For the
pictures
sold: 26 April 1937, n.
Samuel Beckett
705), and The Grand Canal with the Church ofthe Carita (NG!
1043).
Those by Bellotto were A View of Dresden Looking Down the Elbe (NG!
181) and A View of Dresden Looking Up the Elbe (NG!
182).
7 ThefourpastelsbyRosalbaCarriera(1675-1757)were:Spring(NG! 3846),another called Spring (previously called Summer, NG! 3847), Autumn (NG! 3848), and Winter (NG! 3849).
The Perugino Pietil (942) was sent to Vienna for evaluation and cleaning (see 17 July [1936], n. 6).
Adam and Eve (NG! 762) by Irish artist James Barry (1741-1806) had been put into storage, awaiting refurbishment of the new Irish room.
Electric lighting was added to the offices and work rooms of the Gallery, which had had only natural light (Director [Furlong] to the Secretary, Department of Public Works, 4 December 1936; Director to The Secretary, Department of Education, 13 December 1937; NG! Archives). The government had suggested evening openings and the Board of
499
14 May 1937, McGreevy
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Governors and Guardians authorized this change on 3 February 1937 (S. O'Neill, Board ofEducation to theDirector, National Gallery, 19December 1936;Director to The Secretary,Department ofEducation, 3 February 1937; S. O'N[eillJ, Board ofEducation to Secretary,Department of Finance, 6December 1937; NG! Archives).
8 Jack B. Yeats had five paintings in the Royal Hibernian Academy Exhibition in April 1937. Yeats's painting Boy and Horse (Pyle no. 476; private collection) was sold to Bryan Guinness (1905-1992), and While Grass Grows was sold to the Haverty Trust (now in the Waterford Museum of Art, no. 76). The Little Waves ofBreffny (Pyle no. 495; private collection) was not in theExhibition, but was sold directly to Henry Talbot de Vere Clifton (1907-1979), to whom W. B. Yeats dedicated his poem "Lapis Lazuli" (Pyle. Jack B. Yeats: A Catalogue Raisonne of the Oil Paintings, I, 450).
9 The1937RoyalHibernianAcademyExhibition.
Rose Brigid O'Brien Ganly, a member of the RHA since 1935, was the daughter of
Dermod O'Brien who was then President of the RHA.
1O BrianCoffey.
11 AfteraccompanyingSusanManningasfarasLiverpool,MayBecketttraveledon to visit her brother, Edward Price Roe, in Newark, Nottinghamshire.
12 The bronze equestrian statue of George II. sculpted by John van Nost the younger (d. 1780) and erected in St. Stephen's Green, was blown up in an act of protest in response to the coronation of King George VI (1895-1952) on 12 May 1937. W. B. Yeats in a letter to The Irish Times mourned it as the "only Dublin statue that has delighted me by beauty and elegance. Had they blown up any other statue in St. Stephen's Green I would have rejoiced" ("George II," 14 May 1937: 4).
Dublin's Cenotaph: 16January [1936[, n. 11. The statue of Queen Victoria, sculpted by John Hughes (1865-1941), was placed in front of Leinster House in 1903 (it was
removed in 1947 and given in 1987 to the city of Sydney, Australia).
13 OwenandAndreeSheehy-Skeffington.
14 SBreferstoVeraHone'swithdrawndinnerinvitation(see26April1937). David Hone (b. 1928).
15 "Yourdemarche"(thestepyouhavetaken).
THOMAS McGREEVY LONDON
5/6/36 [for 37]
Foxrock [Co. Dublin]
Dear Tom
Since coming back from Cahir there hasn't been any
continuity. Mother was away for a week, seeing Mrs Manning
500
5 June 1936 ifor 1937}, McGreevy
off at Liverpool. then staying with her brother in Notts. .
and came back rested but refusing to admit it. Frank and I
came back by Limerick, where he had some work, and I saw
St. Mary's. Appallingly restored and a lovely west door. I suppose
you know it. I happened to mention it to Sean O'Sullivan who
said, "It would take more than a west door to excite me". En
1
dull performance on both sides. Judgment reserved till
Monday. It doesn't seem to matter much whether we win
this round or not. The hearing proper with jury will probably
not be before October. God knows where I shall be then. I
suppose I must come back for it wherever I am. It is going
to be a very dirty fight and I wish I wasn't in it. It won't do me
any good, in spite of AJL's appreciation of its publicity value.
But even if there was a way out I wouldn't take it. The only
possible defence was indicated yesterday, that the cap was
not made to fit anyone. A bloody lie, but it may be hard to
prove the obvious. And even with a verdict for the plaintiff
here, it is only the beginning. Cowan & Rich have not filed an
appearance and so do not come within the jurisdiction. And the
American edition is much worse, 16 extra lines of doggerel to
the effect that whatever you bought there you were genuinely
2
of the hat. Now it is with Lovat Dickson. 3 I had a letter from a firm of Berlin publishers (Rohwohlt) [for Rowohlt] suggesting that I should make a selection from the poems of Joachim Ringelnatz (ob. 1934, well known to the Sinclairs in Kassel) and translate them. I wrote replying that I was on en principe, which covers everything. They suggested a Faber & Faber
501
effet.
The hearing for the injunction was on yesterday. Very
sold.
Constable turned down Murphy, with the customary sweep
5 June 1936 [for 1937}, McGreevy
Miscellany. The Hogarth Press strikes me as more likely, but
4
from the French at Geneva for a "non-commercial organisation" cut out of the Listener. I replied asking for particulars, but forgot to sign the letter. A nice example of Verschreiben. And Ruddy sent me an advertisement for post of lecturer in Italian at Cape Town. They had written to him directly. I am not thinking of applying. 5
The Sinclairs, all three, are going out to S. Africa in August to prevent the son coming home before the winter. I suppose also they want to be away when this thing is on. Cissie loathes the thought of it. 6
I went round to the Currans for the first time and met
Gorman there. He is doing a big biography of Joyce and was
looking for the gates of night-town. I went rather expecting
spits all round but it was no worse than tedious. I had a message
for the daughter from a painter in Munich. She had brought
back from Germany an exquisite little picture by a man called
7
they can look after that end of it themselves.
Geoffrey sent me an advertisement for post of translator
Scharl.
sive residential cowpad and hadn't a bad word to say for anyone.
50 RM. Constantine bumbled like a beetle on an exclu
I saw Gorman again a few days later at Yeats's. He carried
felicitations from Joyce to Harry Sinclair, which I must say rather
surprised me. He talked about their group in Paris, Jolas, L. P.
Fargue, Pelorson, and of their search for a Stammtisch with the
booze cheap and the Stimmung transitional; and with tentative
contempt of the rats who left the ship when the franc went
8
mother and the donkey. I think it went quite well. Mother was
502
kaputt.
I drove Jack and Cotty and Joe Hone out one day to see
as completely natural and at her ease as the donkey was and
didn't allow Joe's remote mumblings to disturb her. Cotty
had a penetrating basin hat and everything was jolly. Jack
admired his pictures. He has been doing well by the way, did I
tell you. 380 pounds worth sold within a week. Two out of the
Academy, the small boy and horse to Brian [for Bryan] Guinness
and the big Where Grass Grows (for While Grass Grows] to the
Haverty and a lovely big new landscape from his studio to a
9
5 June 1936 lfor 1937}, McGreevy
London dealer, I think Langton Davis. to Thursday.
