Ever, Dirk: The Bogarde Letters

by Unknown

  This trip it was a comforting tin of Baxters and a certain amount of Scotch. Could’nt have been happier. Apart from those fucking choirs, Holy Night, White Christmas and Jungle Bells. God!

  I suddenly discover that I have used up my last piece of typing paper, so I’ll clear off and mail this, hope springs eternal with me .. and buy a quire or whatever it is I need. I’m in the middle of a book and it’s got to be In House by March.

  Happy, constructive, brave, New Year … be sensible about yourself, you deserve you. Enjoy it a bit. Could’nt you?

  Ever

  Dirk

  XXXX

  The interview for Channel 4, Dirk Bogarde – By Myself, was transmitted in two hour-long episodes on 11 and 18 January.

  To Gareth Van den Bogaerde Cadogan Gardens

  23 January 1992

  My dear Gareth –

  I am typing this for only one reason: that you should be able to read it and not try to decipher my hideious handwriting, made far worse than usual after replying to a great pile of mail.

  Your letter has given me such infinate pleasure, it would be difficult for you perhaps to understand.

  I am always aware, and terrified, that when I appear on TV or even the Radio, I shall offend someone. I see The Family wincing in distress and saying helplessly, ‘Why did he have to say that?’ … so it was with great trepidation that I accepted, as a final performance, the TV thing I have so recently done. Well: it was shot in August, but shown last week.

  I insisted that it would be done entirely by myself … hence the title .. that there would be no questions, only guide-words like ‘Losey’ or ‘Dearden’ or ‘Lead into Forwood’, that sort of thing. So in fact I would be doing a sort of A.J.P. Taylor lecture. Did you ever see him? Historian, splendid, never used a script or referred to a note. It IS possible .. and because you are in complete control you know there wont be a left-fielder suddenly, like Parkinson, Wogan, (I refuse to even read his letters!) or poor old Russel Harty and the rest. I insisted on vetting all the footage (five hours of film) and made only two modest cuts. They agreed, and I think they realise that you can do an interview without an Interviewer nodding his head in a close-up! Anyway; it was done, and thank you for your generosity.

  As far as I am concerned thats it. No more to be said now. Not quite sure what happens to the remaining three hours. Interesting point.

  And thank you for your sweetness about the Knighthood. All nonsense I suppose, but people in the street seem to like it. I tried, very hard, to get out of it, [w]as councilled to ‘think it over for three days and give a favourable answer on Monday by 10 am.’ I had a pretty bloody week-end. No one to talk to. One is forbidden to even speak of it .. to wife, husband, parent .. anyone. And then I finally thought, the hell with it. There is only one other Knight of the Cinema and thats Chaplin.1 So I said yes. And was ill with terror for two long months .. more. However the worst is still to come: I shall enjoy it only because it is giving Lu such inordinate joy! And Lally keeps half a bottle of sherry by the TV to celebrate! God knows what. Never mind. Daddy would have been amused. He made me promise, faithfully, that I would never accept a political award, or purchase one, or one for a charitable business. I promised. And I dont think that I have broken the promise because this was offered for my service to the Cinema and also, which is rather nice, for being a good ambassador for my country while abroad! Odd that. But I did my best I admit. Especially after Heysell1 and one or two other bits like the Falklands.…

  [ … ] I am so grateful for your good wishes: I am glad that you are happy about it. I’m getting used to it now. It is good that I never changed my name to Niven! Can you imagine NOT being a Bogaerde?

  Always my love, & my admiration – your devoted brother –

  Dirk

  To Patricia Kavanagh Cadogan Gardens

  24 January 1992

  Patricia dear –

  Here is the first part (I anticipate only two) of ‘GREAT MEADOW’. Much of which you have read before2 .. but it has been tidied up and I made a few changes here and there.

  I did, I think, tell you once that it was a bit like eating four melted Mars Bars all at once. And you, with inordinant wit and perspecacity, (? SP for both) said that ‘some people like that Dirk’. So now you can have a belter yourself.

  There can be illustrations .. I can do some .. my Pa has done a very pretty (thats the word. He was a rather ‘pretty’ painter in the ’30s) view in oils of Great Meadow .. and it would make a splendid cover if anyone wanted it.

