Harry
Sinclair
and Boss were twin brothers.
Samuel Beckett
Brian Coffey had been in London.
12 SBreferstoDenisDevlin'scollectionofpoemsIntercessions,notyetpublishedby Reavey'sEuropa Press. Irish writerEdward Sheehy (c. 1910-1956) was on the staffof Ireland To-Day, a journal published from June 1936 to March 1938, edited by Frank O'Connor. SB did not write this review.
"Execute myself' (Gallicism for "do it as asked").
13 KimmageisaDublinsuburb. TheannualRoyalHibernianAcademyExhibition was at this time.
14 Ethna MacCarthy's painting by the School of Pourbus: 20 February 1935, n. 13.
15 VeraHone;LennoxandDollyRobinson. "Would not go" (Gallicism for "wouldn't work").
16 Three works by Poussin were lent for the Chefs d'Oeuvre de ! 'Art Franc;:ais Exhibition at the Palais National des Arts in Paris from June to October 1937: The Entombment of Christ (NG! 214 ), Acis and Galatea (NG! 814), and an ink and wash on paper, The Marriage of Acis and Galatea (NG! 2842). Lucas Cranach's painting Christ on the Cross (NGJ 471) was lent to the Kaiser Friedrich Museum in Berlin (from 24 April 1937); A Young Fisherman of Scheveningen (also known as The Fisher Boy, NGI 193) by Franz Hals was lent for the Franz Hals Exhibition in Haarlem Uuly to September 1937) ("National Gallery of Ireland: Loans and Purchases," The Irish Times 8 April 1937: 8).
17 When in Spain during the summer and autumn of 1936, Nancy Cunard met Pablo Neruda, who introduced her to Spanish poets, and encouraged her to create a series to print poetry inspired by the Spanish Civil War. Six pamphlets were published in 1937, hand-printed by Cunard and Neruda on her press at Reanville: Les Poetes du monde defendent le peup! e espagnol (Poets of the World Defend the Spanish People). The first number, Dos Poemas, consisted of a poem by Neruda, "Canto sobre unas ruinas", and another by Cunard, "Para hacerse amar", tr. Vicente Aleixandre (La Chapelle Reanville, 1937; Chisholm, Nancy Cunard: A Biography, 235-238; Rafael Osuna, Pablo Neruda y Nancy Cunard: ! es poetes du monde defendent le peuple espagnol lMadrid: Editorial Origenes, 1987] 21-30).
18 ThomasRudmose-BrownpublishedareviewofthethesisofErnaLow,"Beitrage zur De Tabley Forschung" (University of Vienna, 1935) in Dublin Magazine 12. 2 (April-June 1937) 72-74. In the review, Rudmose-Brown writes of how the poetry of John Byrne Leicester Warren, Baron de Tabley (1835-1895) influenced him while a student in Aberdeen; Rudmose-Brown alludes to his wife's death through quotation of de Tabley's lines ("How lonely all the years will run / Until I rest by thee" and "To listen for a step that will not come! ").
Llewelyn Powys, "Dr. Johnson - Idler, Rambler and Straggler," Dublin Magazine 12. 2 (April-June 1937) 9-15.
American-born British writer Vincent O'Sullivan (ne Sean O'Suilleabhain, 1872-1940) had financial and US citizenship difficulties at this time (letter 6 March 1937 to Seumas O'Sullivan, TCD, MSS 4630-49/1439; letter to A. J. A. Symons 1 March 11937], in Vincent O'Sullivan, Selected Letters, ed. Alan Anderson ILoanhead, Scotland: Tragara Press. 1993] 43-45). Vincent O'Sullivan had done some paid research for
492
26 April 1937, McGreevy Joseph Hone's book on George Moore in 1934-1935 (Vincent O'Sullivan, FifteenLetters
to Seumas O'Sullivan [Edinburgh: Tragara Press, 1979] 20-24, 28).
19 Big Sugarloaf (1,659 feet) is southwest of Bray, Co. Wicklow. SB refers to the Fassaroe cross, 1 mile northeast of Enniskerry and 2 miles west-southwest of Bray, in a niche on the north side ofa narrow by-road (road SN 337); a primitive crucifixion is on one side and two human heads on the other (Anthony Weir, Early Ireland: A Field Guide [Belfast: BlackstaffPress, 1980] 231; William Cumming, Architect, National Monuments Division,The Office ofPublic Works, Dublin, 1 November 1994).
Whitsunday fell on 16 May in 1937. Clonmel is the largest town in Co. Tipperary. The Galtee Mountains, the highest inland range in Ireland, extend westward for about 16 miles from Cahir, Co. Tipperary. Blackstairs Mountain (2,411 feet) is in Co. Carlow, near Cashel, Co. Tipperary.
20 SB's reading notes about Samuel Johnson, especially his relationship with HesterThrale, can be found in his notebooks for Human Wishes (BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1-3).
Johnson and theThrales: 13 December 1936 and n. 6 and n. 8.
