SB sends Murphy to Simon and
Schuster
in New York.
Samuel Beckett
1506/1508, painted for the Doni family, Uffizi Gallery, Florence) as representing the Law of Nature while the foregrounded Holy Family represented the Law of Grace (The Observer 13 October 1935: 15).
"Tout de meme" (all the same).
James Louis Garvin (1868-1947) was Editor of The Observer from 1908 to 1942 and of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica (13th and 14th edns. ). His editorial, "Keep Out This Time," claimed that the attack of the Italian army on Adowa, Abyssinia, confirmed his view that Mussolini and Hitler posed a genuine threat, that Britain's policy of sanctions was fallacious and inept, and that the Letter of Covenant of the League of Nations was invalid after the withdrawal of the United States, Japan, and Germany (The Observer 6 October 1935: 18).
2 SBreferstoMcGreevy'ssisterDelia.
Hester Dowden's niece has not been identified; her sister Hilda Mary Dowden (1875-1936) did not many.
3 L'Etoile,30CharlotteStreet,Soho.
Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) was invited by the Institute of Medical Psychology (Tavistock Clinic) to give a series of five lectures from 30 September to 4 October 1935. Bion was a discussant for lectures two and four; he took SB to the third lecture (Wednesday, 2 October 1935).
AE was interested in theosophy, ancient Irish myth, and mysticism.
4 Followinghislecture,Jungwasaskedhowhewouldfitmysticismintohisscheme of psychology and the psyche. He responded: "Mystics are people who have a partic ularly vivid experience of the processes of the collective unconscious. Mystical expe rience is experience of archetypes. " He added that he made no distinction between archetypal forms and mystical forms (C. G. Jung, Analytical Psychology: Its Theory and Practice, The Tavistock Lectures [London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. 1968] 110-111). Jung discussed the "anima figure" in dreams in his lecture (99-100). He also told of a patient who wanted to be a professor although his dreams indicated this goal to be beyond his ability; the patient, however, thought his dreams represented an unrealized incestu ous wish that could be overcome. Jung reported: "it took him just about three months to lose his position and go to the dogs" (96-105).
5 SBwrote"<Heisvery>Themind. "
Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741-1801), Swiss poet, physiognomist, and theologian, a close friend of Herder and Goethe. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, citizen of Geneva. Euclid, (third century BC).
6 "InJung'swritingsJolasfoundthemetaphysicshehadsoughtinvaininFreud's work" (Eugene Jolas. Man from Babel, xxi-xxii).
7 In discussion following the third Tavistock lecture, Jung concluded, "I cannot cure schizophrenia in principle. Occasionally by great good chance I can synthesize the fragments" Uung, Analytical Psychology, 113).
Jung wrote on 6 September 1947 to B. V. Raman, Astrological Magazine (India): "In cases of difficult psychological diagnosis I usually get a horoscope in order to have
285
8 October 1935, McGreevy
8 October 1935, McGreevy
a further point of view from an entirely different angle" (C. G. Jung, C. G. Jung: Letters, I, ed. Gerhard Adler and Aniela Jaffe, tr. R. F. C. Hull [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973] 475; see also Aniela Jaffe, From the Life and Work of C. G. Jung, tr. R. F. C. Hull and Murray Stein [Einsiedeln, Switzerland: Daimon Verlag, 1989] 17-45).
8 "Toothandyankcamps,"anallusiontotheproponentsofrivalpsychoanalytic theories.
9 "Tantpis"(toobad). "Usemetothem"(Gallicismfor"getusedtothem").
10 The Count of Monte Cristo (1934), directed by American-born Rowland V. Lee (1891-1975), featuring Robert Donat (1905-1958) and Elissa Landi (nee Elizabeth Marie Christine Kiihnelt, 1904-1948), was shown at the Metropole in Dublin during the week of23 September 1935.
11 Europa Press, publisher of SB's Echo's Bones, depended upon subscriptions to underwrite the costs of printing a book. SB refers to his poem "Malacoda. "
12 SBwasworkingonthedraftofMurphy.
13 TheThompsons'wedding:see22September1935,n. 5.
14 A Mountainous Landscape (NGL 4383), then ascribed to Hercules Segers (also Seghers, c. 1589-c. 1638) is now ascribed to an imitator ofSegers (Neil Maclaren, The Dutch School, 1600-1900, 1, rev. Christopher Brown [London: National Gallery, 1991[ 420). Dutch painter Carel Fabritius (1622-1654), A View ofDelft with Musical Instrument Seller's Stall (1652, NGL 3714).
15 Hillis proposed that they attend the opera Boris Godunov by Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (1839-1881), which opened the Sadler's Wells 1935-1936 season on 29 September 1935. The production was billed as the first English production of the original 1869 version ofthe opera; Mussorgsky revised it in 1872, and his musical executor Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov also reorchestrated the opera in 1896 and 1908.
SB conflates two concerts. On Saturday, 12 October in Wigmore Hall, the Isolde Menges Quartet played String Quartet in D minor, op. 56 ("Voces Intimae"), by Finnish composer Jean Sibelius (1865-1957); the string quartet Serenade in G major ("Italian Serenade") by Austrian composer Hugo Wolf(1860-1903); and String Quartet in D major, op. 9, by Belgian-born French composer Cesar Franck (1822-1890). On Thursday 17 October in Wigmore Hall, the Isolde Menges Quartet led by violinist Isolde Menges (1893-1976), with the addition of Helen Just (1903-1989) and Alfred De Reygher[e] (fl. 1930s-1940s), played Tchaikovsky's string sextet Souvenir de Florence in D major, op. 70; Brahms's String Sextet no. 2 in G major, op. 36; and the String Sextet by English composer Frank Bridge (1879-1941).
