Charlotte Mew

by Penelope Fitzgerald

  I may add that I could never have finished this book without the help of John Lake and Maria Fitzgerald, Tina and Terence Dooley and my patient and understanding book editor, Richard Ollard.

  P.M.F.

  Notes and References

  ABBREVIATIONS

  AM Alida Monro

  CADS Mrs Catherine Amy Dawson Scott

  FH Florence Hardy

  HM Harold Monro

  MS May Sinclair

  SCC Sydney Cockerell

  CMCP Charlotte Mew: Collected Poems and Prose, edited by Val Warner, London and Manchester 1982.

  Davidow Charlotte Mew: Biography and Criticism (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Brown University, 1960.)

  Memoir Alida Monro’s Charlotte Mew: a Memoir, the preface to Collected Poems of Charlotte Mew, London 1953.

  NYPLB Bulletin of the New York Public Library.

  Berg Berg Collection of the New York Public Library.

  Buffalo The Lockwood Library, University of Buffalo. Texas Humanities Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin.

  MW Collection of Mrs Marjorie Watts.

  CHAPTER ONE

  ‘George and James went first …’ Their home and business address was 26 Surrey Square, Old Kent Road.

  ‘the great builder Thomas Cubitt …’ Cubitt was in charge of the work at Osborne 1844–6. The stucco façade, with other details, was criticized because Cubitt was only a tradesman, and not an architect.

  ‘Manning and Mew …’ Michael Prendergast Manning became an associate of the RIBA in 1866, and retired in 1902. His office was at 6 Mitre Court.

  ‘The New School of Design at Sheffield.’ Later the College of Art, Arundel Street. The drawing was exhibited in 1856.

  ‘his grand old father …’ Henry Kendall, 1776–1875. Charlotte Mew did not much care for her great-grandfather’s work, and used to deplore his convent for the Kilburn Sisters in Brondesbury.

  ‘Sir John Paul …’John Samuel Paul, 1849–1912.

  ‘Kendall’s Modern Architecture.’ (1846) In his Designs for Schools and Schoolhouses (1847) Kendall claimed to be able to build an ‘artistic and tasty village school’ for £300, cheaper still if the casements had wrought iron frames and the gargoyles and parapets were made in cement. He was, however, a serious student of historical styles and of the fitness of the materials used to the locality.

  ‘When Kendall drew up his will …’ on 13 May 1863 Kendall bequeathed the residue of his estate to his wife and Fred Mew jointly, on condition that the survivor should convert it into Government or real securities in England. Mrs Kendall was to get the income during her lifetime, and after her death the capital was to be divided between the surviving children.

  ‘Mrs Lewis Cubitt …’ Thomas Cubitt (1788–1855) and William Cubitt (1791–1863) split up their joint business in 1827. During the 1830s William worked with his brother Lewis. All the Cubitt undertakings were successful.

  ‘30 Doughty Street.’ Not 10 Doughty Street, as has often been stated. At the time of writing this house has been taken over by Camden Borough Council for restoration.

  ‘Oh! King who hast the key …’ Exspecto Resurrectionem (CMCP p. 28)

  ‘To us as children …’ An Old Servant (CMCP p. 401)

  ‘flung into the festooned disorder …’ An Old Servant (CMCP p. 403)

  ‘an essay of 1901 …’ Miss Bolt: A Study (CMCP p. 338) appeared in Temple Bar April 1901. A T/S in the British Library (Add MSS 57754) shows that Charlotte made alterations to disguise the real names and addresses. It includes several passages cut by Temple Bar’s editor.

  ‘Give a thing, and take a thing …’ Not in the published article,

  ‘Past the white points of the Needles …’ The Hay-Market (CMCP p. 408)

  ‘Tide be runnin’ …’ Sea Love (CMCP p. 34) first appeared in The Chapbook no 1, July 1919.

  ‘But on Sundays …’ Most of these details are from The Country Sunday (CMCP p. 370). Charlotte has altered some details – for example, the lace factory at Broadlands House, Barton, becomes a ‘rope factory’.

  ‘St Paul’s, Barton …’ A ‘Norman Style’ church built in 1845, less than a mile to the S.W. of Newfairlee Farm.

  ‘Line Upon Line, or a Second Series of the Earliest Religious Instruction the Infant Mind is Capable of Receiving, with verses illustrative of the subject, by the Author of The Peep of Day, London 1837.

  ‘In early years …’ An Old Servant (CMCP p. 405)

  ‘Saturday Markets …’ These were held at Whitsun and on three successive Saturdays before Michaelmas.