After his stroke, Johnson wrote to Hester Thrale on 19 June 1785: "I have loved you with virtuous affection, I have honoured You with sincere Esteem. Let not all our endear ment be forgotten" (Samuel Johnson,Letters ofSamuelJohnsonLLD. , II. Jan15, 1777-Dec. 18,
1784, col. and ed. George Birkbeck Hill [New York: Harper and Brothers, 1892] 303). When Johnson suspected Mrs. Thrale had already married Piozzi, he berated her in what is known as his "rough Jetter" of 2 July 1784: "If you have abandoned your children and your religion, God forgive your wickedness. " Then, thinking that he might still prevent the marriage, he added: "I who have loved you, esteemed you, reverenced you, & served you, I who long thought you the first of womankind, entreat that before your fate is irrevocable, I may once more see you" Oohnson,Letters ofSamuel
Johnson, LL. D, II, 405-406; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1. f. 10-llR, f. 12 R).
21 Vulliamy wrote that Mr. Thrale "could never emerge from his constitutional torpidity, and all that we know of him proves him to have been a man whose intelligence was Jess than mediocre. " Yet Johnson supported Thrale in domestic dis putes and "expressed a high regard for Mr. Thrale, in which it was difficult to avoid seeing a trace of hypocrisy or of obstinacy" (Mrs. Thrale of Streatham, 68-69, 72).
22 HesterThralemarriedPiozziinLondonon23July1784. Herlastmeetingwith Johnson was on 5 April 1783, when Johnson wrote in his Diary (rather than his Meditations): "I took leave of Mrs. Thrale. I was much moved. I had some expostulations with her. She said that she was likewise affected" (Samuel Johnson, Diaries, Prayers, and Annals, ed. E. L. McAdam, Jr. with Donald Hyde and Mary Hyde,The Yale Edition of the Works of Samuel Johnson, I [New Haven: Yale University Press, 1958] 358-359).
When Mr. and Mrs. Thrale had discovered Johnson on his knees before Dr. John Delap (1725-1812) in June 1766, "Beseeching God to continue to him the use of his understanding," they resolved to take him into their country home, Streatham, where he stayed from late June until October, and where he later became a regular visitor (Bate, SamuelJohnson, 412; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1, f. 41R).
Irish writer Arthur Murphy (ne Charles Ranger, 1727-1805), HenryThrale's oldest friend, had introduced Johnson to the Thrales; Murphy supported Mrs. Thrale in her decision to marry Piozzi, when even her friend Frances Burney (known as Fanny, 1752-1840), among others, sought to prevent it (Bate, Samuel Johnson, 572; BIF, UoR. MS 3461/1, f. 14R and f. 35 R).
493
26 April 1937, McGreevy
When Frank Barber was interviewed by "Our Ingenious Meteorological Journalist" for Gentleman's Magazine, he reported that Johnson had never cursed at him, saying that the worst word he had had from Johnson was: "You dunghill dog" ("A Meteorologist's Tour from Walton to London," Gentleman's Magazine and Historical 63. 1 Uuly 1793] 620).
23 Les Lauriers sont coupes (1887) by Edouard Dujardin (1861-1949). Joyce read the novel between 1902 and 1903. tried without success to be in touch with Dujardin in 1917. and acknowledged the impact of Dujardin on Ulysses (Ellmann. James Joyce. 126, 411. 520; Elizabeth van der Staay, Le Monologue interieur dans ! 'oeuvre de Valery Larbaud [Paris: Champion-Slatkine, 1987], 84-85; Mary Colum disputes this influence, Life and the Dream, 394-395). Joyce mentioned Dujardin's novel to Larbaud in 1921 and secured a copy for Larbaud, who became an admirer, writing the preface for Les Lauriers sont coupes when it was reissued (Paris: Messein, 1925) (Ellmann, James Joyce, 519-520).
"Astuce" (shrewdness).
24 Jeremy Thompson, son ofAlan Thompson and Frances Sylvia Thompson (nee
Reeves, 1904-1982), was born on 25April 1937.
25 CharlesPrentice. IfSBwrotetohim,theletterhasnotbeenfound.
26 On19September1777BoswellnotedofJohnson:"'If(saidhe)1hadnoduties, and no reference to futurity, I would spend my life in driving briskly in a post-chaise with a pretty woman; but she should be one who could understand me, and would add something to the conversation'" (Boswell, Boswell's Life of]ohnson, Ill, The Life /1776-1780}, 162). SB commented in his notebook for Human Wishes that this was a symptom of impotence (BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1, f. 90V).
27 At Seumas O'Sullivan's home, Grange House, Beckett's aunt, Cissie Sinclair, met Ernest O'Malley (1898-1957), a Republican, journalist, and advocate of Irish artists.
THOMAS McGREEVY LONDON
14/5/37 Cooldrinagh Foxrock
DearTom
I was very sorry to hear about Raven. I can well imagine the
kind of performance. He will probably feel much better for it, for a time. I wish you did not come in for all these dramas. Dont be
1
died in Rathdrum Sanatorium lastTuesday week and was buried
494
persuaded to go back to 15.