He has changed his day
I had lunch one Sunday with the Coffeys. The President discoursed on ecclesiastical architecture and Bri[a]n showed me his article on Sainte-Beuve. Apparently Denis Devlin wants me to give Ria Mooney a poem to read on the wireless. I think that is almost sufficient incentive to write a new one. Bri[a]n didn't tell me what his trouble was. We got on better than before I felt. He was amusingly disturbed by his desire to eat the tulips in Stephens Green refusing to wrap up into a notion. I had an anonymous communication from London the other day with envelope addressed in capitals, just the label from Barclay's beer bottle with Dr. J. as trademark stuck on to a blank sheet. I suppose it was from him. Also by same post El Greco's Munich Mater Dolorosa with just "Bonjour" and an illegible monogram. 10
Austin Clarke was at Cissie's one evening I was there, together with Salkeld and fffffffrench-Mullen, who has been staying with the Sinclairs for the past month, pending the build ing ofa cottage near Mt. Venus. Clarke was full ofhate but didn't seem to bear me any ill will for the Bookman article, if he ever saw it. 11 He is really pathetic and sympathetic. Or is it that one clutches at any kind of literary contact? He was asking for you. So of course was Gorman.
503
5 June 1936 [for 1937}, McGreevy
I heard from Charles and wrote him at length in reply. 12 His silence since makes me fear he is bad again and not able to make the trip to Florence. If you have any news of him pass it on.
The only thing resembling work has been in the library on Johnson. I know the whole thing pretty well now and could start anytime. But my married cousin is staying with us with her husband for a week and there is no possibility of settling down to writing till they are gone. We are all going to the Abbey this evening to see the Hunt-O'Connor thriller. 13 I haven't been there for years and years.
Have linked up in a kind of way again with my uncle Gerald who went about so much with Father. I suppose that is the reason. He is inspector of health for Wicklow and lives in Greystones. We bathe and play duets together and he tells me about coral reefs, Torquemada and how telepathy pisses in the eye of the rule about inversely as the square of the distance. 14
How are the translations going? Do write very soon and tell me how it goes with you. 15
Love ever s/ Sam
TLS; 1 leaf, 2 sides; TCD, MS 10402/97. Dating: follows SB to McGreevy, 18 May 1937 (TCD, MS 10402/132) which anticipates SB's trip to Cahir and Cashel; preliminary hearing for Gogarty libel trial was reported in The Irish Times, 5 June 1937; advertise ment for French translator appeared in The Listener, 5 and 12 May 1937.
1 St. Mary's Cathedral in Limerick, on King's Island in the River Shannon, has a Romanesque west door (restored in the nineteenth century) and for a 120-foot tower with four step turrets. The original church was founded in 1168 by the King of Munster, Donal Mor O'Brien, and the King's palace was incorporated into it. The west doorway may have been the palace entrance (Noreen Ellecker, St. Mary's Cathedral).
"En effet" (Indeed).
504
5June 1936 {for 1937}, McGreevy
2 AninjunctiontorestrainfurtherpublicationofAsIWasGoingDownSackvilleStreet by Oliver St. John Gogarty was sought in a hearing on 4 June 1937. The defense, represented by Ralph Brereton-Barry, claimed that the description was not intended to identify the plaintiffs ("Gogarty Libel Action: New Injunction Sought: Court Reserves Judgment," The Irish Times 5 June 1937: 13).
A. J. Leventhal.
The London publishers of the book, Rich and Cowan.
The American editions included two additional verses and the beginning of a
third:
They kept a shop for objects wrought By masters famed of old
Where you, no matter what you bought Were genuinely sold.
But Willie spent the sesterces
And brought on strange disasters
Because he sought new mistresses More keenly than old masters.
The other . . .
(Gogarty, As I Was Going Down Sackville Street, A Phantasy in Fact [New York: Reyna! and
Hitchcock, 1937] 68-69; O'Connor, Oliver St. John Gogarty, 277-278)
3 Londonpublishers:ConstableandCompany;LovatDickson.
4 Axel Kaun worked with Rowohlt, the publisher of German poet Joachim Ringelnatz (ne Hans Boetticher, 1883-1934). Rowohlt's letter to SB suggesting that a selection of Ringelnatz's poems in English might be of interest to Faber and Faber's Criterion Miscellany (a monograph series published from 1919 to 1936) has not been found; nor has SB's reply. The Hogarth Press had published several poets in trans lation, including Rilke.
5 The advertisement sent by Geoffrey Thompson appeared in The Listener 17. 434 (5 May 1937) 895 and 17. 435 (12 May) 950. "Verschreiben" (a slip of the pen).
Rudmose Brown; University of Cape Town: 29 July 1937, below.
6 Cissie Sinclair and two of her daughters, Nancy and Deirdre, planned to visit Morris Sinclair in South Africa.
7 ConstantineCurranwashosttoHerbertShermanGorman(1893-1954),whowas writing his biography. James Joyce (1939); in Joyce's illysses, "Circe" (chapter 15) opens with set directions describing "The Mabbot street entrance ofnighttown" UamesJoyce, illysses [Paris: Shakespeare and Company, 1922] 408).
Elizabeth Curran had met Edgar Ende in Munich, whom SB also met there (see 25 March 1937, n. 13). SB refers to a painting by Josef Scharl entitled Bauemhochzeit owned by Elizabeth Curran.
8 It is not certain whether SB met Gorman again at the home of W. B. Yeats or Jack B. Yeats. Harry Sinclair, the brother of Boss Sinclair. Eugene Jolas, Leon-Paul Fargue, Georges Pelorson. "Stammtisch" (table for regulars, in a pub or simple restau rant). "Stimmung" (mood, atmosphere). Devaluation of the dollar against the franc
505
5 June 1936 {for 1937}, McGreevy
had made it more expensive to live in France, and many American expatriates who had
lived there in the 1920s and early 1930s had left.
9 Jack and Cottie Yeats, Joseph Hone. SB owned Comer Boys and Morning by Yeats (see 7 May 1936, n. 2, and 5 May 1935, n. 4).
For the pictures sold: 26 April 1937, n. 8; as indicated here, the picture may have been The Little Waves ofBreffny which was sold not to Langton Davis but to Henry Talbot de Vere Clifton.
10 Brian Coffey's family; his father Denis Coffey was President of University College Dublin. Brian Coffey published his review: "'Sainte-Beuve, Les Meilleurs Textes, intro. Andre Therive," The Criterion 16. 64 (April 1937) 716-721.
Denis Devlin's involvement in broadcasts of readings and comments on literature on Irish radio: 8 October 1935, n. 17. Ria Mooney (1904-1973), Irish actress and producer, often did readings for radio.
SB assumes that Coffey had sent the beer label anonymously. Barclay beer was produced by Barclay, Perkins, and Co. (the company formed to buy out Hester Thrale's interest in the Anchor Brewery on 31 May 1781). Samuel Johnson's image as "the stout academic clutching a pint pot became the brewery's emblem" (www. thrale. com/history/english/hester_and_henryfbrewery/index. php, 15 June 2006).