"<;:a va" (is all right).
The Soldier's Fortune (1680) by English playwright Thomas Otway (1652-1685) was playing at the Ambassadors Theatre. T. S. Eliot's Sweeney Agonistes (1926) was at the Westminster Theatre; the Ballets Jooss, the company ofGerman dancer and choreo grapher Kurt Jooss (1901-1979), was performing The Green Table and The Mirror in repertoire with Ballade, The Big City, and Ball in Vienna at the Gaiety Theatre. The film
286
of Anna Karenina (1935) with Greta Garbo (1905-1990) was playing at the Empire Theatre in Leicester Square.
16 St. John Ervine (ne John Greer Ervine, 1883-1971), Irish-born playwright and novelist, wrote a column, "At the Play," for The Obsen,er; a young reader had written that a sector of theatre audiences wished merely to be entertained by plays "that have nothing to do with their everyday life . . . Do you see what I mean? " Ervine's retort was "Yes, my dear, I see" ("The Generations Disagree," 6 October 1935: 17).
As Book Editor of The Sunday Times, Desmond MacCarthy reviewed Anthony Hope ana His Books (1935) by Sir Charles Mallet (1863-1947) ("Anthony Hope: Achievements and Disappointments," 6 October 1935: 6). Anthony Hope ana His Books was a biography of Anthony Hope (ne Anthony Hope Hawkins, 1863-1933), author of The Prisoner of Zenda (1894).
17 Denis Devlin broadcast readings and comments on literature on Irish radio; he wrote to McGreevy: "I don't know whether you may have listened to 2RN last night (i. e. the 4th instant) and heard my marvellous recital of your Nocturne of the Self-Evident Presence. It ran 'Mr. Thomas McGreevy, an Irishman, who has been most incomprehensibly neglected. ' [. . . ] Are you pleased? I am glad to have got the chance. '' Apparently McGreevy had not heard the broadcast, because Devlin continued this letter on 22 October: "I am chagrined that you did not hear me" (5 October 1935 continued 22 October 1935, TCD, MS 8112/7). The Dublin radio station was 2RN. "Nocturne of the Self-Evident Presence" was originally published by MacGreevy under the pseudonym L. St. Senan in The Irish Statesman 7. 3 (25 September 1926) 57; rpt. MacGreevy, Collected Poems of Thomas MacGreevy, ed. Schreibman, 42-43.
Devlin worked in the Department of External Affairs; as Secretary to the legation, he accompanied Eamon De Valera (popularly known as Dev, 1882-1975), then Taoiseach (Prime Minister) of the Irish Free State and Head of Council of the League of Nations, to the League of Nations in Geneva (3 September to 2 October 1935) (Devlin, Collected Poems of Denis Devlin, 19; "Back from Geneva," The Irish Times 2 October 1933: 7).
18 Yeats may have traced the provenance of Comer Boys, which had had an owner previous to SB (see 5 May 1935, n. 4).
Tobias and the Angel by Scottish playwright James Bridie (ne Osborne Henry Mavor, 1888-1951) was performed at the Gaiety Theatre (not the Abbey Theatre) as part of the Dublin Summer School of Acting on Sunday, 22 September 1935 (The Irish Times 23 September 1935: 8).
19 Mrs. Frost,SB'slandladyat34GertrudeStreet. The"Lieblings"(lovers),presum- ably the couple described in 8 September 1934.
Geoffrey Thompson and Ursula Stenhouse were shortly to be married.
20 Boissier:see22September1935,n. 8.
21 GermanpublisherKarlBaedeker(1801-1859)publishedtravelguidesforvarious regions of Europe; updated versions continue to be published.
22 Simon and Schuster and SB's request to Chatto and Windus: 8 September 1935.
287
8 October 1935, McGreevy
13 October 1935, Reavey GEORGE REAVEY
LONDON
13/10/35
Dear George
34 Gertrude Street London SW10
Thanks for letter & prospectus. Further victims:
Charles Rowe, Esq. , F. T. C. D. , Trinity College, Dublin.
1
It is better for you to diffuse them, but let me have a dozen in case I think of someone else.
The American publishers I have in mind are Messrs. Simon &
Schuster, 386 Fourth Avenue, New York. They wrote to me about
a month & a half ago, asking to see whatever material I had
available for publication in USA. I sent them Proust & Pricks &
have not yet had their decision. They seem well disposed. This
being the position, it occurs to me that they ought to be offered
the first refusal ofBones, also that it might be advisable to wait for
their decision as to prose before submitting the verse. However
I leave you to deal with the matter as you think best. I am quite
2
pectus. Ifthis is your dastardly intention and the covers have not
3
Frances Steen (n. d. ), schoolmate of SB's at Earlsfort House School, Dublin; her brother, RobertEllsworth Steen (1902-1981) was a friend of SB's at TCD, and they golfed together at Carrickrnines, Co. Dublin.
288
Miss Frances Steen, Carrickmines, Co. Dublin.
satisfied with 20% for EP [for EB].