I have done very little for the past fortnight. Boss Sinclair
in the Jewish cemetery the following Thursday. The week before
I was down with Cissie I don't know how many times. His last
words to me were an apology for his poor company. Har:ry was
with him at the end. Cissie takes it quite calmly, her affective
apparatus is worn out. He is not missed from the house in Mayne
Road because he was never there. Har:ry & Cissie asked me to
write something for the Irish Times, which I did, with only an
hour to do it. Har:ry put it into Smyllie's hand, I standing visible
but aloof, and did not say whose it was. Smyllie promised to put
it in, had in fact asked Harry for something, but it did not appear.
2
some weeks before his death. Gogarty has been evading service of
writ for the past 3 or 4 days & I do not think they have got him
even now. Dodging out ofhis back door, sleeping in Howth, etc.
What good does he think that will do him. All kinds of dirt will be
raked up & I suppose they will try & discredit me as author of the
Pricks. That is ifGogarty faces the court, which I fancy he will do
lepping, unless Cowan & Rich [for Rich & Cowan] insist on settling
outside. Apparently he & they took advice at every point of the
book, but from some London lawyer incompetent to appreciate
the references! I think most people here disapprove of the action,
however little sympathy they may have with the defendant,
perhaps just on that account. But there are limits to scurrility, &
to cynical laissez-faire. It is not pleasant for me and wont do me
3
495
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Har:ry had to write something himselfin the end.
I suppose you have read about the action for libel that Har:ry is taking against Gogarty. I am in it up to the neck. And gladly in so far as Boss wanted it done, having seen the offending passage
any good. But it will amuse me. And Boss wanted it. Assez.
I met Furlong one evening at Hones and left him to it very shortly after dinner, left him talking about the dear Rajah who was so anxious to obtain his services and the exquisite Lady
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Fingal[l), in his voice where the Nancy, Mayfair & Tipperary
elements meet without mixing. Ineffable shoulders. His sole
aesthetic remark was that Vermeer built up his pictures in a
contrast of blue & yellow. I very nearly asked him which
4
I was really shocked to see what he had done with the
Gallery. He has taken all the Dutch pictures down to the print
room & the prints are in the cellars. The print room is done up a
cold dark scientific laboratory or public lavatory green. There is
no top light & the pictures, all boldly hung in a single line, are
worse than invisible. As there is not room for them all on the
walls he is experimenting with movable screens. He looks for
ward to treating the sculpture hall in the same way, i. e. remov
ing the casts & putting pictures there. There is no top lighting
there either. No matter how one addresses oneselfto a picture
one has the light in one's eyes. And they are all hung on about a
5
when there is plenty ofroom & the line set at the right height, is
carried on upstairs, where the Italian pictures begin now in the
Dutch rooms (& Irish room) & finish with the awful Gentileschi
& Piazzetta in the big room where they all were previously. The
wallpaper has been done up an indescribable shade ofanchovy
which Furlong asserts "goes well" with "Italian pictures", as a
man might have a prejudice in favour ofstout with oysters. It
has a pleasant effect on the blues of Canaletto & Bellotto. The
result of the single line is acres of this heavy angry colour
weighing down on the pictures and on the spectator. The rail
6
Vermeer he meant. He talked all the stock sentimental bunk about the Nazi persecutions. He asked were you in Paris. I said, on the contrary. He doesn't smoke & he doesn't drink & tea parties are his passion -
level with the pubic bone.
The mania for single line hanging, which is all very well
hehasremovedaltogether. ViewsofRosalbacorrespondacross
496
the stairs. The big Perugino has gone to Vienna "for examina
tion. " The Barry Adam & Eve has gone down to the cellars.
Where he got the money from I don't know. Or how he got
even that Board of Guardians to consent. Now he wants artificial
7
Jack Yeats & Cottie came out to Foxrock for tea & got on well with Mother. He has sold £280 worth in the last fortnight. A 30 pounder (the boy & horse) to Brian [for Bryan] Guinness; the £100 "Where Grass Grows" [for "While Grass Grows"] in the Academy to the Haverty Trust & the big new Waves ofBreffni [for Breffny] that I think I mentioned to you to someone from London who saw it in his studio, I think Talbot Davis was the name -8
The Academy was incredibly awful. Bridget [for Brigid] O'Brien stands now in a fair way to take the place ofpapa -9
I had lunch one day with Brian. 10 He didn't admit me into his confidence. Talked most of the time about Saint[e]-Beuve and the critical function. And mentioned he was looking for a part time teaching job in London. Saw him again yesterday in the Library, looking really ill.
Mother went off on the mailboat this morning, with Mrs Manning, who sails to-morrow from Liverpool to America, to help deliver Mary. Then mother will go on to her brother near Newark for a short stay. This afternoon Frank & I are going down to Cahir for 3 or 4 days. I am looking forward to seeing Cashel again on the way down -11
The George II they blew up yesterday in the Green was one of the best statues in Dublin. If it had been Victoria or the
12
wife) & congratulated him on having resumed his cricket.
lighting and evening opening. It is time someone put him in mind of the purpose of a picture gallery, to provide pictures worth looking at and the possibility of seeing them.
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Cenotaph no one would have minded.
