Liberation: Diaries:1970-1983

by Christopher Isherwood

  An amazing father and son comedy act, “Steptoe and Son,” on the telly, (Wilfr[i]d Brambell, Harry H. Corbett). They were so good it was even funny as intended, but moving, like Chekhov. The story anyhow wasn’t in the best of taste; an old horse dies and is made into cat food.*

  This morning I woke, and there had been a quite heavy snowfall during the night. I leaned out of the window to breathe in the beautiful pure Brontë air, and saw dark drops on the snow along the windowsill—BLOOD! I was having a profuse nosebleed, my first in I don’t know how long. And what a Wuthering Heights thing to do! Cathy bleeding into the snow!

  Am reading The First Circle by Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Trollope’s The Eustace Diamonds. Also brought The Autobiography of Malcolm X here with me. Trollope goes down easily; Solzhenitsyn as tough as his name.

  March 8. Woke with such a feeling of the hills all around in the heavy snow. They are so powerfully present, so aloof and yet so suburban, and really so small; but I have never experienced any hills like them. And there comes a sense of how Kathleen [Isherwood] saw them, from the Wyberslegh windows, and how her wish was granted, to end her long life amongst them and die amongst them, grumbling but finally contented.

  What I actually see from my window here at the Bradleys’ are seven minigarages, some brick council houses, and a shed, a little tree with large very black rooks (from the churchyard rookery) in it, and the hillside of small gardens under heavy snow, black sticks sticking out of it. The air of the hills smells strongly of cow.

  Richard really does seem much less bizarre; perhaps I am comparing him with a fright-Richard of my imagination, but I don’t think so. We drove over to tomb-chilly Wyberslegh and came back with Kathleen’s news cuttings album, her diary for 1924 (for details of Granny Emmy’s death) and the Marple-Wyberslegh book,12 which Richard will let me take to London and get xeroxed. Also he has told me quite a number of valuable extra details—such as that Emily, at the end, would only eat food that was yellow.*

  Later: 10:40 p.m. Don is running around somewhere in Los Angeles, getting ready for his show later in the afternoon; it’ll be about 2 a.m. tomorrow, English time. I mustn’t pray for his success, only Swami can do that, but I can give thanks that I know him and love him. How amazing he is!

  Have accomplished a good deal while here, but today was pretty trying. It was Dan Bradley’s birthday, he was sixty. He is wonderfully vigorous and so truly honest and courageous, and Richard certainly should give thanks for him and Mrs. Dan, who is adorably good-natured and looks absolutely marvellous for her age, unless she’s far younger than I think she is.* But today the children were here, in two shifts most of the time, and this produced maximum schizophrenia—the attention torn seven ways at once by grownups, kiddies, the little dog, Dan’s memories of being buried by a bomb at Plymouth during the war, Mrs. Dan bringing in food, the telly or radio played nearly full strength and Richard coughing just when you were trying to listen to anyone or anything else. Finally, glutted and dazed and slightly asphyxiated by the gas fire, I went out for a walk, just up the hill as far as the turn off of the road to Macclesfield. Snow was falling lightly but it was thawing. The air was so pure and full of strength. The snow hills with the dark crests of copses and the blackish-green stone walls and the black telegraph wires and barbed wire and fence posts. The farm where I stayed when the Monkhouses were at Meadow Bank and I had a crush on Johnny and Rachel had a crush on me. I’m glad people have had crushes on me, glad I used to be cute; it is a very sustaining feeling. Of course I often behaved like a little faggot bitch, but no tears need be shed over that. I too have been bitched—more than once.

  The most interesting members of Dan’s family are the Danish boy, Bent Nilson (Nilsson? Neilson?) and his wife, Dan’s daughter Elizabeth. She met him in Australia, fell in love with him and had a child. She told him he didn’t have to marry her; she didn’t want him unless he wanted her. But he did marry her and they had another child after returning to England—both sons, both called by Danish names, Nils and Bjorn (this maybe proves something). Elizabeth adores him. [. . .] He is really quite powerfully sexy, with his smooth sulky face still boyish, his pretty carefully arranged fringe of wavy brown hair, his broad shoulders, thick wrists, tall lithe body, straight athletic legs with big knees and sturdy thighs. [. . . T]hey are soon leaving for a visit to his family in Denmark by ferry and car through Belgium and Holland and Germany.