El Greco's painting in Munich was The Stripping of Christ (Alte Pinakothek 8573), not Mater Dolorosa (The Virgin Mary), which is in the collection of the Musee des Beaux-Arts, Strasburg (MBA 276); hence both the identification of the image on the card and its sender are uncertain. SB wrote "monogram. <It might be Lucia>. "'
11 SB'sarticleinTheBookman(1934),"RecentIrishPoetry,"wasnotappreciativeof Austin Clarke's writing.
Cecil Salkeld.
It may have been Douglas ffrench-Mullen (1893-1943) who was boarding with Cissie Beckett in Mayne Road, Rathgar; Mt. Venus, near Woodtown, Co. Dublin, is a cromlech.
12 NeithertheletterfromCharlesPrenticenorSB'sreplyhasbeenfound.
13 RobinaSheilaPage(neeRoe,knownasSheila,andbySBasEli,1905-1993)and Donald Temple Page (1901-1989) were visiting Cooldrinagh. In the Train, adapted by Hugh Hunt from a short story by Frank O'Connor, had opened at the Abbey Theatre on 31 May 1937.
14 Gerald Beckett, younger brother of William Beckett, lived at Drummany (Burnaby Estate), Portland Road, Greystones, Co. Wicklow.
Tomas de Torquemada: to May [1934], n. 1.
Telepathy, the apparently direct transfer of impressions from one mind to another, runs counter to the cause-effect relationship described by the "inverse-square" law of physics.
15 McGreevy'stranslationswereMaillart'sForbiddenJourney;FromPekingtoKashmir for Heinemann (see 22 December 1936, n. 1), and Young Girls (London: George Routledge, 1937), the first volume of Henry de Montherlant's Les Jeunes filles (4 vols. , 1936-1939; Pityfor Women).
506
JOSEPH HONE
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND
July 3rd 1937
Dolphin Hotel Essex Street, (Parliament Street) Dublin
dear Joe
The passage I think you want is the following:
"One's prejudices guide one's judgments, & I confess that
I like to think that my father went to the House ofCommons like Empedocles to Etna, & flung himself over the edge because he wished to know what the interior ofa crater was like. I am afraid that this explanation of my father's reasons for going to the House of Commons will appear whimsical to those who, like my brother, take a normal view ofour national assembly; all the same my brother does not seem to have escaped altogether the prevalent belief that the House of Commons is an anachronism like the House of Lords. He does not chronicle the debates with the same untiring industry as Lord Morley & Mr. Winston Churchill. He is impressed by the importance of the division bell, but not to the same extent that they are, & he would have been still less impressed ifhe were acquainted with their works - excellent works, full of information, thoughtfulness & literary quality, lacking little, perfect works one would say were they not unreadable. " 1
I trust this is neither too little nor too much - -
507
3July 1937, Hone
3 July 1937, Hone
I was delighted to have your letter. Arland (on se fait a tout) sent me your Lausanne address & I was meaning to write to you, but the days pass over me & I do nothing. 2
To-morrow morning I leave with Kahn [for Kahan] for
Cappagh in the old car. Wasn't it about this time last year that
you & I went down? I look forward to Beverl[e]y not being there.
Jack Yeats describes his voice at its most dulcet (i. e. cajoling
young ladies in the club) as a sack of coal being delivered. The
3
I was offered a job as agent to an estate (Lord Rathdowne's? )
near Carlow. £300 per. an. & a free house. I passed it on to Percy
but he turned it down, on the ground that Beverley would whip
in a young wife the moment his back was turned. I thought it
4
Italian at Cape Town University, & perhaps I shall. 5 He says the fruit makes np for the Kaffirs. I should have reversed this prop osition myself.
I heard from Nancy Cunard. She is collecting the opinions of writers on the Spanish business. I replied "Uptherepublic". Then
6
selection ofJoachim Ringelnatz & translate it for a Faber & Faber
(page missing]7
Still there is a mass of marginalia that would be useful, e. g.
in the Annals his recollection of the first time that the
---
Heaven-Hell dichotomy was brought to his notice, when he was in bed with his mother aged 18 months. Heaven she
508
clack of a mill hopper occurs to me rather. It is Nash or Greene. Which alas is the difference, part of the difference.
would have suited him exactly.
Rudmose-Brown wants me to apply for a lectureship in
she wrote again, to demand amplifications.
A firm of Berlin publishers wrote asking me to make a
described as the happy place where some people went, Hell as
the sad place where the lost went. She does not seem to have
been at all High Church. The following morning, so that he
might impress the information on his mind, she required
him to repeat it to Thomas Jackson, their serving man. But he
8
i. e. the fear of his death, when he was being reproached by
his clerical friend Taylor for holding the opinion that an eternity
of torment was preferable to annihilation. He must have had
the notion ofpositive annihilation. Ofhow many can as much be
9
ing the surviving attention with Schopenhauer on women.
My brother has got himself engaged to be married. So has
11
12
Picture to review. I passed it on to Mrs. Salkeld.
Come back soon. I miss you. Remember me to Vera Sally
ALS; 3 leaves. 6 sides; letterhead; TxU.
1 The citation is from the preface to Maurice George Moore. An Irish Gentleman, George Henry Moore: His Travel, His Racing, His Politics(London: T. W. Laurie, 1913) xv-xvi. Joseph Hone writes in his memoir of SB: "I had asked him to look up for me a passage in George Moore's preface to his(Moore's) biography of their father, George Hay [for Henry] Moore. the Irish politician"("A Note on my Acquaintance with Sam Beckett"; TxU, J. M. Hone/ Works).
John Morley, 1st Viscount Morley of Blackburn (1838-1923); Winston Churchill (1874-1965).
509
wouldnot. Allthiswouldcomeinquitenaturallyinthelastact,
3July 1937, Hone
said.
I have been insulting myselfwith Belloc on Milton & divert
10
Devlin's poems come out shortly in the same series as mine did. I recommend them to you. My book
my agent George Reavey.
is with Allen & Unwin.
Seumas gave me McNeice's [for MacNeice's] Out of the
13
14
David.
Yrs ever
Sam
3 July 1937, Hone
2 Ussher's given names were Percival Arland; although he was previously called "Percy," he now preferred "Arland. " "On se fait a tout" (one can get used to anything).
3 SB called Robert Kahan, who was with the Board of Works, "another frustrated intellectual" (SB to McGreevy, 7 July 1937, TCD, MS 10402/128); Kahan pursued the interests of a scholar, linguist, and literary critic and was the Irish correspondent of the Jewish Chronicle (Alrland] Ulssher], "Mr. Robert Kahan: An Appreciation," The Irish Times 12 December 1951: 5). Cappagh, the Ussher family home in Co. Waterford, was owned by Arland Ussher's father, Beverley.
SB refers to English dramatist and satirist Thomas Nash (1567-1601) and English poet, playwright, and novelist Robert Greene (1558-1592); a specific allusion has not been found. At the end of SB's "Whoroscope" Notebook (BIF, UoR, MS 3000) are twelve pages headed 'For Interpolation' that include citations from Robert Greene's Menaphon (1589), in Groatsworth ofwitte, bought with a million ofrepentance; The repentance ofRobert Greene, 1592, ed. G. B. Harrison (London: Bodley Head, 1923), and Plays and Poems of Robert Greene, ed. J. Churton Collins, 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1905) (Pilling, "'For Interpolation': Beckett and English Literature," 218-219).