I hope the Bones are not covered in the canary of the pros
yet been put in hand, be an angel and change it to PUTIY. Yours ever
s/ Sam
TIS; 1 leaf, 1 side; AN in another hand: checkmarks, and underscoring; TxU.
1 CharlesHenryRowe,ProfessorofMathematicsatTrinityCollegeDublin.
Saturday [after 13 October 1935}, Reavey
2 Echo's Bones.
3 Thecoloroftheprospectuswaswarmgold;thecolorofthefinalcoverforEcho's
Bones was putty. GEORGE REAVEY
LONDON
Saturday [after 13 October 1935]
34 Gertrude St [London] SWlO
Cher ami
It might be a good idea to send a copy to Observer, "for favour
of etc. ", & if so to Humbert Wolfe, lest it should fall into black
1
Clare St. & both Tom & Brian know
Mr NAIRN, Combridge's, Grafton Street
Hodges & Figgis also might take a few copies. 2
Looking over it at leisure I am very pleased with layout.
I only find one mistake: there should be a space in Enueg 2 between "doch I assure thee" & "lying on O'Connell Bridge. " Pas serieux-3
I have sent out 5 more prospectuses this morning that may bring a few more bob.
A mardi Sam
I have found MS of Serena III which you can have 4
ALS; 1 leaf folded, 2 sides; from "Looking over it . . . ", text appears upside down because SB has turned the folded page; PS written to left of signature; TxU. Dating: in 15 March 1935, SB gives his choice of title for the volume of poems; in 8 October 1935, SB anticipates proofs that week; in SB's letter toReavey of 13 October 1935, SB discusses the color of the cover. The imprint of Echo's Bones gives the publication date as November 1935. "Enueg 2" was published in Echo's Bones without the correction SB
289
claws of Austin Clarke.
For distribution in Dublin I know:
Mr PEMBRY [for Pembrey] Green's [for Greene's] Library,
Saturday [after 13 October 1935}, Reavey
requested in this letter, and with "Serena III" (published as "Serena 3," Echo's Bones [31-321). The date, therefore, is after 13 October, but before 30 November 1935, probably early to mid-November.
1 Humbert Wolfe (1885-1940), English poet, satirist, and civil servant. Austin Clarke reviewed for the Times Literary Supplement and The Spectator; SB was wary of retaliation (see 8 September 1934, n. 2).
2 HerbertS. Pembrey(1909-2000),sub-postmasterandproprietorwithhisfather, Herbert H. Pembrey, of Greene's Library, 16 Clare Street.
Thomas McGreevy; Brian Coffey.
Ernest Nairn (d. 1970), a book expert who worked for about fifty years at Combridges, at 18-20 Grafton Street in 1935. Hodges & Figgis, bookstore, was then at 20 Nassau Street.
3 Seediscussionofdatingabove.
"Pas serieux" (anglicism for "pas grave" [no great matter]). Reavey may have mis understood SB's comment, as the page layout was not altered in this or in subsequent editions.
4 "Amardi"(tillTuesday).
290
1936 January 18January
24January 1 February
2March
7 March By25 March
By 9April 2May
6May
By 7 May By 9June 11June
27 June 29June
CHRONOLOGY 1936
SBpursuesinterestinfilmtheoryandmethods. VisitsJack B. Yeats.
T. S. Eliot speaks at University College Dublin. SB visitsJack B. Yeats withMorris Sinclair. Applies to study with Eisenstein.
Germans occupy the Rhineland.
SB travels with Frank Beckett to Galway. Visits Clonmacnoise.
Tells Reavey that transition can choose any poems to publish from Echo's Bones.
Declines to undertake more translations of Eluard's poems for Reavey.
Offers transition the unpublished "Censorship in the Saorstat," updating it with the censorship registry number for More Pricks Than Kicks.
Buys Jack B. Yeats's painting Morning. Finishes a first draft ofMurphy.
Opening of the International Surrealist Exhibition, New Burlington Galleries, London. Publication ofEluard's Thorns of Thunder with SB's translations.
Murphy typescript finished.
SB sends Murphy to Ian Parsons at Chatto and Windus, to Charles Prentice, and to
McGreevy.
291
Chronology 1936
July
By 7 July
15 July Mid-July By 17 July
17 July
By 6 August 12 August
18 August By 19August
c. 31 August
6 September 29September 30 September 2 October
By 5 October
7 October
3 November 5 November
13 November 4 December
Dublin Magazine publishes "An Imaginative Work! " SB's review of The Amaranthers by Jack B. Yeats.
SB sends Murphy to Simon and Schuster in New York.
Chatto and Windus rejects Murphy.
SB sends poem "Cascando" to Dublin Magazine.
Sends Murphy to Frere-Reeves at Heinemann. Receives author's copy of Thorns of Thunder.
Spanish Civil War begins. Heinemann rejects Murphy.
SB translates Samuel Johnson's Letter to Lord Chesterfield into German in his notebook.
Drafts German translation of"Cascando. "
Sends Murphy to Reavey so that he can act as agent.
Visits Arland Ussher at Cappagh with Joe Hone; sees Ardmore and Cashel.
Reavey visits Dublin from Belfast. SB leaves for Germany.
Arrives in Le Havre.
Arrives in Hamburg.
Simon and Schuster rejects Murphy. Dublin Magazine publishes poem "Cascando. "
SB settles in the Pension Hoppe, Hamburg. Visits Lubeck.