  Heard Richard laughing in the kitchen with Mrs. Dan. He sounded just as he used to, long ago, when he was laughing with Kathleen.

  March 9. Back at Moore Street after a slow train trip during which I read myself a little more deeply into The First Circle and continued to enjoy The Eustace Diamonds.

  Clement Scott Gilbert came by: Clifford Williams is definitely out. Now he’s eager to get Alec Guinness (and I suddenly remember how Guinness wrote me that fan letter about Meeting). Am to talk to Don in the morning. He sent a handsome announcement of his show, says he has several commissions already.

  March 10. Have been talking to Clement, Don and Nicholas Thompson (in that order) about the play etc. John Roberts will stay with us if we can cast it. (I remarked to Clement that this was like the Los Angeles City Council, which took a pledge of allegiance to the flag on V-J Day13). Now I’m to dictate the necessary changes to a typist, who will then type up the copies to be sent around. Clifford Williams has sent a note of apology to us; so that’s that.

  Don’s show seems to have been a success, whatever that means. Don was as cagey as usual about it. Mrs. Blum told him Irving thought this was the best opening he’d ever had. (How utterly unimportant this play is to me, compared with the prospect of Don’s achieving something like this, all on his own!) So we’ve decided to stay each of us where we are, for the present, and await developments.

  Don says Evelyn Hooker has emerged into the light of social intercourse. She called, after having been all this time in the funny ward at Mount Sinai! She had been suffering for two years from depression because she couldn’t write her book; now she has resolved not to write it at all and go into private practice. Don says her face has quite lost its deathly “terminal” look. Is she a demonstration of Homer Lane’s statement that you can cure yourself of cancer by going mad?

  Don has seen Jim Bridges’ film, still dislikes the story but thinks it really remarkable and Jim has got a great performance out of Collin Wilcox. The question now arises, should Jim direct the play after all, if he’s willing? I said well, you ask him and, if he’s free and wants to, let him get in touch with Nicholas Thompson at once, but meanwhile we’ll be looking elsewhere.

  Talking of performances, Don says my T.V. talk about homosexuality14 was thought very highly of by Evelyn, Gavin and—George Cukor!

  P.’s confidences at supper last night about poor D.* make D. seem terribly like an image of me and my past (I hope) behavior. P. says that whenever he tells D. he’d like to get away on his own and have more freedom, sexual and otherwise, D. always reacts by saying, “You hate me.” P. wants to have his own place and go on visiting D., without all this social involvement. Another point of similarity is the money question; D. is completely generous and wildly extravagant, but P. is nevertheless shy of behaving as if D.’s money really is his, as well. P. has only a small allowance from his family, doesn’t earn anything. [. . .]

  I think it very likely that P. will end up by marrying.

  March 11. Last night—oh Kitty forgive me!—I got very drunk with a young man named John Byrne. He wrote to me several months ago because he’s working with Alan Clodd on a bibliography of me.15 He has a job with an antiquarian and first edition bookseller called Bertram Rota in Savile Row (I went there today and we had lunch and I was given a copy of Romer Wilson’s The Death of Society because I said I wanted it, largely for nostalgic reasons; I’m sure it isn’t good). I’m not particularly thrilled by him and certainly not attracted—the poor boy has bad scars on his face, due to an accident with a heater, I think—but he’s good co
mpany (or should I say a good audience?). We stayed up till the small hours and today I’ve had a terrible hangover, which made me visit a Turkish bath, the one in Jermyn Street, and have my hair cut. It’s been raining on and off, which is depressing. Today Clement came by and went through the script of the play, now that the cubes have been removed. It will be typed up again as soon as possible. Only one alteration; I have added the two final lines spoken by Patrick and Oliver. I think they help a lot.

  A note from [Don’s friend] asking if we can meet. Now I must write and tell him no. I only hope he won’t be at Tony Richardson’s tonight!

  March 12. He wasn’t. And now I’ve written him saying that I don’t want to see him. He should get my letter tomorrow; so that’s that.

