protectively between the pushing interviewer and the frail and aged figure of God in a bath-chair. “Now, don’t you speak rough to Him – He’s very old and shaky, and I wouldn’t answer for the consequences.”…
The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers Vol II: 1937-1943: From Novelist to Playwright Page 48