4 SBisnotcertainoftheowneroftheestate. TheRathdowneestatewasinCounty Dublin. It belonged to Godfrey John Boyle Chetwynd (1863-1936), Viscount Chetwynd, who was also Baron of Rathdowne; he was succeeded by his son Adam Duncan Chetwynd (1904-1965). The Rathdonnell estate in Country Carlow comes closer to the description SB gives. Thomas Leopold McClintock-Bunbury, Lord Rathdonnell (1880-1937), resided in England. His estate, Lisnavagh, had the same manager from 1930 to 1951, but it is possible that a smaller family property nearby, Oak Park, "could have required a manager in 1937" (Lord Rathdonnell lb. 1938], 30 November 1992; records of this estate are not extant).
SB described the position to Arland Ussher in his letter ! before 15 June 1937]: "Most of your truck would be with the auditors and proprietor (who seems to spend most of his time in England and is somewhere over here at present, fishing. Alas I do not know his name") (TxU). SB wrote to McGreevy, 7 July 1937, that he had encouraged both Arland Ussher and Joe Hone to apply:
I pushed Ussher for the job, but he would not go up for it, being apparently convinced that immediately he left the house at Cappagh his father would marry again & jeopardise the succession. I had mentioned all this writing to Joe Hone, now in Lausanne, & had a wire from him when in Cappagh entreating me to get the job for him! I wish I could, but fear it is now too late. (TCD, MS 10402/128)
5 SBwrotetoArlandUssheron15June1937:"NowthatIhaveassembledtestimo nials for the Cape Town Gehenna I am in a position to abstain from applying. "
6 Neither Cunard's letters nor SB's replies have been found, but SB wrote to McGreevy on 7 July 1937: "Nancy Cunard circularised me for my opinion of the Spanish business. I replied Up the republic. She wrote again, for amplifications . .
I replied again, that I could not make myself any clearer, unless she insisted that I should. Since when nothing" (TCD, MS 10402/128).
The Cunard collection at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center holds documents related to Cunard's project, including some original letters in reply to the questionnaire sent from Paris in June 1937; "These replies are the only survivors
510
3July 1937, Hone
of the 150 to 200 received by Cunard. The remainder 'disappeared during World War II, in my house at Reanville in Normandy'" (Lake, No Symbols Where None Intended, 36). Nancy Cunard initiated the project in June 1937 from Paris, with "The Question" addressed to "Writers and Poets ofEngland, Scotland, Ireland and Wales: . . . Are you for, or against, the legal Government and the People of Republican Spain? Are you for, or against, France and Fascism? " SB's response ("iUPTHEREPUBLIC! ") was pub lished in Nancy Cunard, ed. , Authors Take Sides on the Spanish War (London: Left Review, [1937)) [6]. Writers were asked to limit their contributions to six lines: SB's was the
briefest.
7 TheproposedEnglishtranslationofaselectionofpoemsbyRingelnatz:5June 1936 [for 1937], n. 4. SB wrote to Arland Ussher on 15June 1937: "I shall also back out of the Ringelnatz translation. " SB's letter to McGreevy of7 July 1937 offers greater detail: "The people in Berlin sent me three volumes of Ringelnatz. He is even worse than I thought and I do not think of undertaking the job of translating a selection from him. I had a letter from them again the other day asking for specimen translations to submit to T. S. E. ! ! ! " (TCD, MS 10402/128).
At this point a page is missing from the letter; as Hone describes in his memoir of SB: "The attached letter, ofwhich unfortunately a page is missing was written to me while I was in Switzerland in the summer of1937" ("A Note on my Acquaintance with Sam Beckett"; TxU, J. M. Hone / Works). The letter continues with SB's discussion of his preparations for writing a play on Samuel Johnson.
8 SB refers to Samuel Johnson's entry in his Annals during Lent 1712 (Diaries, Prayers, and Annals, 10; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/3, f. lR).
9 SBreferstoJohnTaylor'sALettertoSamuelJohnson,L. L. D. ontheSubjectofaFuture State [With some letters ofDr. Johnson and possibly in part written by him] (London: T. Cadell, 1787; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/2, f. 101V).
In a conversation with Anna Seward (1742-1809) who claimed that fear ofannihila tion "was groundless," Johnson reportedly said: "'Mere existence is so much better than nothing, that one would rather exist even in pain"' (Bate, SamuelJohnson, 452 ). In response to this conversation, SB notes: "Much as he dreaded the next world he dreaded annihilation still more" (BIF, UoR, MS 3461/2, f. 81R).
10 HilaireBelloc,Milton(London:Cassell,1935).
Arthur Schopenhauer, "Essay on Women," in Essays and Aphorisms, 80-88.
11 FrankBeckettwasengagedtoJeanWright;SBwrotetoMcGreevyon7July1937: "Frank hopes to get married about the middle of August. Another gone. From me I mean of course. He is house hunting. Do write & congratulate him" (TCD, MS 10402/128).
George Reavey was engaged to Clodine Gwynedd Cade. SB wrote to McGreevy on 7 July 1937: "I sent George a Meissen wine cup before I left [for Cappagh] but have had no acknowledgment. I suppose he knows what he is doing, but it is hard not to feel sorry for him. I don't think he'll write much more poetry" (TCD, MS 10402/128); a certificate of authentication dated 1 July 1937 from Harris & Sinclair, Dublin, is in Reavey's papers (TxU; Reavey collection, miscellaneous).
12 Denis Devlin, Intercessions, Europa Poets (London: Europa Press, 1937). SB's col lection of poems Echo's Bones was the third in this series.
Murphy was being read by London publisher Allen and Unwin.
511
3 July 1937, Hone
13 SeumasO'SullivanaskedSBtoreviewOutofthePicture(1937)byLouisMacNeice (ne Frederick Louis MacNeice 1907-1963); it was reviewed by Blanaid Salkeld in Dublin Magazine 12. 4 (October-December 1937) 67-68.
14 JoeHone'swifeVera,andtheirchildrenSally(m. Cooke-Smith,1914-2003)and David (b. 1928).
AXEL KAUN BERLIN
[SB's Letter to Axel Kaun below exists only as a draft, corrected by various hands over time; it is presented here without editorial corrections. ]
9/7/37
6 Clare Street Dublin
IFS
Lieber Axel Kaun!
Besten Dank fur Ihren Brief. Ich war gerade im Begriff,
Ihnen zu schreiben, als er kam. Dann habe ich verreisen mus sen, wie Ringelnatz' mannlicher Briefmark, obgleich unter
1
Ringelnatz ist meiner Ansicht nach nicht der Muhe wert. Sie werden sicherlich nicht mehr enttauscht sein, dies von mir zu horen, als ich es gewesen bin, es feststellen zu miissen.
Ich habe die 3 Bande durchgelesen, 23 Gedichte ausge
2
was sie notwendigerweise dabei verloren haben, ist naturlich
nur im Verhaltnis mit dem zu schatzen, was sie eigentlich
3
Daraus ist gar nicht zu schliessen, dass ein iibersetzter Ringelnatz weder Interesse noch Erfolg beim englischen
512
weniger leidenschaftlichen Umstanden.
Das Beste ist, ich sage Ihnen sofort und ohne Umschweife,
wahltund2vondiesenalsProbestuckeubersetzt. Daswenige,
zu verlieren haben, und ich muss [_]en, dass ich diesen Verschlecterungskoeffizient, auch da, wo er am meisten Dichter ist, und am wenigsten Reimkuli, ganz gering gefunden habe.