  It was quite fun at Tony Richardson’s, because David was so sweet, as usual, and adorable wriggly little Wayne Sleep was there, and [Rudolf ] Nureyev, with his current friend* and some other guy. I think Nureyev had a sort of suspicion of me or thought I was some obsolete old Establishment fart. Anyhow, after dinner, while we were talking, he suddenly twisted my wrist with really cruel violence and in order not to let him hurt me I had to swing around with the result that I lost my balance and fell across the cocktail table, providentially not breaking anything. Actually I did skin my shin and drew blood but I made like it was nothing and apologized for my clumsiness. The others were aghast for a moment. Immediately, Nureyev’s manner changed, he became mock-affectionate, hugged me to his cold breast, covered my face with vampire kisses. He really is a macabre absurd nineteenth-century vampire, but at least he has great style and he dresses most elegantly. I felt quite warmly towards him, but it was much nicer to cuddle with Wayne, who has an admirer from New York who owns nineteen ships and has given him a gold watch. Peter defied Tony, when Tony said that Andy Warhol is no good at all; but Tony didn’t seem to mind a bit, and we are all to visit him for Easter in the South of France. The house is full of rather terrifying masks he has brought back from New Guinea. Also he has a construction of colored lights which flash on and off in turns and varying combinations, made by an artist named [Vassilikas] Takis.

  This afternoon I got Kathleen’s manuscript book xeroxed.

  March 13. I feel a sudden black depression. This weather is so wretched and the play is dragging its feet (not even ready to be typed till Tuesday) and I have just talked to Don and he hasn’t sold any pictures from his show and has hardly any commissions. He also says that Jim Gates has got his call-up and now will soon have to leave, unless he can get approved C.O. work near home. Also, to be frank, I minded because Don seemed quite casual about my returning or not returning—yet I know so well how easily one can give that impression without meaning. . . . Well, fuck all that. Courage! Now I must go out in the drizzle and visit Hermione Baddeley. And tomorrow Cambridge and Morgan [Forster].

  Edward [Upward] came up to see me today, which ought to have left me cheerful because his visit was really all that our meetings are at their best. He seems fatter and speaks with half-closed eyes, sometimes sleepily, sometimes excitedly and inaudibly. One always has a tremendous sense of his vocation as a writer. Nothing else matters to him. (This actually isn’t true; he is devoted to Hilda and the children.) But this intellectual passion is immensely stimulating and we rattled away, hardly noticing the hours pass.*

  Last night I had supper with Phillip Foster and his Finnish wife Eija, a tiny blonde with hair hanging down.16 I couldn’t help feeling a tiny falseness in her—or is it merely a hardness? Yes, she is hard, has probably had to be. Phillip is sleak, well fed, quite fat with a jowly face but still fat-sexy. Everything is Finland—he is learning the language and the flat is full of Finnish fabrics and artifacts. A very snug little couple; there seemed almost no difference in their sex.

  Gerald Hamilton came on on T.V. and was quite marvellously himself (now eighty-two) so polished and gross and charming and hideous. He rolls up his eyes until you see nothing but the whites; it’s almost as terrific as the picture of Dorian Gray.

  March 14. Another little nosebleed this morning and it’s raining and cold weather is forecast and I’m off to Cambridge, but my mood is good—partly because, after a very short visit to a bash given by Hermione Baddeley, at which I knew no one except Victor Spinetti,17 I went to supper with Patrick Woodcock and met a really beautiful boy named [K]arl Bowen who kissed me, in the nowadays style, in front of the taxi driver as we said goodnight. I do wish I could stop drinking though. I do hate it so.

  March 15. When I got to Cambridge I saw Mark Lancaster; we met in the middle of the grass of the main court, joking about whether or not Mark was a senior member of the college and thus entitled to walk on it. Mark has Lowes Dickinson’s18 old rooms; they are above the archway through which you see a view of the Backs19 and therefore look straight across at the college gate, commanding a view of everyone who goes through—also, at present, of two monster cranes in the background. Cambridge is being rebuilt but not nearly as fast as most places.