I met the hearty (? ) Mr Skeffington at the Academy (with
13
497
"Oh
14 May 1937, McGreevy
I am sure" he said "you would love to be playing too, ifyou analysed yourself. " The right answer was that I had overcome the need ofreturning to my vomit.
I am sorry that you mentioned anything to the Robinsons.
Hone thought Vera's manoeuvre as gratuitous as I did. Why
should he like my book? Or me? The Hones are off to Switzerland
next week, with the wretched little David, who is to be left there.
Vera has ordained that he is ill & halfthe doctors in town have
14
publicity value ofyour demarche. " 15 God love thee. Write very soon
Ever Sam
ALS; 3 leaves, 6 sides; ! water damage and torn at lower left margin (recto), lower right (verso)]; TCD, MS 10402/127.
1 Thomas Ravenhill, McGreevy's friend, who was resident at 15 Cheyne Gardens, Chelsea; the incident to which SB refers is unknown.
2 William "Boss" Sinclair died on 4 May 1937 and was buried in the Jewish Cemetery at Dolphin's Barn, Dublin, on 6 May.
Harry Sinclair and Boss were twin brothers. Cissie Sinclair had moved the family to a house on Moyne Road, Rathgar, during Boss's illness and hospitalization. Although SB wrote "some 100 Jines hurriedly on Boss Sinclair for the Irish Times," R. M. Smyllie, Editor of The Irish Times, published an unsigned obituary (SB to Mary Manning Howe, 22 May 1937, TxU); From a Correspondent, "William Abraham Sinclair. " 8 May 1937: 10).
3 As reported in The Irish Times ("Alleged Libel in Novel: Summons against Dr. Gogarty: London Publishers to be Sued," 14 May 1937: 2), Harry Sinclair initiated legal action against Oliver St. John Gogarty, and his London publishers Rich and Cowan, for libelous passages in his novel As I Was Going Down Sackville Street: A Phantasy in Fact (London: Rich and Cowan, 1937). The plaintiffcited passages that maligned himselfand his late brother, as well as his grandfather Morris Harris (1823-1909), who were in business as Harris and Sinclair, Antique Plate, Jewellery and Works of Art, 47 Nassau Street, until the shop was moved to 4 Grafton Street, Dublin.
SB was named as a witness, and the article cites from his affidavit:
Mr. Wood read an affidavit by Mr. Samuel Beckett, author, of Cooldrinagh, Foxrock. who stated that he purchased a copy of "As I Was Going Down Sackville Street," his attention having been called to it by many advertisements that he had read, and, he said, the notoriety of its author.
498
had a whack at him.
Leventhal's remark, a propos ofthe libel: "I appreciate the
On reading paragraphs at pages 65, 70 and 71 he instantly inferred that the lines commencing 'Two Jews in Sackville Street" referred to Mr. Henry Morris Sinclair and the late Mr. William Abraham Sinclair, and the words "old usurer" and "grandsons" referred to the late Mr. Morris Harris and his two grandsons. He considered that the words constituted a very grave charge against Mr. Henry Morris Sinclair and his late brother. (2)
SB thought that his authorship of More Pricks Than Kicks would be used to discredit him; Proust and Whoroscope also served that purpose in the trial (Ulick O'Connor, Oliver St. John Gogarty: A Poet and His Times [London: Jonathan Cape, 1964[, 280-281).
"Assez" (Enough).
4 GeorgeFurlong,DirectoroftheNationalGallery.
It is not known to what Rajah Furlong refers. SB mentions a Maharajah of Chittagong (then in East Bengal, now in Bangladesh) in his letter to Mary Manning Howe (22 May 1937; TxU), but Chittagong had not been a regal colony since it was ceded to the East-India Company in 1760, and did not have a Maharajah (Dorian Leveque, Oriental and India Office Collections, British Library, 21 June 2006; Edward Thornton,A Gazetteer ofthe Tenitories under the Government ofthe East-India Company and of the Native States on the Continent ofIndia [London: William H. Allen, 1857] 206. )
Furlong refers to Elizabeth Mary Margaret Plunkett (nee Burke, 1866-1944), then Dowager Countess of Fingall (following the death of her husband Horace Plunkett, 11th Earl of Fingall in 1929). To SB, Furlong's voice contained tones of Nancy [? Cunard], Mayfair (smart London), and Tipperary (rural Ireland).
There was no Vermeer in the collection of the National Gallery oflreland.
5 TheDutchcollectionoftheNationalGallerywasrehunginagroundfloorroom that had been the print room, with the only light from side windows, darkened with frosted glass Uohn Dowling, "Art: Advice and Estimates Free," Ireland To-Day 2. 10 [October 1937] 63, 77).
6 The Italian collection was rehung and distributed across the first floor rooms (formerly the Dutch, Irish and Italian rooms). SB refers to David Slaying Goliath (NG! 980) by Gentileschi and A Decorative Group (NG! 656, now attributed to the Studio of Giovanni Battista Piazzetta [1682-1754]).
Paintings by Canaletto: A View of the Piazza San Marco (NG! 286), The Grand Canal with the Church ofSalute (NG! 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).