7 ThefourpastelsbyRosalbaCarriera(1675-1757)were:Spring(NG! 3846),another called Spring (previously called Summer, NG! 3847), Autumn (NG! 3848), and Winter (NG! 3849).
The Perugino Pietil (942) was sent to Vienna for evaluation and cleaning (see 17 July [1936], n. 6).
Adam and Eve (NG! 762) by Irish artist James Barry (1741-1806) had been put into storage, awaiting refurbishment of the new Irish room.
Electric lighting was added to the offices and work rooms of the Gallery, which had had only natural light (Director [Furlong] to the Secretary, Department of Public Works, 4 December 1936; Director to The Secretary, Department of Education, 13 December 1937; NG! Archives). The government had suggested evening openings and the Board of
499
14 May 1937, McGreevy
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Governors and Guardians authorized this change on 3 February 1937 (S. O'Neill, Board ofEducation to theDirector, National Gallery, 19December 1936;Director to The Secretary,Department ofEducation, 3 February 1937; S. O'N[eillJ, Board ofEducation to Secretary,Department of Finance, 6December 1937; NG! Archives).
8 Jack B. Yeats had five paintings in the Royal Hibernian Academy Exhibition in April 1937. Yeats's painting Boy and Horse (Pyle no. 476; private collection) was sold to Bryan Guinness (1905-1992), and While Grass Grows was sold to the Haverty Trust (now in the Waterford Museum of Art, no. 76). The Little Waves ofBreffny (Pyle no. 495; private collection) was not in theExhibition, but was sold directly to Henry Talbot de Vere Clifton (1907-1979), to whom W. B. Yeats dedicated his poem "Lapis Lazuli" (Pyle. Jack B. Yeats: A Catalogue Raisonne of the Oil Paintings, I, 450).
9 The1937RoyalHibernianAcademyExhibition.
Rose Brigid O'Brien Ganly, a member of the RHA since 1935, was the daughter of
Dermod O'Brien who was then President of the RHA.
1O BrianCoffey.
11 AfteraccompanyingSusanManningasfarasLiverpool,MayBecketttraveledon to visit her brother, Edward Price Roe, in Newark, Nottinghamshire.
12 The bronze equestrian statue of George II. sculpted by John van Nost the younger (d. 1780) and erected in St. Stephen's Green, was blown up in an act of protest in response to the coronation of King George VI (1895-1952) on 12 May 1937. W. B. Yeats in a letter to The Irish Times mourned it as the "only Dublin statue that has delighted me by beauty and elegance. Had they blown up any other statue in St. Stephen's Green I would have rejoiced" ("George II," 14 May 1937: 4).
Dublin's Cenotaph: 16January [1936[, n. 11. The statue of Queen Victoria, sculpted by John Hughes (1865-1941), was placed in front of Leinster House in 1903 (it was
removed in 1947 and given in 1987 to the city of Sydney, Australia).
13 OwenandAndreeSheehy-Skeffington.
14 SBreferstoVeraHone'swithdrawndinnerinvitation(see26April1937). David Hone (b. 1928).
15 "Yourdemarche"(thestepyouhavetaken).
THOMAS McGREEVY LONDON
5/6/36 [for 37]
Foxrock [Co. Dublin]
Dear Tom
Since coming back from Cahir there hasn't been any
continuity. Mother was away for a week, seeing Mrs Manning
500
5 June 1936 ifor 1937}, McGreevy
off at Liverpool. then staying with her brother in Notts. .
and came back rested but refusing to admit it. Frank and I
came back by Limerick, where he had some work, and I saw
St. Mary's. Appallingly restored and a lovely west door. I suppose
you know it. I happened to mention it to Sean O'Sullivan who
said, "It would take more than a west door to excite me". En
1
dull performance on both sides. Judgment reserved till
Monday. It doesn't seem to matter much whether we win
this round or not. The hearing proper with jury will probably
not be before October. God knows where I shall be then. I
suppose I must come back for it wherever I am. It is going
to be a very dirty fight and I wish I wasn't in it. It won't do me
any good, in spite of AJL's appreciation of its publicity value.
But even if there was a way out I wouldn't take it. The only
possible defence was indicated yesterday, that the cap was
not made to fit anyone. A bloody lie, but it may be hard to
prove the obvious. And even with a verdict for the plaintiff
here, it is only the beginning. Cowan & Rich have not filed an
appearance and so do not come within the jurisdiction. And the
American edition is much worse, 16 extra lines of doggerel to
the effect that whatever you bought there you were genuinely
2
of the hat. Now it is with Lovat Dickson. 3 I had a letter from a firm of Berlin publishers (Rohwohlt) [for Rowohlt] suggesting that I should make a selection from the poems of Joachim Ringelnatz (ob. 1934, well known to the Sinclairs in Kassel) and translate them. I wrote replying that I was on en principe, which covers everything. They suggested a Faber & Faber
501
effet.
The hearing for the injunction was on yesterday. Very
sold.
Constable turned down Murphy, with the customary sweep
5 June 1936 [for 1937}, McGreevy
Miscellany. The Hogarth Press strikes me as more likely, but
4
from the French at Geneva for a "non-commercial organisation" cut out of the Listener. I replied asking for particulars, but forgot to sign the letter. A nice example of Verschreiben. And Ruddy sent me an advertisement for post of lecturer in Italian at Cape Town. They had written to him directly. I am not thinking of applying. 5
The Sinclairs, all three, are going out to S. Africa in August to prevent the son coming home before the winter. I suppose also they want to be away when this thing is on. Cissie loathes the thought of it. 6
I went round to the Currans for the first time and met
Gorman there. He is doing a big biography of Joyce and was
looking for the gates of night-town. I went rather expecting
spits all round but it was no worse than tedious. I had a message
for the daughter from a painter in Munich. She had brought
back from Germany an exquisite little picture by a man called
7
they can look after that end of it themselves.
Geoffrey sent me an advertisement for post of translator
Scharl.
sive residential cowpad and hadn't a bad word to say for anyone.
50 RM. Constantine bumbled like a beetle on an exclu
I saw Gorman again a few days later at Yeats's. He carried
felicitations from Joyce to Harry Sinclair, which I must say rather
surprised me. He talked about their group in Paris, Jolas, L. P.
Fargue, Pelorson, and of their search for a Stammtisch with the
booze cheap and the Stimmung transitional; and with tentative
contempt of the rats who left the ship when the franc went
8
mother and the donkey. I think it went quite well. Mother was
502
kaputt.
I drove Jack and Cotty and Joe Hone out one day to see
as completely natural and at her ease as the donkey was and
didn't allow Joe's remote mumblings to disturb her. Cotty
had a penetrating basin hat and everything was jolly. Jack
admired his pictures. He has been doing well by the way, did I
tell you. 380 pounds worth sold within a week. Two out of the
Academy, the small boy and horse to Brian [for Bryan] Guinness
and the big Where Grass Grows (for While Grass Grows] to the
Haverty and a lovely big new landscape from his studio to a
9
5 June 1936 lfor 1937}, McGreevy
London dealer, I think Langton Davis. to Thursday.