  But perhaps no one will. I still have the feeling, inspite of your good lady who reads for Kiddies that it was too sophisticated, that it would be a good kids book. Roald made a killing by talking about bodily functions and so on. Maybe not. But for the vast majority of my readers who read to each other in bed with the cocoa or by the fireside with a modest glass of Dry Fly Sherry this sort of thing is, alas, what they really like. I know from the response to the first book and from anything that I write for the Telegraph which has the least link with ‘then’. The mail after ‘A Night To Remember’3 STILL arrives. I think we all survived after Arnhem! Amazing …

  Anyway .. this is it. I start Part 2 tomorrow (Saturday). Unless you cry ‘Halt!’ Then [sic] I shall carry on.

  Love – Dirk

  To Harold Pinter Cadogan Gardens

  30 January 1992

  Harold –

  Very much to my astonishment we finished the recording1 yesterday at, exactly, 13.32 .. give or take a second.

  I cant imagine what it sounds like: how we played it.

  You will be the judge.

  This, really, simply to thank you for such a wonderous part .. I did not, as I told you, see J.G .. and did not have his ‘voice in my ear’ so perhaps it is not what you would have wished.

  All I know is that I was ravished by such words.

  Each was like savouring one pure spoon of caviar.

  By that I mean no onion, egg, tabasco, tra la la .. simple, joyous words.

  It was the first time for me to play such a part. Once I came near perfection (word-wise) with D. Mercer and Resnais .. but with this it WAS total joy. Never played a ‘Spooner’ before, and probably I never will. So, simply, Ta.

  I forgot to tell you: Jimmy Wax2 and I ‘Passed Out’ together at Sandhurst. Side by side we were; marching up the white steps of that extraordinary building behind a Royal on a white horse, which, just as Jimmy and I (heading the line) reached the top step deficated grandly.

  He was a dear friend, and remained so … seemed oddly fitting to be working on his dedication.

  With tremendous admiration –

  & love

  Dirk

  To Penelope Mortimer Cadogan Gardens

  5 February 1992

  Penelope –

  Well then. I simply dont know what you do about the Pinter Piece.3 Rather difficult […] But he is a difficult fellow, I mean, he has altered so much as a person since I knew him in the early sixties.

  But then I suppose we are all different? He just seems differenter.

  I did my stint in that hideious basement in Portland Place .. no air, wrenched my pectoral (dont laugh) by pulling open those sodding bronze doors, and in consequence was in great pain for the whole recording and am only now JUST able to reach to the colander.

  Well: you dont know where that is. No matter. It hurts. And I am told it must be rested. Thankfully I no longer mastubate.

  But Harold came to the First Reading. We all, of course, read as if we were reading the words of ‘Nearer My God To Thee’ on that ship.

  But he seemed jolly enough; replaced three commas and one adverb.

  Important, as it turned out, and mis-typed by a lady at the BBC.

  To my terror I am bidden to dine with him and Antonia (!) and some ‘extremely amusing woman you will like’ at a restuarant he’ll tell me of later in this week. Oh well […]

  But, yes, I am occupied. In buying my sister frocks and gloves and hat and ther
mals (what if it’s snowing?) for the dubbing-caper on the 13 … and arranging lunch and supper and all the tra la la that seems to be part and parcle of this Family Treat. No treat for me, I assure you, And I am wearing a simple black frock and a decent plain tie and thats IT. No top-hat and spangles. I only wear costume in costume parts.

  I THINK my present opus has been accepted by Viking for Christmas. I want it for a stocking-filler. I reckon I’ll make a bit of loot from it because it is so yuckky and full of ‘nostalgia’ and Virol and paraffin lamps and all that to-do. We’ll see. I think the Blue-Rinses will heave with horror at ‘JERICHO’ … all that bondage … so this will get me back onto an even keel.

  [ … ] I am glad that your new Agent seems sensible. Mine is. But reasonable, which is not always wise with giants like Viking. But I do NOT complain over much.

  Now piss off, girl. I must get back to the ‘Thank You For Your Very Kind Letter’ bit. Thousands (it seems) since the K.C.B or whatever it is.1 By the way, your mammoth plant, cut to the ground as you saw, is a mass of little green shoots. I’m in for trouble it would seem.

  And did you know? We gain three minutes light every evening!

  Wow!

  Love D XXX

  To Hélène Bordes Cadogan Gardens

  22 February 1992

  Chere Planche –

  Your letter came today, and I write immediatly to say how relieved I am that ‘JERICHO’ was acceptable.