German museums ordered to remove "decadent art. "
SB refuses to accept cuts in Murphy requested by Houghton Mifflin, Boston. Asks Reavey how to acquire permission to use "apes at chess" for frontispiece ofMurphy.
Leaves Hamburg; visits Liineburg.
292
Chronology 1936
5 December
6 December
7 December
8 December
10 December
11 December
c. 16-17 December
In Hanover; visits home of Leibniz.
In Brunswick.
In Riddagshausen.
In Wolfenbiittel; visits Lessing Museum. In Hildesheim.
Arrives in Berlin.
Settles in Pension Kempt, Berlin.
293
GEORGE REAVEY LONDON
9/1/35 [for 1936] 6 Clare Street Dublin
Dear George
Thanks for your card. I am more or less all right again now. Coffey left here I think last Friday, for a lecture at Sorbonne
Sat. morning, so I suppose you didn't see him in London. He said he had sent you some more Bones. 1 Yes, let me have as many more as I am due. I think he got my copy of the This Quarter in question. I said i [sic] was not keen on doing more translations, but would if necessary. 2 He appears to want to make the philo sophical series very serious & Fach. But my Geulincx could only be a literary fantasia. 3
I am glad to hear of the European Quarterly. I suppose I have odd poems, or perhaps I might let you have an excerpt from the prose work I mentioned. But there doesn't seem to be much, among my papers or in my mind. 4 I have not seen Devlin. He works in an office, you know. Then in the evening the ballroom. Codpiece Bordel de Danse, Gipsy Scrotum and his Band. Ne suis pas a la hauteur. 5
My friends here esquivent the Bones for the more part, which means the bolus has gone home. What shall they say, my not even enemies. May it stick in their anus. "I am sure you were not born with a pop. " But am I not sparkling? Then how should the birth be still? Sois calme, 6 mon souleur . . 6 Andersen was the byblow of a Frenchman from the Marne. Ca explique Dieu. 7
295
9 January 1935 {for 1936}, Reavey
How much longer London? As I broached the stairs to your
party, as to observatory platform at uranal distance from the
young lady whose name escapes me altogether don't you know,
the gan;on tirebouchon (ce qui m'interesse, c'est le tirebouchon,
non pas le Chandon - Gide) smirked his inadequacy. His heart
8
was not pure. Non pas le condom.
Hommages to Miss Cordon non pas bas bleu.
Your obedient servant s/Sam
9
Ce n'est pas au pelican Pas si pitoyable
Ni a Marie
Pas si pure
Mais a Lucie
Egyptienne oui et peaussiere aussi
Qui ne m'a pas gueri mais qui aurait pu Et a. Jude
Dontj'ai adorore la depouille Quej'adresse la cause desesperee Qu'on dirait la mienne. 10
TLS; 1 leaf, 1 side; TxU. Dating: Echo's Bones was published in November 1935, and so the year must be 1936.
1 SB had been ill with pleurisy (SB to McGreevy 31 December [1935J, TCD, MS 10402/84).
Brian Coffey left Dublin for Paris on Friday, 3 January 1936. Before he had left Paris for the Christmas holidays in Dublin, he had sent George Reavey copies ofEcho's Bones, which had been published byEuropa Press in Paris (Brian Coffey to George Reavey, 17 December 1935; TxU).
2 SBwrote"<Hecamedownheretoseeme,asIwasnotyetpromenable,>Ithink. "
Coffey had taken SB's copy of This Quarter 5. 1 (September 1932} in which SB's translations of Paul Eluard's poems ("Lady Love," "Out of Sight in the Direction of My Body," "Scarcely Disfigured," "The Invention," "Definition," "A Life Uncovered or The Human Pyramid," "The Queen of Diamonds," "Do Thou Sleep," "Second Nature," "Scene," "All-Proof: Universe-Solitude," and "Confections") had appeared (86-98). Reavey was preparing Thorns of Thunder, a collection ofEluard's poems in translation,
296
9January 1935 [for 1936}, Reavey
which included SB's translations already published in This Quarter; Reavey had appa rently asked, through Coffey, ifSB would prepare more.
3 BrianCoffeyhadinmindamonographseriesonphilosophers;hewasstudying the philosophy of science with Catholic thinker Jacques Maritain {1882-1973) at the lnstitut Catholique de Paris.
"Fach" {professional).
Despite his disclaimer, SB pursued study ofFlemish metaphysicanArnold Geulincx {1624-1669) in the library ofTrinity College Dublin, as he wrote to McGreevy: "I put my foot within the abhorred gates [ofTCDJ for the first time since the escape, on a commis sion from Ruddy. And I fear I shall have to penetrate more deeply, in search ofGeulincx, who does not exist in the National, but does in TCD" (9 January 1935 [for 1936[, TCD, MS 10402/85). SBreadandtookextensivenotesinLatinfromtheEthicaofArnoldGeulincx, in the edition Arnoldi Geulincx antverpiensis Opera Philosophica. Sumptibus providernnt Sortis spinozianae curatores, 3 vols. , ed. Jan Pieter Nicolaas Land {The Hague: apud Martinum Nijhoff, 1891-1893). For SB's notes on his reading ofGeuiincx, see TCD, MS 10971/6; EverettFrostandJaneMaxwell,"TCDMS10971/6LatinexcerptsfromArnoldusGeulincx and R. P. Gredt," Notes Diverse Holo, Special issue SBT/A 16 (2006) 141-155.