  ‘I remember one evening …’ The Trees Are Down (CMCP p. 48)

  ‘the picture of the Shining City …’ The detailed history of this picture is given in an article by F. W. Leakey, Baudelaire et Kendall, Revue de Littérature Comparée, 1956 no 1, pp. 53–63.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ‘Miss Bolt had warned …’ in another cancelled passage from Charlotte’s Miss Bolt (see note for p. 12). The only exceptions to the rule ‘what you’re made, that you will be’ were, it seems, female impersonators.

  ‘sheets of pathetically laboured manuscripts …’ An Old Servant (CMCP p. 402)

  ‘The Changeling.’ This poem (CMCP p. 13) first appeared in The Englishwoman, 17 Feb 1913, although the style seems earlier.

  ‘children of her acquaintance …’ (Information from Mrs Marjorie Watts.)

  ‘the headmistress, Miss Lucy Harrison …’ Most of the following details about her are from A Lover of Books: The Life and Literary Papers of Lucy Harrison by Amy Greener, London 1916.

  ‘Social Geography for Teachers and Infants’ by Lucy Harrison, London 1903. The passage quoted is on p. 93. In an earlier lesson (p. 12) the children are asked: ‘Why do we wear clothing? 1. For warmth. 2. To keep us from injury. 3. For ornament. 4. Because it is right.’

  ‘Catarina to Camoens’ from Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Poems 1844.

  ‘Left Behind’ (CMCP p. 57) was first published from the manuscript by Mary Davidow, 1960,

  ‘restless ghosts …’ Ces Plaisirs, Paris 1932, reissued Paris, 1941, as Les Purs et les Impurs, par Colette.

  CHAPTER THREE

  ‘It is a legend in my family …’ CM/CADS 1 March 1914. (MW)

  ‘‘Old Kendall had died …’ on 4 Jan 1875. He left effects valued at less than £100.

  ‘greatly assisted …’ The Builder vol 48 pp. 883–4.

  ‘“Sir,” wrote an unsuccessful competitor …’ Hampstead & Highgate Express, 6 May 1876.

  ‘that though the work …’ Hampstead & Highgate Express, 8 June 1877.

  ‘The Capital and Counties Bank …’ in Clare Street, Bristol. The bank is illustrated in The Builder, 12 Dec 1885.

  ‘Freda lived for another sixty years …’ She died on 1 March 1958, leaving effects valued at £1960. 9s.6d.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ‘On the Asylum Road and Ken …’ (CMCP p. 19 and 15)

  ‘the first editor to see Ken …’ (CM/HM 9 Feb 1916), quoted in Memoir p. XVII.

  ‘for a coffin …’ The Narrow Door (CMCP p.3)

  ‘the horse-trough is always there …’ The Hay-Market (CMCP p. 408)

  ‘If there were fifty heavens …’ Madeleine in Church (CMCP p. 25)

  ‘The Architectural Association …’ founded in 1847 to encourage original ideas and to help young architects to pass the RIBA exams.

  ‘a dignified but pathetic letter …’ The Builder, 6 Feb 1897, p. 128.

  ‘Anything that appears foggy …’ Fred Mew/Walter Barnes Mew, 4 Jan 1893, F. B. Adams Collection, quoted in Davidow.

  ‘the Royal Female School of Art …’ Founded in 1842, the School acquired premises at 43 Queen Square, Bloomsbury, and remained there until 1908 when it amalgamated with the Central School of Art. Fees were 15 guineas for 2 terms, half fees for artisans.

  ‘Please you, excuse me …’ A very early poem (CMCP p. 54), first printed after Charlotte’s death in The Rambling Sailor, 1929.

  ‘a bla
de of grass which dare not grow too high …’ A Country Book (CMCP p. 411)

  ‘The Outlook …’ The Outlook changed its name to The New Review in 1898, so Charlotte presumably sent in her article earlier than this.

  ‘It set my own heart beating …’ A Country Book (CMCP p. 411). This is an apparently unpublished essay on Richard Jefferies’ Field and Hedgerow, perhaps inspired by Edward Thomas’s Life and Work of Richard Jefferies, 1909.

  ‘Elsie Millard …’ Elsie exhibited landscapes and miniature portraits between 1893 and. 1916 at the Royal Academy, the Royal Hibernian Academy, and the Society of Women Artists.

  ‘a strange group of Goodman relatives …’ An Old Servant (CMCP p. 405)

  ‘A Wedding Day …’ This unpublished T/S was printed for the first time in CMCP (p. 216). The T/S is dated 1895.

  ‘yet another magazine …’ The preliminary announcement of The Yellow Book came out at the beginning of March 1894.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘John Lane …’ (1854–1925)

  ‘Henry Harland …’ (1861–1905)

  ‘St James’s, Spanish Place …’ The architect was George Goldie (1828–87). Charlotte, as the story implies, did not approve of his work.