  NOT an easy story for my elderly readers! They will be very shocked I fear, but AIDS, or SIDA, is still almost un-mentionable in this country and I decided that no one had written a Detective Story about it, so I would!

  My Doctor, who advised me medically, was very curious to know about the ‘ugly’ side of life. I told him that I really did’nt know a thing about it!! I had never been into a Club like the Poisson, and as you will see, I did not describe it because I can not!

  All imagination, and, naturally, reading the newspapers … but otherwise it is all faux. As faux as Bagremon, Sur-Yves! WHERE did that name come from? Hommage, perhaps, to my old friend Montand?

  It is published here on the 16th of March, and then I do the Big Ouf! Touring the North, Glasgow, Edinborough, Manchester even Dublin .. to talk about the book et moi meme: bien sur!

  I hate to do this, but one has to now in the recession .. alas.

  But the really exciting news is that my next book will be published in October! A memoir of childhood continuing the ‘Summer’ part of ‘Postillion’ which so many seem to have liked more than any of the others, really. So this one, ‘GREAT MEADOW’, is almost finished, has been bought, and so I will have TWO books printed this year for Viking, and five altogether! If you include 3 re-prints.

  Pal mal? Pas mal de tour, cher Planche …

  On Wednesday I have to submit to jornalists and photographer from Paris who will come to my apartment for a piece in Figaro Madame .. I would never allow a British Press person NEAR the flat … so you will see how much I still respect and love my France.

  I hope I’m not wrong!

  The Palace tra-la-la was great fun last week. It was very impressive, I managed to kneel for the sword, and really quite enjoyed it!

  The Palace is not Versailles … much later .. but impressive as all those Royal Houses are. Gilt, crimson, vast corridors, huge salons, all the Kings and Queens watching from enormous paintings .. tapestries and chandeliers, the Household Cavalry, the Guards, the Ghurkas, and the Queen in a simple silk frock, one rope of pearls, a small clip on her shoulder, very charming, expert and amused. I bowed for her to place my insignia round my neck and then was truly one of her Knights Bachelor .. for services to the Arts.

  How Papa would have smiled. I never passed one exam, was always the bottom of the class, failed even six months of intense Tutoring, and was finally allowed to go to Art School. Well: there is hope for some idiots after all! I am a Knight of G.B .. I am a Commandeur of my beloved France .. and altogether, when I finally finish ‘MEADOW’ I will have written ten books. Something must be wrong?

  And yes: now I am Sir Dirk .. on my envelopes and in my cheque-book .. The evening before the Ceremony, the concierge called up to my suite at the Connaught and said: ‘Oh. Sir Dirk … I have a Mr Bogaerde in the hall ..’ and for a moment I thought it was me! But I quickly realised that it was my brother and his wife who had come to dine, and that I would never be just ‘Mr’ ever again!

  That, I think, sums it all up perfectly ..

  With my love, and my gratitude for your affection ..

  Always

  Dirk XX

  To John Osborne Cadogan Gardens

  18 June 1992

  My dear 22524901. (Disbanded)1

  Anguish prompts me to invade your ‘Sleepy Hollow’ in the hills of Salop. Anguish reading todays ‘Spectator’.2 You APPEAR to be leaving us all? You simply can not contemplate anything so churlish and unkind.

  Do, please, reconsider. What else will you do pray? Another play? Too early, is’nt it, for another autobio .. although, as you know, I absolutely long for it … so what else will you do, apart from being bloody to your wife and opening another bottle and some daft Local Fayre near Shrewsbury.

  Oh do come back! Forget the foulness of the Press .. I know it is almost impossible .. I come out in hives if I merely see the word ‘BOG’ or ‘DICK’.3 Reel away, I do, with beating heart. HOW I loath them. The ‘piece’ did jolly well. You cant possibly see it in that light I know, but, it got tremendous ‘space’, as they said in Beverly Hills, remember, and it was very seriously considered and the critics, as Visconti always said, are Eunichs, they cant create … it frustrates them.

  Your filthy Female Interviewers are so familiar to me. ‘Have you any friends?’ or ‘Are you in love with anyone?’ or, worse, ‘Have you no love to give?’. Christ. I’ve had them all.