4 As SB wrote to McGreevy, "A card from Reavey, decided to launch European Quarterly . . What would I like to give him for nothing? " (9 January 1935 [for 19361). It is not known what poems or prose SB had in mind, although a poem appears at the end of the present letter. Reavey did not establish a quarterly journal.
5 DenisDevlin(see5May1935,n. 1).
"Borde! de Danse" (Dance Brothel). "Ne suis pas a la hauteur" ([I'm] not up to it).
6 Echo'sBoneswasmentionedasforthcominginthe"Irishman'sDiary:IrishWriters," The Irish Times 7 December 1935: 6. "Esquivent" (are dodging); "the more part" (Gallicism for "the most part"). SB wrote to McGreevy: "No professional reactions to the poems in any quarter that I know of. Con & Ethna were able to get out ofthe awkward position by remarking that they were already familiar with most ofthem. Ruddy had only feuillete" (9 January 1935 [for 1936[, TCD, MS 10402/85). "Feuillete" (leafed through).
SB imagines a response to the line from "Sanies I": "I was born with a pop with the green ofthe larches" (Echo's Bones, [191). He mentally prepares a retort with wordplay based on sparkling wine/water and still, birth, and stillbirth.
In "Sois calme, 6 mon soiileur" (Be calm, oh my intoxicator), SB makes play with the opening line of Baudelaire's poem "Recueillement": "Sois sage, 6 ma Douleur" (Behave, my sorrow) (Baudelaire, Oeuvres completes, I, 140; Baudelaire, Les Reurs du Mal, The Rowers ofEvil, 173).
7 Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) was born in wedlock, his parents having married two months before his birth (1805); his father, Hans Andersen, was a journey man shoemaker from Odense (Elias Bredsdorff, Hans Christian Andersen: The Story ofHis Life and Work, 1805-75 [London: Phaidon Press, 1975[ 15-16).
·c;;a explique Dieu" (That explains God).
8 Theyoungwoman,asfardistantastheplanetUranus,hasnotbeenidentified.
"Gar�on tirebouchon (ce qui m'interesse, c'est le tirebouchon, non pas le Chandon - Gide)" (The waiter with the corkscrew [what interests me is the corkscrew, not the Chandon - Gide]). Reference unclear.
"Non pas le condom" (Not the condom).
297
9 January 1935 [for 1936}, Reavey
9 "Hommages to Miss Cordon non pas bas bleu" (Respects to Miss Cordon not bleu): "bas bleu" (bluestocking). Punning combines this with "Cordon bleu. " The subject of SB's reference is not known.
10 This version of the poem varies from that published in French in SB's Dream of Fair to Middling Women, 21. For a discussion of sources and nuances, see also Pilling, A Companion to "Dream of Fair to Middling Women," 54-55. SB did not translate this poem.
It is not to the pelican Not so pitiable
Nor to Marie
Not so pure
But to Lucie
Yes, the Egyptian (and in the leather trade) Who did not cure me but who might have And to Jude
Whose hide I adorored
That I put the desperate case
That might look like mine.
THOMAS McGREEVY LONDON
16/1 [1936]
Foxrock [Co. Dublin]
Dear Tom
Very glad to have your letter & poems. The verdict ofOxford
is final & excellent. I do not care so much for its preparation. Davies matters as little as the jelly. j'irai dans le desert I liked
1
tion ofVollard's new book.
I found Devlin the other day among his external affairs &
am lunching with him to-morrow. His poems are in hand & he has a new prose-cum-verse romance. But he said he had written to you himself. He wondered were you bose with him. I said: Macche! 3
298
also. But is it not rather from the desert. Call it camp foutu. Rutter turns out to be ofsome service at last - in his indica
2
16January {1936}, McGreevy
The weather is dreadful & I cannot get warm. I trailed down to Newcastle one day with Cissie to see Boss. Always when I get there I am glummer than the whole institution put together. On the way back a hard hit publican in Bray quoted Daniel O'Connell to prove there was no hope remaining for this coun try. A cow, a cow, my Free State for a cow. In the train from Bray, vainly unrecognized, the pestiferous Michael Farrell fresh from Kilmacanogue & next doordom to All Forlorn (whose elucubra tion on Coriolanus at the Abbey I trust you read in the Chelsea Library). He is finishing a work, really very beautiful, & admired by All Forlorn, himself naively 5 minutes later extolled by Farrell as a critic! 4
No news from Coffey since I saw him here. I shall have to go
into TCD after Geulincx, as he does not exist in National Library.
I suddenly see that Murphy is break down between his ubi nihil
vales ibi nihil velis (positive) & Malraux's Il est difficile a celui
qui vit hors du monde de ne pas rechercher les siens (negation).
I have not done a tap since I saw you. Shelves are going up slowly
in the room where I hope to dig in, and books slowly from Clare
5
The X-Ray shows nothing. Je m'en doutais.