He has changed his day
I had lunch one Sunday with the Coffeys. The President discoursed on ecclesiastical architecture and Bri[a]n showed me his article on Sainte-Beuve. Apparently Denis Devlin wants me to give Ria Mooney a poem to read on the wireless. I think that is almost sufficient incentive to write a new one. Bri[a]n didn't tell me what his trouble was. We got on better than before I felt. He was amusingly disturbed by his desire to eat the tulips in Stephens Green refusing to wrap up into a notion. I had an anonymous communication from London the other day with envelope addressed in capitals, just the label from Barclay's beer bottle with Dr. J. as trademark stuck on to a blank sheet. I suppose it was from him. Also by same post El Greco's Munich Mater Dolorosa with just "Bonjour" and an illegible monogram. 10
Austin Clarke was at Cissie's one evening I was there, together with Salkeld and fffffffrench-Mullen, who has been staying with the Sinclairs for the past month, pending the build ing ofa cottage near Mt. Venus. Clarke was full ofhate but didn't seem to bear me any ill will for the Bookman article, if he ever saw it. 11 He is really pathetic and sympathetic. Or is it that one clutches at any kind of literary contact? He was asking for you. So of course was Gorman.
503
5 June 1936 [for 1937}, McGreevy
I heard from Charles and wrote him at length in reply. 12 His silence since makes me fear he is bad again and not able to make the trip to Florence. If you have any news of him pass it on.
The only thing resembling work has been in the library on Johnson. I know the whole thing pretty well now and could start anytime. But my married cousin is staying with us with her husband for a week and there is no possibility of settling down to writing till they are gone. We are all going to the Abbey this evening to see the Hunt-O'Connor thriller. 13 I haven't been there for years and years.
Have linked up in a kind of way again with my uncle Gerald who went about so much with Father. I suppose that is the reason. He is inspector of health for Wicklow and lives in Greystones. We bathe and play duets together and he tells me about coral reefs, Torquemada and how telepathy pisses in the eye of the rule about inversely as the square of the distance. 14
How are the translations going? Do write very soon and tell me how it goes with you. 15
Love ever s/ Sam
TLS; 1 leaf, 2 sides; TCD, MS 10402/97. Dating: follows SB to McGreevy, 18 May 1937 (TCD, MS 10402/132) which anticipates SB's trip to Cahir and Cashel; preliminary hearing for Gogarty libel trial was reported in The Irish Times, 5 June 1937; advertise ment for French translator appeared in The Listener, 5 and 12 May 1937.
1 St. Mary's Cathedral in Limerick, on King's Island in the River Shannon, has a Romanesque west door (restored in the nineteenth century) and for a 120-foot tower with four step turrets. The original church was founded in 1168 by the King of Munster, Donal Mor O'Brien, and the King's palace was incorporated into it. The west doorway may have been the palace entrance (Noreen Ellecker, St. Mary's Cathedral).
"En effet" (Indeed).
504
5June 1936 {for 1937}, McGreevy
2 AninjunctiontorestrainfurtherpublicationofAsIWasGoingDownSackvilleStreet by Oliver St. John Gogarty was sought in a hearing on 4 June 1937. The defense, represented by Ralph Brereton-Barry, claimed that the description was not intended to identify the plaintiffs ("Gogarty Libel Action: New Injunction Sought: Court Reserves Judgment," The Irish Times 5 June 1937: 13).
A. J. Leventhal.
The London publishers of the book, Rich and Cowan.
The American editions included two additional verses and the beginning of a
third:
They kept a shop for objects wrought By masters famed of old
Where you, no matter what you bought Were genuinely sold.
But Willie spent the sesterces
And brought on strange disasters
Because he sought new mistresses More keenly than old masters.
The other . . .
(Gogarty, As I Was Going Down Sackville Street, A Phantasy in Fact [New York: Reyna! and
Hitchcock, 1937] 68-69; O'Connor, Oliver St. John Gogarty, 277-278)
3 Londonpublishers:ConstableandCompany;LovatDickson.
4 Axel Kaun worked with Rowohlt, the publisher of German poet Joachim Ringelnatz (ne Hans Boetticher, 1883-1934). Rowohlt's letter to SB suggesting that a selection of Ringelnatz's poems in English might be of interest to Faber and Faber's Criterion Miscellany (a monograph series published from 1919 to 1936) has not been found; nor has SB's reply. The Hogarth Press had published several poets in trans lation, including Rilke.
5 The advertisement sent by Geoffrey Thompson appeared in The Listener 17. 434 (5 May 1937) 895 and 17. 435 (12 May) 950. "Verschreiben" (a slip of the pen).
Rudmose Brown; University of Cape Town: 29 July 1937, below.
6 Cissie Sinclair and two of her daughters, Nancy and Deirdre, planned to visit Morris Sinclair in South Africa.
7 ConstantineCurranwashosttoHerbertShermanGorman(1893-1954),whowas writing his biography. James Joyce (1939); in Joyce's illysses, "Circe" (chapter 15) opens with set directions describing "The Mabbot street entrance ofnighttown" UamesJoyce, illysses [Paris: Shakespeare and Company, 1922] 408).
Elizabeth Curran had met Edgar Ende in Munich, whom SB also met there (see 25 March 1937, n. 13). SB refers to a painting by Josef Scharl entitled Bauemhochzeit owned by Elizabeth Curran.
8 It is not certain whether SB met Gorman again at the home of W. B. Yeats or Jack B. Yeats. Harry Sinclair, the brother of Boss Sinclair. Eugene Jolas, Leon-Paul Fargue, Georges Pelorson. "Stammtisch" (table for regulars, in a pub or simple restau rant). "Stimmung" (mood, atmosphere). Devaluation of the dollar against the franc
505
5 June 1936 {for 1937}, McGreevy
had made it more expensive to live in France, and many American expatriates who had
lived there in the 1920s and early 1930s had left.
9 Jack and Cottie Yeats, Joseph Hone. SB owned Comer Boys and Morning by Yeats (see 7 May 1936, n. 2, and 5 May 1935, n. 4).
For the pictures sold: 26 April 1937, n. 8; as indicated here, the picture may have been The Little Waves ofBreffny which was sold not to Langton Davis but to Henry Talbot de Vere Clifton.
10 Brian Coffey's family; his father Denis Coffey was President of University College Dublin. Brian Coffey published his review: "'Sainte-Beuve, Les Meilleurs Textes, intro. Andre Therive," The Criterion 16. 64 (April 1937) 716-721.
Denis Devlin's involvement in broadcasts of readings and comments on literature on Irish radio: 8 October 1935, n. 17. Ria Mooney (1904-1973), Irish actress and producer, often did readings for radio.
SB assumes that Coffey had sent the beer label anonymously. Barclay beer was produced by Barclay, Perkins, and Co. (the company formed to buy out Hester Thrale's interest in the Anchor Brewery on 31 May 1781). Samuel Johnson's image as "the stout academic clutching a pint pot became the brewery's emblem" (www. thrale. com/history/english/hester_and_henryfbrewery/index. php, 15 June 2006).
El Greco's painting in Munich was The Stripping of Christ (Alte Pinakothek 8573), not Mater Dolorosa (The Virgin Mary), which is in the collection of the Musee des Beaux-Arts, Strasburg (MBA 276); hence both the identification of the image on the card and its sender are uncertain. SB wrote "monogram. <It might be Lucia>. "'
11 SB'sarticleinTheBookman(1934),"RecentIrishPoetry,"wasnotappreciativeof Austin Clarke's writing.
Cecil Salkeld.