  ‘hurrying-through-mean-streets stories …’ In vol 2 of The Yellow Book, where Passed appeared, Harland also printed Frederic Greenwood’s The Gospel of Content. Here the air is ‘thick with darkness and drizzling rain’ and the narrator hurries through the ‘squalid streets of King’s Cross’ to the rescue of a Russian nobleman who has been reduced to selling dolls’ hats made out of his starving children’s clothes.

  ‘Victoria Crosse …’ Her real name was Vivien Corey, and her Keynote (no 5 in Lane’s series) was The Woman Who Didn’t, written in reply to Grant Allen’s best-selling The Woman Who Did.

  ‘He wanted the story toned down …’ These details are from Henry Harland and CM letters in the F. B. Adams Collection, printed in Davidow.

  ‘the down-and-out Frederick Rolfe …’ Rolfe (‘Baron Corvo’) left Aberdeen in February 1894 and lived in London in a state of semi-starvation until the middle of 1895.

  CHAPTER SIX

  ‘It sounds like a regional play …’ It was broadcast in dramatized form on BBC Western Region, 12 Nov 1953.

  ‘Newlyn lights …’ CM/Mrs Hill 24 July 1913. (Buffalo.)

  ‘the run was cut short …’ The play was withdrawn on 9 May.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘Charlotte, taking charge …’ Her letters are in the F. B. Adams Collection and are printed in Davidow.

  ‘Mrs Clement Parsons …’ She was the sister-in-law of Alfred Parsons, the flower painter. In 1901 she published The Child At Home.

  ‘The Governess in Fiction’ (CMCP p. 335) appeared in The Academy on 12 August 1899. It was identified as Charlotte’s work by Mary Davidow.

  ‘Her fears began …’ Professor A. G. Tansley/S. C. Cockerell 27 June 1944. (Berg.)

  ‘In Nunhead Cemetery’ (CMCP p. 8). The last eight verses, which show the ‘gradual lapse into insanity’, were omitted in the Collected Poems published by Duckworth in 1953.

  ‘The essence, never the solution …’ Alida Monro’s note on Charlotte Mew in The Chapbook for June 1920 (A Bibliography of Contemporary Poetry with Notes on Some Contemporary Poets by a recorder.)

  ‘Kipling’s young chemist’s assistant …’ in Wireless (Traffics and Discoveries, 1908).

  ‘she danced the can-can …’ This story is told by Michael Holroyd in Unreceived Opinions p. 156 (New York 1967).

  ‘Ellen Mary …’ Ellen Mew, who took the name of Sister Mary Magdalen, was interviewed by Mary Davidow.

  ‘He was alive to me …’ Madeleine in Church (CMCP p. 28)

  ‘She could seem so gay …’ Memoir p. xiv.

  ‘Mary Kendall …’ In April 1904 Temple Bar printed an article describing the writer’s visit in 1901 to the Princess Mathilde Bonaparte ‘while staying with an aunt … who for years had been one of [her] most intimate friends’. The article is signed C.M., and Mary Davidow believed that it was by Charlotte, and that the aunt was Mary Kendall. This is almost certainly a mistake. Charlotte never signed herself CM. (though sometimes C.M.M.), and the ‘aunt’ is said in the article to live in Paris, whereas Mary Kendall lived at 29 Sillwood Road, Brighton. Apart from this, she was gravely ill in 1901. CMCP gives the article in an appendix, p. 439.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ‘I do care for money …’ This and the following quotations are taken from Ella D’Arcy’s letters to John Lane 1894–7, in the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, University of California.

  ‘a brutal portrait of me by Wilson Steer …’ This portrait had been exhibited in Brussels in 1893 and Lane had in fact printed it in The Yellow Book for July 1894 as ‘Portrait of a Lady.’ Cf. Bruce Laughton, Philip Wilson Steer, 1860–1942 (Oxford 1971). Catalogue no. 110.

  ‘This new wife …’ Annie Eichberg King. In 1924, she recommended André Maurois’ life of Shelley, Ariel, which Ella translated for John Lane. Ariel was reissued in 1925, 1935 and 1950, but Ella seems not to have benefited from its success.

  ‘My dear, I scarcely know where to begin …’ CM/Edith Oliver [undated] April 1902 (Buffalo)

  ‘Rooms …’ (CMCP p.38)

  ‘I remember rooms …’ (CMCP p.38). The T/S in BL Add MSS 57754 gives ‘wearing out of the heart’ instead of ‘slowing down’.