I was hoping to see JBY last Saturday but went to the Gallery
6
299
Street.
instead. Not a picture touched, only two "British" rooms closed. Bion in his last acknowledgment of the filthy "trusted I had by now taken up my work with pleasure and satisfaction", as he was sure I must "even though not entirely freed from neuroses"! Mother's whole idea of course is to get me committed to life here. And my travel-courage is so gone that the collapse is more than likely. I find myself more than ever frightened by the prospect of effort, initiative & even the little self-assertion of getting about from one place to another. Solitude here, perhaps
16 January {1936}, McGreevy
more sober than before, seems the upshot of the London
Torture. Indeed I do not see what difference the analysis has
made. Relations with M. as thorny as ever and the nights no
7
provenistheliterary. Wartenur. . . FrankIfeelcensoriousas
9
I have not seen Ruddy since. It is very difficult to get across
10
better. Aheartattacklastnightthatwouldhavedonecreditto three years ago. The only plane on which I feel my defeat not
8
not before. He is so successful. To-day gone to Galway, not to return till Saturday.
from here, and when one does . . . But I hear he gets on well.
I
have seen all the Jew faithful, Con etc. , but really feel I do not
want to see them any more. If nothing has survived but the
11
Geoffrey seems to be working too hard at the Maudsley. He
has applied for a demonstratorship in physiology, 4 hours a
week well paid & work that would give him no trouble. Then
he could give up the Maudsley. I should say he has a very good
chance ofgetting in. He will be upset by the death ofAndy Frank
Dixon announced in to-day's paper. One of the few good minds
12
your gaffe will save her. Greetings to her & Hester & Raven. 13 Write very soon again.
Love Sam
300
habit, to insist is like doffing to the Cenotaph.
seem to have committed myself to some months here, London & you & Geoffrey seem the sanctuary & reality. Perhaps the flight will be sooner than I expect, but no more Bion. As I write, think, move, speak, praise & blame, I see myselfliving up to the speci men that these 2 years have taught me I am. The word is not out before I am blushing for my automatism.
Now, just as I
left in the place.
Poor Dilly, in the running for Lynd's good opinion. Surely
Sean O'Sullivan was over taking plan & elevation of Shem.
He asked did I dive with my glasses on. Sean liked Leon (for Leon].
They all got jolly together, chez Fourquet [for Fouquet]. Parait
16January {1936}, McGreevy
14
ALS; 2 leaves, 3 sides; env to Thomas McGreevy Esq, 15 Cheyne Gardens, Chelsea,
London SW 3; pm 20-1-36, Dublin; TCD, MS 10402/86. Dating: from pm.
1 McGreevy'slettertoSBhasnotbeenfound;itisnotknownwhichofthepoems he enclosed.
W. B. Yeats selected and introduced the poems included in The Oxford Book ofModem Verse: 1892-1935 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1936).
McGreevy was aware that his poems "Aodh Ruadh 6 Domhnaill" and "Homage to Jack Yeats" would be included (333-335). Since his friend George Yeats (nee Bertha Georgie Hyde-Lee, 1892-1968) was handling permissions and compiling the index for the anthology in early January 1936, McGreevy is likely to have seen the other poems selected (Ann Saddlemyer. Becoming George, 495-496).
Welsh-born poetWilliam Henry Davies (1870-1940) was represented in the anthol ogy by seven poems (128-133).
"Tout de meme" (all the same).
James Louis Garvin (1868-1947) was Editor of The Observer from 1908 to 1942 and of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica (13th and 14th edns. ). His editorial, "Keep Out This Time," claimed that the attack of the Italian army on Adowa, Abyssinia, confirmed his view that Mussolini and Hitler posed a genuine threat, that Britain's policy of sanctions was fallacious and inept, and that the Letter of Covenant of the League of Nations was invalid after the withdrawal of the United States, Japan, and Germany (The Observer 6 October 1935: 18).
2 SBreferstoMcGreevy'ssisterDelia.
Hester Dowden's niece has not been identified; her sister Hilda Mary Dowden (1875-1936) did not many.
3 L'Etoile,30CharlotteStreet,Soho.
Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) was invited by the Institute of Medical Psychology (Tavistock Clinic) to give a series of five lectures from 30 September to 4 October 1935. Bion was a discussant for lectures two and four; he took SB to the third lecture (Wednesday, 2 October 1935).
AE was interested in theosophy, ancient Irish myth, and mysticism.
4 Followinghislecture,Jungwasaskedhowhewouldfitmysticismintohisscheme of psychology and the psyche. He responded: "Mystics are people who have a partic ularly vivid experience of the processes of the collective unconscious. Mystical expe rience is experience of archetypes. " He added that he made no distinction between archetypal forms and mystical forms (C. G. Jung, Analytical Psychology: Its Theory and Practice, The Tavistock Lectures [London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. 1968] 110-111). Jung discussed the "anima figure" in dreams in his lecture (99-100). He also told of a patient who wanted to be a professor although his dreams indicated this goal to be beyond his ability; the patient, however, thought his dreams represented an unrealized incestu ous wish that could be overcome. Jung reported: "it took him just about three months to lose his position and go to the dogs" (96-105).
5 SBwrote"<Heisvery>Themind. "
Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741-1801), Swiss poet, physiognomist, and theologian, a close friend of Herder and Goethe. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, citizen of Geneva. Euclid, (third century BC).
6 "InJung'swritingsJolasfoundthemetaphysicshehadsoughtinvaininFreud's work" (Eugene Jolas. Man from Babel, xxi-xxii).
7 In discussion following the third Tavistock lecture, Jung concluded, "I cannot cure schizophrenia in principle. Occasionally by great good chance I can synthesize the fragments" Uung, Analytical Psychology, 113).