12 SBreferstoDenisDevlin'scollectionofpoemsIntercessions,notyetpublishedby Reavey'sEuropa Press. Irish writerEdward Sheehy (c. 1910-1956) was on the staffof Ireland To-Day, a journal published from June 1936 to March 1938, edited by Frank O'Connor. SB did not write this review.
"Execute myself' (Gallicism for "do it as asked").
13 KimmageisaDublinsuburb. TheannualRoyalHibernianAcademyExhibition was at this time.
14 Ethna MacCarthy's painting by the School of Pourbus: 20 February 1935, n. 13.
15 VeraHone;LennoxandDollyRobinson. "Would not go" (Gallicism for "wouldn't work").
16 Three works by Poussin were lent for the Chefs d'Oeuvre de ! 'Art Franc;:ais Exhibition at the Palais National des Arts in Paris from June to October 1937: The Entombment of Christ (NG! 214 ), Acis and Galatea (NG! 814), and an ink and wash on paper, The Marriage of Acis and Galatea (NG! 2842). Lucas Cranach's painting Christ on the Cross (NGJ 471) was lent to the Kaiser Friedrich Museum in Berlin (from 24 April 1937); A Young Fisherman of Scheveningen (also known as The Fisher Boy, NGI 193) by Franz Hals was lent for the Franz Hals Exhibition in Haarlem Uuly to September 1937) ("National Gallery of Ireland: Loans and Purchases," The Irish Times 8 April 1937: 8).
17 When in Spain during the summer and autumn of 1936, Nancy Cunard met Pablo Neruda, who introduced her to Spanish poets, and encouraged her to create a series to print poetry inspired by the Spanish Civil War. Six pamphlets were published in 1937, hand-printed by Cunard and Neruda on her press at Reanville: Les Poetes du monde defendent le peup! e espagnol (Poets of the World Defend the Spanish People). The first number, Dos Poemas, consisted of a poem by Neruda, "Canto sobre unas ruinas", and another by Cunard, "Para hacerse amar", tr. Vicente Aleixandre (La Chapelle Reanville, 1937; Chisholm, Nancy Cunard: A Biography, 235-238; Rafael Osuna, Pablo Neruda y Nancy Cunard: ! es poetes du monde defendent le peuple espagnol lMadrid: Editorial Origenes, 1987] 21-30).
18 ThomasRudmose-BrownpublishedareviewofthethesisofErnaLow,"Beitrage zur De Tabley Forschung" (University of Vienna, 1935) in Dublin Magazine 12. 2 (April-June 1937) 72-74. In the review, Rudmose-Brown writes of how the poetry of John Byrne Leicester Warren, Baron de Tabley (1835-1895) influenced him while a student in Aberdeen; Rudmose-Brown alludes to his wife's death through quotation of de Tabley's lines ("How lonely all the years will run / Until I rest by thee" and "To listen for a step that will not come! ").
Llewelyn Powys, "Dr. Johnson - Idler, Rambler and Straggler," Dublin Magazine 12. 2 (April-June 1937) 9-15.
American-born British writer Vincent O'Sullivan (ne Sean O'Suilleabhain, 1872-1940) had financial and US citizenship difficulties at this time (letter 6 March 1937 to Seumas O'Sullivan, TCD, MSS 4630-49/1439; letter to A. J. A. Symons 1 March 11937], in Vincent O'Sullivan, Selected Letters, ed. Alan Anderson ILoanhead, Scotland: Tragara Press. 1993] 43-45). Vincent O'Sullivan had done some paid research for
492
26 April 1937, McGreevy Joseph Hone's book on George Moore in 1934-1935 (Vincent O'Sullivan, FifteenLetters
to Seumas O'Sullivan [Edinburgh: Tragara Press, 1979] 20-24, 28).
19 Big Sugarloaf (1,659 feet) is southwest of Bray, Co. Wicklow. SB refers to the Fassaroe cross, 1 mile northeast of Enniskerry and 2 miles west-southwest of Bray, in a niche on the north side ofa narrow by-road (road SN 337); a primitive crucifixion is on one side and two human heads on the other (Anthony Weir, Early Ireland: A Field Guide [Belfast: BlackstaffPress, 1980] 231; William Cumming, Architect, National Monuments Division,The Office ofPublic Works, Dublin, 1 November 1994).
Whitsunday fell on 16 May in 1937. Clonmel is the largest town in Co. Tipperary. The Galtee Mountains, the highest inland range in Ireland, extend westward for about 16 miles from Cahir, Co. Tipperary. Blackstairs Mountain (2,411 feet) is in Co. Carlow, near Cashel, Co. Tipperary.
20 SB's reading notes about Samuel Johnson, especially his relationship with HesterThrale, can be found in his notebooks for Human Wishes (BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1-3).
Johnson and theThrales: 13 December 1936 and n. 6 and n. 8.