  ‘no record …’ Ella died in London, 5 Sept 1937, of ‘senile dementia’. Katherine Lyon Mix, the author of A Study in Yellow (Kansas City, 1960) writes to me: ‘I first met Ella when she came to London from Paris in 1930. I was rather shocked at her appearance for she had dyed her hair a dreadful red orange … Yet she was a bright and witty talker, with sharp comments about life.’ By the 1930s Ella had become embittered, and, as always, was chronically short of money. (Ella D’Arcy’s letters to Mrs Mix are in the library of Penn State College.)

  CHAPTER NINE

  ‘The Quiet House …’ (CMCP p. 17)

  ‘to me the most subjective of the lot …’ CM/Mrs Hill 4 Jan 1917. (Buffalo.) Mrs Hill was related by marriage to the Hill family, for whom Fred Mew had built Ivy Lodge, Hampstead, where Belsize Lane meets Haverstock Hill.

  ‘Gordon Street was, in fact …’ CM/Edith Oliver 27 June 1911. ‘The noise of Gordon Street seems 10,000 miles away.’ (Buffalo.)

  ‘Jane Elnswick …’ the name is given in Alida Monro’s draft for her memoir of Charlotte Mew, BL Add MSS 57755.

  ‘The Federation’s handbooks …’ The Report for 1914–15 advises a six-months’ training course for leaders, but there is no evidence that Charlotte did any training at all.

  ‘a good imitation …’ In A Fatal Fidelity (CMCP p. 201) Charlotte even tried to write in the style of W. W. Jacobs, whom she met at a tea-party early in 1914.

  ‘The heroine of his New Grub Street …’ in Chapters 5 and 7.

  ‘the last sentence of Wuthering Heights …’ In fact Mr Lockwood ‘wondered how anyone could imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth’.

  ‘Anglefield …’ This house has now been converted into flats.

  ‘Requiescat’ (CMCP p. 51)

  ‘Looking through some of Ella’s old letters …’ CM/CADS 12 May 1914. (MW.)

  ‘more typical lady tourist’s letters …’ CM/Edith Oliver June 1909. (Buffalo.)

  ‘Péri en mer …’ (CMCP p. 61)

  ‘she read his The Old Sceptic …’ CM/Edith Oliver 27 June 1911. (Buffalo.)

  ‘Religion is like music …’ Men and Trees II, CMCP p. 396)

  ‘This time they went to Boulogne …’ CM/Edith Oliver 27 June 1911. (Buffalo.)

  CHAPTER TEN

  ‘The Farmer’s Bride …’ (CMCP p. 1)

  ‘The change in metre …’ This has been compared with the change of metre in Hardy’s The Voice, but The Voice is one of the Poems of 1912–13, and was first published in Satires of Circumstance (1914).

  ‘The quality of emotion …’ CM/Mrs H
ill, 4 January 1917. (Buffalo.)

  ‘Charlotte once saw a woman …’ The Hay-Market (CMCP, pp. 409–10)

  ‘my idea of a rough countryman …’ CM/SCC 10 July 1918. (Berg.)

  ‘an Imp with brains …’ Mrs Dawson Scott’s diary for early 1913. These diaries were not strictly kept by the day.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  ‘She was entirely deluded …’ Herman Ould, Shuttle (London 1947) p. 322.

  ‘her first published work …’ Sappho appeared in 1889.

  ‘give a reading …’ All details about these readings are from Mrs Dawson Scott’s diaries for 1913. (MW.)

  ‘Evelyn Underhill …’ (1875–1941) was a lecturer on the philosophy of religion. Her book of poems, Immanence, was published in 1912, and her study, Practical Mysticism, in 1914.

  ‘Fame …’ (CMCP p. 2)

  ‘a first-class devil …’ CM/CADS 26 Dec 1913. (MW.)

  ‘you made me feel rather a vampire …’ CM/CADS 10 March 1914. (MW.)

  ‘I read next to no poetry …’ CM/CADS 3 Feb 1913. (MW.)

  ‘We only have about half-an-hour …’ Mrs Dawson Scott’s diaries for September 1913. (MW.)

  ‘sleeping stuff …’ CM/Mrs Hill 12 March 1913. (Buffalo.)

  ‘Frederic Whelen …’ Whelen/CM 25 April 1914. BL Add MSS 57755. Whelen was presenting his own successful ‘grotesque play’, The Lethal Hotel.

  ‘I have a studio At Home …’ CM/Mrs Hill 12 March 1913. (Buffalo.)

  ‘described in an article …’ Men and Trees 1 (CMCP p. 388)

  ‘a delightful girl of 14 …’ CM/Mrs Hill 12 March 1914. (Buffalo.)