Jung wrote on 6 September 1947 to B. V. Raman, Astrological Magazine (India): "In cases of difficult psychological diagnosis I usually get a horoscope in order to have
285
8 October 1935, McGreevy
8 October 1935, McGreevy
a further point of view from an entirely different angle" (C. G. Jung, C. G. Jung: Letters, I, ed. Gerhard Adler and Aniela Jaffe, tr. R. F. C. Hull [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973] 475; see also Aniela Jaffe, From the Life and Work of C. G. Jung, tr. R. F. C. Hull and Murray Stein [Einsiedeln, Switzerland: Daimon Verlag, 1989] 17-45).
8 "Toothandyankcamps,"anallusiontotheproponentsofrivalpsychoanalytic theories.
9 "Tantpis"(toobad). "Usemetothem"(Gallicismfor"getusedtothem").
10 The Count of Monte Cristo (1934), directed by American-born Rowland V. Lee (1891-1975), featuring Robert Donat (1905-1958) and Elissa Landi (nee Elizabeth Marie Christine Kiihnelt, 1904-1948), was shown at the Metropole in Dublin during the week of23 September 1935.
11 Europa Press, publisher of SB's Echo's Bones, depended upon subscriptions to underwrite the costs of printing a book. SB refers to his poem "Malacoda. "
12 SBwasworkingonthedraftofMurphy.
13 TheThompsons'wedding:see22September1935,n. 5.
14 A Mountainous Landscape (NGL 4383), then ascribed to Hercules Segers (also Seghers, c. 1589-c. 1638) is now ascribed to an imitator ofSegers (Neil Maclaren, The Dutch School, 1600-1900, 1, rev. Christopher Brown [London: National Gallery, 1991[ 420). Dutch painter Carel Fabritius (1622-1654), A View ofDelft with Musical Instrument Seller's Stall (1652, NGL 3714).
15 Hillis proposed that they attend the opera Boris Godunov by Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (1839-1881), which opened the Sadler's Wells 1935-1936 season on 29 September 1935. The production was billed as the first English production of the original 1869 version ofthe opera; Mussorgsky revised it in 1872, and his musical executor Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov also reorchestrated the opera in 1896 and 1908.
SB conflates two concerts. On Saturday, 12 October in Wigmore Hall, the Isolde Menges Quartet played String Quartet in D minor, op. 56 ("Voces Intimae"), by Finnish composer Jean Sibelius (1865-1957); the string quartet Serenade in G major ("Italian Serenade") by Austrian composer Hugo Wolf(1860-1903); and String Quartet in D major, op. 9, by Belgian-born French composer Cesar Franck (1822-1890). On Thursday 17 October in Wigmore Hall, the Isolde Menges Quartet led by violinist Isolde Menges (1893-1976), with the addition of Helen Just (1903-1989) and Alfred De Reygher[e] (fl. 1930s-1940s), played Tchaikovsky's string sextet Souvenir de Florence in D major, op. 70; Brahms's String Sextet no. 2 in G major, op. 36; and the String Sextet by English composer Frank Bridge (1879-1941).
"<;:a va" (is all right).
The Soldier's Fortune (1680) by English playwright Thomas Otway (1652-1685) was playing at the Ambassadors Theatre. T. S. Eliot's Sweeney Agonistes (1926) was at the Westminster Theatre; the Ballets Jooss, the company ofGerman dancer and choreo grapher Kurt Jooss (1901-1979), was performing The Green Table and The Mirror in repertoire with Ballade, The Big City, and Ball in Vienna at the Gaiety Theatre. The film
286
of Anna Karenina (1935) with Greta Garbo (1905-1990) was playing at the Empire Theatre in Leicester Square.
16 St. John Ervine (ne John Greer Ervine, 1883-1971), Irish-born playwright and novelist, wrote a column, "At the Play," for The Obsen,er; a young reader had written that a sector of theatre audiences wished merely to be entertained by plays "that have nothing to do with their everyday life . . . Do you see what I mean? " Ervine's retort was "Yes, my dear, I see" ("The Generations Disagree," 6 October 1935: 17).
As Book Editor of The Sunday Times, Desmond MacCarthy reviewed Anthony Hope ana His Books (1935) by Sir Charles Mallet (1863-1947) ("Anthony Hope: Achievements and Disappointments," 6 October 1935: 6). Anthony Hope ana His Books was a biography of Anthony Hope (ne Anthony Hope Hawkins, 1863-1933), author of The Prisoner of Zenda (1894).
17 Denis Devlin broadcast readings and comments on literature on Irish radio; he wrote to McGreevy: "I don't know whether you may have listened to 2RN last night (i. e. the 4th instant) and heard my marvellous recital of your Nocturne of the Self-Evident Presence. It ran 'Mr. Thomas McGreevy, an Irishman, who has been most incomprehensibly neglected. ' [. . . ] Are you pleased? I am glad to have got the chance. '' Apparently McGreevy had not heard the broadcast, because Devlin continued this letter on 22 October: "I am chagrined that you did not hear me" (5 October 1935 continued 22 October 1935, TCD, MS 8112/7). The Dublin radio station was 2RN. "Nocturne of the Self-Evident Presence" was originally published by MacGreevy under the pseudonym L. St. Senan in The Irish Statesman 7. 3 (25 September 1926) 57; rpt. MacGreevy, Collected Poems of Thomas MacGreevy, ed. Schreibman, 42-43.