  Morgan looked almost exactly the same in the face, the clear blue eyes, the long nose, the pink complexion, the mussed-up hair (except that it’s white) but he is fatter and more stooped—he looks almost as if he had a hump—and much shakier. He moves insecurely with a stick; but he does move and the sight, at least of one eye, is actually better. In Coventry, when I last saw him,20 he was being read to; now he reads to himself. In Coventry—probably partly because of more drink, more comfort and it being a less chilly time of year, he seemed drowsier, lazier and less mentally alert than now. Today, most of the time, he was obviously able to follow all that was said and join in the conversation whenever he wanted to.

  His affection, as always, was touching, childlike. He loves being hugged and kissed. “How extraordinary!” he kept saying; and I took this to mean that because he sees me so seldom and therefore keeps me as a creature of his memory, the fact that I actually exist in the flesh seems extraordinary to him. I asked him if I had changed a lot. “A bit thicker, that’s all.” He made me turn around to look at me. While we were embracing I felt a sort of fake, because I was consciously going through the motions, wishing only to do what would please him and also very much aware of Mark looking on. But actually I’m not faking, on such occasions, it’s only that I take so long to come to a boil. I only felt the emotion of this meeting when I was in the train going back to London.

  Of course it was hard work. I reached sweatily for scraps of news, anecdotes, questions about mutual friends. And he reached too. Do we embarrass each other a bit? Yes. Have we always? Somewhat, maybe. But oddly enough that has little to do with affection. And isn’t the same thing true, to a much smaller degree, of me and Edward?

  Talking about his health, Morgan said, “I have been a little displeased with myself lately.” But he made it clear he was only referring to his physical health. (I wondered if he has a skin cancer problem; there seemed to be something growing in his cheek.) I reminded him of how he had said to me long ago: “I hope I shan’t get depressed—no, I don’t think I shall.” And he told me that, on the whole, he hadn’t. I also reminded him of a letter he had written in which he said that he was staying with [Leonard and Virginia Woolf ] and must therefore be careful to seal it up at once, not leave it lying around open. “I’m glad I wrote that,” Morgan said, and this was one of the few times he showed any resentment. Speaking of Vanessa Bell he said she was much easier to get along with than her sister, and how Virginia would suddenly turn on you and attack you.

  Morgan said he had liked getting the Order of Merit. I said, “It’s the only decoration really worth getting,” and he said, “I’ve come to feel that—now I’ve got one.” He said he had been rereading some of his early writing (I should have asked him what, exactly, but like an idiot I didn’t) and he had liked it very much. He added, “The creative power has gone now, but I don’t mind.” He has a marvellous flair for saying such things without the least pathos— merely with mild surprise. He then said that he hoped he’d “po
p off quickly” when the time came.

  We had tea with Mark in his rooms. A gaunt, long-haired rather attractive [. . .] geneticist from Caius named Richard Le Page was there. Morgan remarked three times to me how pale he looked, seeming quite concerned; “He must be ill.”

  Our meal in hall in the evening was bad; the meat was tough. Morgan got quite enraged. “How awful that I should have brought you here to eat this filth.” There one saw a characteristic flare-up of senile, childlike rage, and he sulked a bit during the rest of the meal. There we did seem out of the picture. Term is just over and the only remaining dons were young—they seemed to be mostly mathematicians with Ban-the-Bomb attitudes. (The cutest of them, Denis Mollison, volunteered to drive me back to the station and was charmingly friendly and genuinely concerned about Morgan’s health.) The two estates of the college are now divided in a different way. The undergraduates don’t have to stand when the dons come in. They eat between certain hours as they like, with self service. The high table is down on their level, moved to the other end of the hall. In a year or two there will be coeducation. And the lady dons will move the high table back and reintroduce all the protocol and ceremony, no doubt.

  This visit to Morgan was really very moving. Yes, he has survived, he is past ninety and he functions. But at what a price! How slow and how alone! It is his speed that isolates him, for he is surrounded by people. He has fallen out of the running. I think he would really like to stay with the Buckinghams all the time and be made comfortable. But perhaps not. He looks after himself with amazing doggedness, taking ages to switch off the light, pick up clothes from the floor, shut the door of his rooms. He is under sentence of death, just as visibly as if he were lying on his deathbed. And yet he enjoys conversation, affection, food, sherry. He told me he had put his homosexual stories out of his mind (I think he only meant, had ceased to think of them) but when I talked about Maurice he showed pleasure and he told me he was glad to think of all this again and wished he could write another such story.