After his stroke, Johnson wrote to Hester Thrale on 19 June 1785: "I have loved you with virtuous affection, I have honoured You with sincere Esteem. Let not all our endear ment be forgotten" (Samuel Johnson,Letters ofSamuelJohnsonLLD. , II. Jan15, 1777-Dec. 18,
1784, col. and ed. George Birkbeck Hill [New York: Harper and Brothers, 1892] 303). When Johnson suspected Mrs. Thrale had already married Piozzi, he berated her in what is known as his "rough Jetter" of 2 July 1784: "If you have abandoned your children and your religion, God forgive your wickedness. " Then, thinking that he might still prevent the marriage, he added: "I who have loved you, esteemed you, reverenced you, & served you, I who long thought you the first of womankind, entreat that before your fate is irrevocable, I may once more see you" Oohnson,Letters ofSamuel
Johnson, LL. D, II, 405-406; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1. f. 10-llR, f. 12 R).
21 Vulliamy wrote that Mr. Thrale "could never emerge from his constitutional torpidity, and all that we know of him proves him to have been a man whose intelligence was Jess than mediocre. " Yet Johnson supported Thrale in domestic dis putes and "expressed a high regard for Mr. Thrale, in which it was difficult to avoid seeing a trace of hypocrisy or of obstinacy" (Mrs. Thrale of Streatham, 68-69, 72).
22 HesterThralemarriedPiozziinLondonon23July1784. Herlastmeetingwith Johnson was on 5 April 1783, when Johnson wrote in his Diary (rather than his Meditations): "I took leave of Mrs. Thrale. I was much moved. I had some expostulations with her. She said that she was likewise affected" (Samuel Johnson, Diaries, Prayers, and Annals, ed. E. L. McAdam, Jr. with Donald Hyde and Mary Hyde,The Yale Edition of the Works of Samuel Johnson, I [New Haven: Yale University Press, 1958] 358-359).
When Mr. and Mrs. Thrale had discovered Johnson on his knees before Dr. John Delap (1725-1812) in June 1766, "Beseeching God to continue to him the use of his understanding," they resolved to take him into their country home, Streatham, where he stayed from late June until October, and where he later became a regular visitor (Bate, SamuelJohnson, 412; BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1, f. 41R).
Irish writer Arthur Murphy (ne Charles Ranger, 1727-1805), HenryThrale's oldest friend, had introduced Johnson to the Thrales; Murphy supported Mrs. Thrale in her decision to marry Piozzi, when even her friend Frances Burney (known as Fanny, 1752-1840), among others, sought to prevent it (Bate, Samuel Johnson, 572; BIF, UoR. MS 3461/1, f. 14R and f. 35 R).
493
26 April 1937, McGreevy
When Frank Barber was interviewed by "Our Ingenious Meteorological Journalist" for Gentleman's Magazine, he reported that Johnson had never cursed at him, saying that the worst word he had had from Johnson was: "You dunghill dog" ("A Meteorologist's Tour from Walton to London," Gentleman's Magazine and Historical 63. 1 Uuly 1793] 620).
23 Les Lauriers sont coupes (1887) by Edouard Dujardin (1861-1949). Joyce read the novel between 1902 and 1903. tried without success to be in touch with Dujardin in 1917. and acknowledged the impact of Dujardin on Ulysses (Ellmann. James Joyce. 126, 411. 520; Elizabeth van der Staay, Le Monologue interieur dans ! 'oeuvre de Valery Larbaud [Paris: Champion-Slatkine, 1987], 84-85; Mary Colum disputes this influence, Life and the Dream, 394-395). Joyce mentioned Dujardin's novel to Larbaud in 1921 and secured a copy for Larbaud, who became an admirer, writing the preface for Les Lauriers sont coupes when it was reissued (Paris: Messein, 1925) (Ellmann, James Joyce, 519-520).
"Astuce" (shrewdness).
24 Jeremy Thompson, son ofAlan Thompson and Frances Sylvia Thompson (nee
Reeves, 1904-1982), was born on 25April 1937.
25 CharlesPrentice. IfSBwrotetohim,theletterhasnotbeenfound.
26 On19September1777BoswellnotedofJohnson:"'If(saidhe)1hadnoduties, and no reference to futurity, I would spend my life in driving briskly in a post-chaise with a pretty woman; but she should be one who could understand me, and would add something to the conversation'" (Boswell, Boswell's Life of]ohnson, Ill, The Life /1776-1780}, 162). SB commented in his notebook for Human Wishes that this was a symptom of impotence (BIF, UoR, MS 3461/1, f. 90V).
27 At Seumas O'Sullivan's home, Grange House, Beckett's aunt, Cissie Sinclair, met Ernest O'Malley (1898-1957), a Republican, journalist, and advocate of Irish artists.
THOMAS McGREEVY LONDON
14/5/37 Cooldrinagh Foxrock
DearTom
I was very sorry to hear about Raven. I can well imagine the
kind of performance. He will probably feel much better for it, for a time. I wish you did not come in for all these dramas. Dont be
1
died in Rathdrum Sanatorium lastTuesday week and was buried
494
persuaded to go back to 15.