  You are far too rare and wonderous a creature to be dunted by the crassness of them. Long, long after they have been shovelled into tastefull, or tasteless, plastic urns your books, particularly your books, will still be bound in leather.

  I did’nt contact you at Oscars, because I am only too well aware of the stresses and strains of ‘before the play’ … and when I did get brave and call you’d flitted.

  But you were constantly in my thoughts. Not that it did the least good … nevertheless …

  So reconsider, please. If it is an idle threat fair enough. If you actually mean it I’ll have you reduced to the ranks from which you rose and, worse than that, you’ll be required to do ten rounds of the Parade Ground in Full Marching Order, at Slow March Tempo to selections from ‘High Society’.

  That’ll teach you, you impudent fellow … what nonsense.

  I shall have to cancel my order ..

  No. 267237.1

  For the final stage of what he would one day describe as his ‘Anthracite Years’ in Glasgow, Dirk had lodged – even found refuge – in King’s Park with John (‘Uncle York’) and Hester McClellan and their two children, Nickie and Forrest. Aunt Hester (née Niven) was the third of Margaret Van den Bogaerde’s four sisters. Still living in his native Scotland, Forrest had been diffident about making contact with Dirk at the time of the St Andrews degree ceremony, but wrote when the knighthood was announced and, later, sent a copy of his autobiographical novel, Then a Soldier (Book Guild, 1991). Now he enclosed a further work.

  To Forrest McClellan Cadogan Gardens

  6 July 1992

  Forrest –

  A facinating, if depressing!, collection of stories2 from you today. Naturally I was far too curious not to read them almost right away. Especially the Aunt Sadie parts and the references to your father! [ … ] The awful gentility of it all almost suffocated me again today at seventy one as it did then, when I was a child and, later, a miserable child and adolescent. Thank God for Aunt Hester. She knew, without a word ever being said, how unhappy I was and how awful the situation was in Springfield Terrace (Crescent?) Bishopbriggs.3

  Years ago, when
I was first born, Aunt Sadie longed, and tried, to get legal rights over me because she was quite convinced that my mother was incapable of bringing me up. There was a desperate battle between them, and, on one occasion I can remember being fought over, physically, and Aunt Sadie, in her despair, wrenching my arm and dislocating it! All hell broke out in sobs and tears and apologies and so on.

  Anyway, thank God, I stayed with Mama. I was always told, later in life, that Uncle Murray was unable to have children and that this was discovered very early in their marriage and was the cause of much distress and hostility. I think, frankly, that it did have an awful bearing on their marriage. She was determined that she had married ‘beneath’ her. She accused Hester of the same error!

  My life with them was far FAR worse than anything I wrote in my book. The scars that the time there, three years, burned into me never healed. But, and this I have said before and repeat, without those awful years of bigotry and loneliness I would never have got through life.

  Those years made me strong, determined to save myself, and to get away from all that was ‘dainty’ ‘false’ and ‘genteel’ and, no need to put a fine point on it, cruel. Uncle Murray was deadly cruel. He falsified my school reports, censored my letters home every week, watched me with curious intensity when I took my weekly bath, and although my parents were paying them pretty well a weekly wage for my board and lodging, he made certain that I accounted for every penny I was allowed by my parents for my ‘Saturday Pennies’. I spent most of my time quite alone in their ‘front room’ because the boys I knew at school were either, in his opinion, ‘rough and common’ or ‘dirtying your aunts carpets’.

  Frankly, and I can hardly blame them in a small masonette, they wanted me out and back home, in the first miserable year. We all learn, too late, that things are not as easy as they seem with a boy of 13 and ill with homesickness. Hester, on the other hand, and Aunt Nona,1 got a pretty good idea of things [ … ]

  My father so detested them all that he refused to set foot in poor Scotland ever again after his first journey with my mother after he married her.2 The visit home was a disaster. My mother was glittering, gay, jolly, and painted her nails. She also danced and drank rather a lot! Aunt Sadie was deeply shocked; and furious that her friends all found ‘Madge’ such fun. Naturally they would stuck up in the suburbs of Glasgow. When I had to be removed from the Murrays (I wrote the famous, desperate, post card from Queen Street Station which Murray discovered me writing and made me mail) it was your beloved Mama who took me in, causing more bad feeling within the family at the time, because I still had a final year to go at the school and it was considered, by Dr Steel,3 ‘very unwise to move him away at this stage’.