It may have been Douglas ffrench-Mullen (1893-1943) who was boarding with Cissie Beckett in Mayne Road, Rathgar; Mt. Venus, near Woodtown, Co. Dublin, is a cromlech.
12 NeithertheletterfromCharlesPrenticenorSB'sreplyhasbeenfound.
13 RobinaSheilaPage(neeRoe,knownasSheila,andbySBasEli,1905-1993)and Donald Temple Page (1901-1989) were visiting Cooldrinagh. In the Train, adapted by Hugh Hunt from a short story by Frank O'Connor, had opened at the Abbey Theatre on 31 May 1937.
14 Gerald Beckett, younger brother of William Beckett, lived at Drummany (Burnaby Estate), Portland Road, Greystones, Co. Wicklow.
Tomas de Torquemada: to May [1934], n. 1.
Telepathy, the apparently direct transfer of impressions from one mind to another, runs counter to the cause-effect relationship described by the "inverse-square" law of physics.
15 McGreevy'stranslationswereMaillart'sForbiddenJourney;FromPekingtoKashmir for Heinemann (see 22 December 1936, n. 1), and Young Girls (London: George Routledge, 1937), the first volume of Henry de Montherlant's Les Jeunes filles (4 vols. , 1936-1939; Pityfor Women).
506
JOSEPH HONE
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND
July 3rd 1937
Dolphin Hotel Essex Street, (Parliament Street) Dublin
dear Joe
The passage I think you want is the following:
"One's prejudices guide one's judgments, & I confess that
I like to think that my father went to the House ofCommons like Empedocles to Etna, & flung himself over the edge because he wished to know what the interior ofa crater was like. I am afraid that this explanation of my father's reasons for going to the House of Commons will appear whimsical to those who, like my brother, take a normal view ofour national assembly; all the same my brother does not seem to have escaped altogether the prevalent belief that the House of Commons is an anachronism like the House of Lords. He does not chronicle the debates with the same untiring industry as Lord Morley & Mr. Winston Churchill. He is impressed by the importance of the division bell, but not to the same extent that they are, & he would have been still less impressed ifhe were acquainted with their works - excellent works, full of information, thoughtfulness & literary quality, lacking little, perfect works one would say were they not unreadable. " 1
I trust this is neither too little nor too much - -
507
3July 1937, Hone
3 July 1937, Hone
I was delighted to have your letter. Arland (on se fait a tout) sent me your Lausanne address & I was meaning to write to you, but the days pass over me & I do nothing. 2
To-morrow morning I leave with Kahn [for Kahan] for
Cappagh in the old car. Wasn't it about this time last year that
you & I went down? I look forward to Beverl[e]y not being there.
Jack Yeats describes his voice at its most dulcet (i. e. cajoling
young ladies in the club) as a sack of coal being delivered. The
3
I was offered a job as agent to an estate (Lord Rathdowne's? )
near Carlow. £300 per. an. & a free house. I passed it on to Percy
but he turned it down, on the ground that Beverley would whip
in a young wife the moment his back was turned. I thought it
4
Italian at Cape Town University, & perhaps I shall. 5 He says the fruit makes np for the Kaffirs. I should have reversed this prop osition myself.
I heard from Nancy Cunard. She is collecting the opinions of writers on the Spanish business. I replied "Uptherepublic". Then
6
selection ofJoachim Ringelnatz & translate it for a Faber & Faber
(page missing]7
Still there is a mass of marginalia that would be useful, e. g.
in the Annals his recollection of the first time that the
---
Heaven-Hell dichotomy was brought to his notice, when he was in bed with his mother aged 18 months. Heaven she
508
clack of a mill hopper occurs to me rather. It is Nash or Greene. Which alas is the difference, part of the difference.
would have suited him exactly.
Rudmose-Brown wants me to apply for a lectureship in
she wrote again, to demand amplifications.
A firm of Berlin publishers wrote asking me to make a
described as the happy place where some people went, Hell as
the sad place where the lost went. She does not seem to have
been at all High Church. The following morning, so that he
might impress the information on his mind, she required
him to repeat it to Thomas Jackson, their serving man. But he
8
i. e. the fear of his death, when he was being reproached by
his clerical friend Taylor for holding the opinion that an eternity
of torment was preferable to annihilation. He must have had
the notion ofpositive annihilation. Ofhow many can as much be
9
ing the surviving attention with Schopenhauer on women.
My brother has got himself engaged to be married. So has
11
12
Picture to review. I passed it on to Mrs. Salkeld.
Come back soon. I miss you. Remember me to Vera Sally
ALS; 3 leaves. 6 sides; letterhead; TxU.
1 The citation is from the preface to Maurice George Moore. An Irish Gentleman, George Henry Moore: His Travel, His Racing, His Politics(London: T. W. Laurie, 1913) xv-xvi. Joseph Hone writes in his memoir of SB: "I had asked him to look up for me a passage in George Moore's preface to his(Moore's) biography of their father, George Hay [for Henry] Moore. the Irish politician"("A Note on my Acquaintance with Sam Beckett"; TxU, J. M. Hone/ Works).
John Morley, 1st Viscount Morley of Blackburn (1838-1923); Winston Churchill (1874-1965).
509
wouldnot. Allthiswouldcomeinquitenaturallyinthelastact,
3July 1937, Hone
said.
I have been insulting myselfwith Belloc on Milton & divert
10
Devlin's poems come out shortly in the same series as mine did. I recommend them to you. My book
my agent George Reavey.
is with Allen & Unwin.
Seumas gave me McNeice's [for MacNeice's] Out of the
13
14
David.
Yrs ever
Sam
3 July 1937, Hone
2 Ussher's given names were Percival Arland; although he was previously called "Percy," he now preferred "Arland. " "On se fait a tout" (one can get used to anything).
3 SB called Robert Kahan, who was with the Board of Works, "another frustrated intellectual" (SB to McGreevy, 7 July 1937, TCD, MS 10402/128); Kahan pursued the interests of a scholar, linguist, and literary critic and was the Irish correspondent of the Jewish Chronicle (Alrland] Ulssher], "Mr. Robert Kahan: An Appreciation," The Irish Times 12 December 1951: 5). Cappagh, the Ussher family home in Co. Waterford, was owned by Arland Ussher's father, Beverley.
SB refers to English dramatist and satirist Thomas Nash (1567-1601) and English poet, playwright, and novelist Robert Greene (1558-1592); a specific allusion has not been found. At the end of SB's "Whoroscope" Notebook (BIF, UoR, MS 3000) are twelve pages headed 'For Interpolation' that include citations from Robert Greene's Menaphon (1589), in Groatsworth ofwitte, bought with a million ofrepentance; The repentance ofRobert Greene, 1592, ed. G. B. Harrison (London: Bodley Head, 1923), and Plays and Poems of Robert Greene, ed. J. Churton Collins, 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1905) (Pilling, "'For Interpolation': Beckett and English Literature," 218-219).