I have done very little for the past fortnight. Boss Sinclair
in the Jewish cemetery the following Thursday. The week before
I was down with Cissie I don't know how many times. His last
words to me were an apology for his poor company. Har:ry was
with him at the end. Cissie takes it quite calmly, her affective
apparatus is worn out. He is not missed from the house in Mayne
Road because he was never there. Har:ry & Cissie asked me to
write something for the Irish Times, which I did, with only an
hour to do it. Har:ry put it into Smyllie's hand, I standing visible
but aloof, and did not say whose it was. Smyllie promised to put
it in, had in fact asked Harry for something, but it did not appear.
2
some weeks before his death. Gogarty has been evading service of
writ for the past 3 or 4 days & I do not think they have got him
even now. Dodging out ofhis back door, sleeping in Howth, etc.
What good does he think that will do him. All kinds of dirt will be
raked up & I suppose they will try & discredit me as author of the
Pricks. That is ifGogarty faces the court, which I fancy he will do
lepping, unless Cowan & Rich [for Rich & Cowan] insist on settling
outside. Apparently he & they took advice at every point of the
book, but from some London lawyer incompetent to appreciate
the references! I think most people here disapprove of the action,
however little sympathy they may have with the defendant,
perhaps just on that account. But there are limits to scurrility, &
to cynical laissez-faire. It is not pleasant for me and wont do me
3
495
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Har:ry had to write something himselfin the end.
I suppose you have read about the action for libel that Har:ry is taking against Gogarty. I am in it up to the neck. And gladly in so far as Boss wanted it done, having seen the offending passage
any good. But it will amuse me. And Boss wanted it. Assez.
I met Furlong one evening at Hones and left him to it very shortly after dinner, left him talking about the dear Rajah who was so anxious to obtain his services and the exquisite Lady
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Fingal[l), in his voice where the Nancy, Mayfair & Tipperary
elements meet without mixing. Ineffable shoulders. His sole
aesthetic remark was that Vermeer built up his pictures in a
contrast of blue & yellow. I very nearly asked him which
4
I was really shocked to see what he had done with the
Gallery. He has taken all the Dutch pictures down to the print
room & the prints are in the cellars. The print room is done up a
cold dark scientific laboratory or public lavatory green. There is
no top light & the pictures, all boldly hung in a single line, are
worse than invisible. As there is not room for them all on the
walls he is experimenting with movable screens. He looks for
ward to treating the sculpture hall in the same way, i. e. remov
ing the casts & putting pictures there. There is no top lighting
there either. No matter how one addresses oneselfto a picture
one has the light in one's eyes. And they are all hung on about a
5
when there is plenty ofroom & the line set at the right height, is
carried on upstairs, where the Italian pictures begin now in the
Dutch rooms (& Irish room) & finish with the awful Gentileschi
& Piazzetta in the big room where they all were previously. The
wallpaper has been done up an indescribable shade ofanchovy
which Furlong asserts "goes well" with "Italian pictures", as a
man might have a prejudice in favour ofstout with oysters. It
has a pleasant effect on the blues of Canaletto & Bellotto. The
result of the single line is acres of this heavy angry colour
weighing down on the pictures and on the spectator. The rail
6
Vermeer he meant. He talked all the stock sentimental bunk about the Nazi persecutions. He asked were you in Paris. I said, on the contrary. He doesn't smoke & he doesn't drink & tea parties are his passion -
level with the pubic bone.
The mania for single line hanging, which is all very well
hehasremovedaltogether. ViewsofRosalbacorrespondacross
496
the stairs. The big Perugino has gone to Vienna "for examina
tion. " The Barry Adam & Eve has gone down to the cellars.
Where he got the money from I don't know. Or how he got
even that Board of Guardians to consent. Now he wants artificial
7
Jack Yeats & Cottie came out to Foxrock for tea & got on well with Mother. He has sold £280 worth in the last fortnight. A 30 pounder (the boy & horse) to Brian [for Bryan] Guinness; the £100 "Where Grass Grows" [for "While Grass Grows"] in the Academy to the Haverty Trust & the big new Waves ofBreffni [for Breffny] that I think I mentioned to you to someone from London who saw it in his studio, I think Talbot Davis was the name -8
The Academy was incredibly awful. Bridget [for Brigid] O'Brien stands now in a fair way to take the place ofpapa -9
I had lunch one day with Brian. 10 He didn't admit me into his confidence. Talked most of the time about Saint[e]-Beuve and the critical function. And mentioned he was looking for a part time teaching job in London. Saw him again yesterday in the Library, looking really ill.
Mother went off on the mailboat this morning, with Mrs Manning, who sails to-morrow from Liverpool to America, to help deliver Mary. Then mother will go on to her brother near Newark for a short stay. This afternoon Frank & I are going down to Cahir for 3 or 4 days. I am looking forward to seeing Cashel again on the way down -11
The George II they blew up yesterday in the Green was one of the best statues in Dublin. If it had been Victoria or the
12
wife) & congratulated him on having resumed his cricket.
lighting and evening opening. It is time someone put him in mind of the purpose of a picture gallery, to provide pictures worth looking at and the possibility of seeing them.
14 May 1937, McGreevy
Cenotaph no one would have minded.
I met the hearty (? ) Mr Skeffington at the Academy (with
13
497
"Oh
14 May 1937, McGreevy
I am sure" he said "you would love to be playing too, ifyou analysed yourself. " The right answer was that I had overcome the need ofreturning to my vomit.
I am sorry that you mentioned anything to the Robinsons.
Hone thought Vera's manoeuvre as gratuitous as I did. Why
should he like my book? Or me? The Hones are off to Switzerland
next week, with the wretched little David, who is to be left there.
Vera has ordained that he is ill & halfthe doctors in town have
14
publicity value ofyour demarche. " 15 God love thee. Write very soon
Ever Sam
ALS; 3 leaves, 6 sides; ! water damage and torn at lower left margin (recto), lower right (verso)]; TCD, MS 10402/127.
1 Thomas Ravenhill, McGreevy's friend, who was resident at 15 Cheyne Gardens, Chelsea; the incident to which SB refers is unknown.
2 William "Boss" Sinclair died on 4 May 1937 and was buried in the Jewish Cemetery at Dolphin's Barn, Dublin, on 6 May.
Harry Sinclair and Boss were twin brothers. Cissie Sinclair had moved the family to a house on Moyne Road, Rathgar, during Boss's illness and hospitalization. Although SB wrote "some 100 Jines hurriedly on Boss Sinclair for the Irish Times," R. M. Smyllie, Editor of The Irish Times, published an unsigned obituary (SB to Mary Manning Howe, 22 May 1937, TxU); From a Correspondent, "William Abraham Sinclair. " 8 May 1937: 10).
3 As reported in The Irish Times ("Alleged Libel in Novel: Summons against Dr. Gogarty: London Publishers to be Sued," 14 May 1937: 2), Harry Sinclair initiated legal action against Oliver St. John Gogarty, and his London publishers Rich and Cowan, for libelous passages in his novel As I Was Going Down Sackville Street: A Phantasy in Fact (London: Rich and Cowan, 1937). The plaintiffcited passages that maligned himselfand his late brother, as well as his grandfather Morris Harris (1823-1909), who were in business as Harris and Sinclair, Antique Plate, Jewellery and Works of Art, 47 Nassau Street, until the shop was moved to 4 Grafton Street, Dublin.
SB was named as a witness, and the article cites from his affidavit:
Mr. Wood read an affidavit by Mr. Samuel Beckett, author, of Cooldrinagh, Foxrock. who stated that he purchased a copy of "As I Was Going Down Sackville Street," his attention having been called to it by many advertisements that he had read, and, he said, the notoriety of its author.
498
had a whack at him.
Leventhal's remark, a propos ofthe libel: "I appreciate the
On reading paragraphs at pages 65, 70 and 71 he instantly inferred that the lines commencing 'Two Jews in Sackville Street" referred to Mr. Henry Morris Sinclair and the late Mr. William Abraham Sinclair, and the words "old usurer" and "grandsons" referred to the late Mr. Morris Harris and his two grandsons. He considered that the words constituted a very grave charge against Mr. Henry Morris Sinclair and his late brother. (2)
SB thought that his authorship of More Pricks Than Kicks would be used to discredit him; Proust and Whoroscope also served that purpose in the trial (Ulick O'Connor, Oliver St. John Gogarty: A Poet and His Times [London: Jonathan Cape, 1964[, 280-281).
"Assez" (Enough).
4 GeorgeFurlong,DirectoroftheNationalGallery.
It is not known to what Rajah Furlong refers. SB mentions a Maharajah of Chittagong (then in East Bengal, now in Bangladesh) in his letter to Mary Manning Howe (22 May 1937; TxU), but Chittagong had not been a regal colony since it was ceded to the East-India Company in 1760, and did not have a Maharajah (Dorian Leveque, Oriental and India Office Collections, British Library, 21 June 2006; Edward Thornton,A Gazetteer ofthe Tenitories under the Government ofthe East-India Company and of the Native States on the Continent ofIndia [London: William H. Allen, 1857] 206. )
Furlong refers to Elizabeth Mary Margaret Plunkett (nee Burke, 1866-1944), then Dowager Countess of Fingall (following the death of her husband Horace Plunkett, 11th Earl of Fingall in 1929). To SB, Furlong's voice contained tones of Nancy [? Cunard], Mayfair (smart London), and Tipperary (rural Ireland).
There was no Vermeer in the collection of the National Gallery oflreland.
5 TheDutchcollectionoftheNationalGallerywasrehunginagroundfloorroom that had been the print room, with the only light from side windows, darkened with frosted glass Uohn Dowling, "Art: Advice and Estimates Free," Ireland To-Day 2. 10 [October 1937] 63, 77).
6 The Italian collection was rehung and distributed across the first floor rooms (formerly the Dutch, Irish and Italian rooms). SB refers to David Slaying Goliath (NG! 980) by Gentileschi and A Decorative Group (NG! 656, now attributed to the Studio of Giovanni Battista Piazzetta [1682-1754]).
Paintings by Canaletto: A View of the Piazza San Marco (NG! 286), The Grand Canal with the Church ofSalute (NG! 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).