4 SBisnotcertainoftheowneroftheestate. TheRathdowneestatewasinCounty Dublin. It belonged to Godfrey John Boyle Chetwynd (1863-1936), Viscount Chetwynd, who was also Baron of Rathdowne; he was succeeded by his son Adam Duncan Chetwynd (1904-1965). The Rathdonnell estate in Country Carlow comes closer to the description SB gives. Thomas Leopold McClintock-Bunbury, Lord Rathdonnell (1880-1937), resided in England. His estate, Lisnavagh, had the same manager from 1930 to 1951, but it is possible that a smaller family property nearby, Oak Park, "could have required a manager in 1937" (Lord Rathdonnell lb. 1938], 30 November 1992; records of this estate are not extant).
SB described the position to Arland Ussher in his letter ! before 15 June 1937]: "Most of your truck would be with the auditors and proprietor (who seems to spend most of his time in England and is somewhere over here at present, fishing. Alas I do not know his name") (TxU). SB wrote to McGreevy, 7 July 1937, that he had encouraged both Arland Ussher and Joe Hone to apply:
I pushed Ussher for the job, but he would not go up for it, being apparently convinced that immediately he left the house at Cappagh his father would marry again & jeopardise the succession. I had mentioned all this writing to Joe Hone, now in Lausanne, & had a wire from him when in Cappagh entreating me to get the job for him! I wish I could, but fear it is now too late. (TCD, MS 10402/128)
5 SBwrotetoArlandUssheron15June1937:"NowthatIhaveassembledtestimo nials for the Cape Town Gehenna I am in a position to abstain from applying. "
6 Neither Cunard's letters nor SB's replies have been found, but SB wrote to McGreevy on 7 July 1937: "Nancy Cunard circularised me for my opinion of the Spanish business. I replied Up the republic. She wrote again, for amplifications . .
I replied again, that I could not make myself any clearer, unless she insisted that I should. Since when nothing" (TCD, MS 10402/128).
The Cunard collection at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center holds documents related to Cunard's project, including some original letters in reply to the questionnaire sent from Paris in June 1937; "These replies are the only survivors
510
3July 1937, Hone
of the 150 to 200 received by Cunard. The remainder 'disappeared during World War II, in my house at Reanville in Normandy'" (Lake, No Symbols Where None Intended, 36). Nancy Cunard initiated the project in June 1937 from Paris, with "The Question" addressed to "Writers and Poets ofEngland, Scotland, Ireland and Wales: . . . Are you for, or against, the legal Government and the People of Republican Spain? Are you for, or against, France and Fascism? " SB's response ("iUPTHEREPUBLIC! ") was pub lished in Nancy Cunard, ed. , Authors Take Sides on the Spanish War (London: Left Review, [1937)) [6]. Writers were asked to limit their contributions to six lines: SB's was the
briefest.
7 TheproposedEnglishtranslationofaselectionofpoemsbyRingelnatz:5June 1936 [for 1937], n. 4. SB wrote to Arland Ussher on 15June 1937: "I shall also back out of the Ringelnatz translation. " SB's letter to McGreevy of7 July 1937 offers greater detail: "The people in Berlin sent me three volumes of Ringelnatz. He is even worse than I thought and I do not think of undertaking the job of translating a selection from him. I had a letter from them again the other day asking for specimen translations to submit to T. S. E. ! ! ! " (TCD, MS 10402/128).
At this point a page is missing from the letter; as Hone describes in his memoir of SB: "The attached letter, ofwhich unfortunately a page is missing was written to me while I was in Switzerland in the summer of1937" ("A Note on my Acquaintance with Sam Beckett"; TxU, J. M. Hone / Works). The letter continues with SB's discussion of his preparations for writing a play on Samuel Johnson.
8 SB refers to Samuel Johnson's entry in his Annals during Lent 1712 (Diaries, Prayers, and Annals, 10; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/3, f. lR).
9 SBreferstoJohnTaylor'sALettertoSamuelJohnson,L. L. D. ontheSubjectofaFuture State [With some letters ofDr. Johnson and possibly in part written by him] (London: T. Cadell, 1787; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/2, f. 101V).
In a conversation with Anna Seward (1742-1809) who claimed that fear ofannihila tion "was groundless," Johnson reportedly said: "'Mere existence is so much better than nothing, that one would rather exist even in pain"' (Bate, SamuelJohnson, 452 ). In response to this conversation, SB notes: "Much as he dreaded the next world he dreaded annihilation still more" (BIF, UoR, MS 3461/2, f. 81R).
10 HilaireBelloc,Milton(London:Cassell,1935).
Arthur Schopenhauer, "Essay on Women," in Essays and Aphorisms, 80-88.
11 FrankBeckettwasengagedtoJeanWright;SBwrotetoMcGreevyon7July1937: "Frank hopes to get married about the middle of August. Another gone. From me I mean of course. He is house hunting. Do write & congratulate him" (TCD, MS 10402/128).
George Reavey was engaged to Clodine Gwynedd Cade. SB wrote to McGreevy on 7 July 1937: "I sent George a Meissen wine cup before I left [for Cappagh] but have had no acknowledgment. I suppose he knows what he is doing, but it is hard not to feel sorry for him. I don't think he'll write much more poetry" (TCD, MS 10402/128); a certificate of authentication dated 1 July 1937 from Harris & Sinclair, Dublin, is in Reavey's papers (TxU; Reavey collection, miscellaneous).
12 Denis Devlin, Intercessions, Europa Poets (London: Europa Press, 1937). SB's col lection of poems Echo's Bones was the third in this series.
Murphy was being read by London publisher Allen and Unwin.
511
3 July 1937, Hone
13 SeumasO'SullivanaskedSBtoreviewOutofthePicture(1937)byLouisMacNeice (ne Frederick Louis MacNeice 1907-1963); it was reviewed by Blanaid Salkeld in Dublin Magazine 12. 4 (October-December 1937) 67-68.
14 JoeHone'swifeVera,andtheirchildrenSally(m. Cooke-Smith,1914-2003)and David (b. 1928).
AXEL KAUN BERLIN
[SB's Letter to Axel Kaun below exists only as a draft, corrected by various hands over time; it is presented here without editorial corrections. ]
9/7/37
6 Clare Street Dublin
IFS
Lieber Axel Kaun!
Besten Dank fur Ihren Brief. Ich war gerade im Begriff,
Ihnen zu schreiben, als er kam. Dann habe ich verreisen mus sen, wie Ringelnatz' mannlicher Briefmark, obgleich unter
1
Ringelnatz ist meiner Ansicht nach nicht der Muhe wert. Sie werden sicherlich nicht mehr enttauscht sein, dies von mir zu horen, als ich es gewesen bin, es feststellen zu miissen.
Ich habe die 3 Bande durchgelesen, 23 Gedichte ausge
2
was sie notwendigerweise dabei verloren haben, ist naturlich
nur im Verhaltnis mit dem zu schatzen, was sie eigentlich
3
Daraus ist gar nicht zu schliessen, dass ein iibersetzter Ringelnatz weder Interesse noch Erfolg beim englischen
512
weniger leidenschaftlichen Umstanden.
Das Beste ist, ich sage Ihnen sofort und ohne Umschweife,
wahltund2vondiesenalsProbestuckeubersetzt. Daswenige,
zu verlieren haben, und ich muss [_]en, dass ich diesen Verschlecterungskoeffizient, auch da, wo er am meisten Dichter ist, und am wenigsten Reimkuli, ganz gering gefunden habe.