Devlin worked in the Department of External Affairs; as Secretary to the legation, he accompanied Eamon De Valera (popularly known as Dev, 1882-1975), then Taoiseach (Prime Minister) of the Irish Free State and Head of Council of the League of Nations, to the League of Nations in Geneva (3 September to 2 October 1935) (Devlin, Collected Poems of Denis Devlin, 19; "Back from Geneva," The Irish Times 2 October 1933: 7).
18 Yeats may have traced the provenance of Comer Boys, which had had an owner previous to SB (see 5 May 1935, n. 4).
Tobias and the Angel by Scottish playwright James Bridie (ne Osborne Henry Mavor, 1888-1951) was performed at the Gaiety Theatre (not the Abbey Theatre) as part of the Dublin Summer School of Acting on Sunday, 22 September 1935 (The Irish Times 23 September 1935: 8).
19 Mrs. Frost,SB'slandladyat34GertrudeStreet. The"Lieblings"(lovers),presum- ably the couple described in 8 September 1934.
Geoffrey Thompson and Ursula Stenhouse were shortly to be married.
20 Boissier:see22September1935,n. 8.
21 GermanpublisherKarlBaedeker(1801-1859)publishedtravelguidesforvarious regions of Europe; updated versions continue to be published.
22 Simon and Schuster and SB's request to Chatto and Windus: 8 September 1935.
287
8 October 1935, McGreevy
13 October 1935, Reavey GEORGE REAVEY
LONDON
13/10/35
Dear George
34 Gertrude Street London SW10
Thanks for letter & prospectus. Further victims:
Charles Rowe, Esq. , F. T. C. D. , Trinity College, Dublin.
1
It is better for you to diffuse them, but let me have a dozen in case I think of someone else.
The American publishers I have in mind are Messrs. Simon &
Schuster, 386 Fourth Avenue, New York. They wrote to me about
a month & a half ago, asking to see whatever material I had
available for publication in USA. I sent them Proust & Pricks &
have not yet had their decision. They seem well disposed. This
being the position, it occurs to me that they ought to be offered
the first refusal ofBones, also that it might be advisable to wait for
their decision as to prose before submitting the verse. However
I leave you to deal with the matter as you think best. I am quite
2
pectus. Ifthis is your dastardly intention and the covers have not
3
Frances Steen (n. d. ), schoolmate of SB's at Earlsfort House School, Dublin; her brother, RobertEllsworth Steen (1902-1981) was a friend of SB's at TCD, and they golfed together at Carrickrnines, Co. Dublin.
288
Miss Frances Steen, Carrickmines, Co. Dublin.
satisfied with 20% for EP [for EB].
I hope the Bones are not covered in the canary of the pros
yet been put in hand, be an angel and change it to PUTIY. Yours ever
s/ Sam
TIS; 1 leaf, 1 side; AN in another hand: checkmarks, and underscoring; TxU.
1 CharlesHenryRowe,ProfessorofMathematicsatTrinityCollegeDublin.
Saturday [after 13 October 1935}, Reavey
2 Echo's Bones.
3 Thecoloroftheprospectuswaswarmgold;thecolorofthefinalcoverforEcho's
Bones was putty. GEORGE REAVEY
LONDON
Saturday [after 13 October 1935]
34 Gertrude St [London] SWlO
Cher ami
It might be a good idea to send a copy to Observer, "for favour
of etc. ", & if so to Humbert Wolfe, lest it should fall into black
1
Clare St. & both Tom & Brian know
Mr NAIRN, Combridge's, Grafton Street
Hodges & Figgis also might take a few copies. 2
Looking over it at leisure I am very pleased with layout.
I only find one mistake: there should be a space in Enueg 2 between "doch I assure thee" & "lying on O'Connell Bridge. " Pas serieux-3
I have sent out 5 more prospectuses this morning that may bring a few more bob.
A mardi Sam
I have found MS of Serena III which you can have 4
ALS; 1 leaf folded, 2 sides; from "Looking over it . . . ", text appears upside down because SB has turned the folded page; PS written to left of signature; TxU. Dating: in 15 March 1935, SB gives his choice of title for the volume of poems; in 8 October 1935, SB anticipates proofs that week; in SB's letter toReavey of 13 October 1935, SB discusses the color of the cover. The imprint of Echo's Bones gives the publication date as November 1935. "Enueg 2" was published in Echo's Bones without the correction SB
289
claws of Austin Clarke.
For distribution in Dublin I know:
Mr PEMBRY [for Pembrey] Green's [for Greene's] Library,
Saturday [after 13 October 1935}, Reavey
requested in this letter, and with "Serena III" (published as "Serena 3," Echo's Bones [31-321). The date, therefore, is after 13 October, but before 30 November 1935, probably early to mid-November.
1 Humbert Wolfe (1885-1940), English poet, satirist, and civil servant. Austin Clarke reviewed for the Times Literary Supplement and The Spectator; SB was wary of retaliation (see 8 September 1934, n. 2).
2 HerbertS. Pembrey(1909-2000),sub-postmasterandproprietorwithhisfather, Herbert H. Pembrey, of Greene's Library, 16 Clare Street.
Thomas McGreevy; Brian Coffey.
Ernest Nairn (d. 1970), a book expert who worked for about fifty years at Combridges, at 18-20 Grafton Street in 1935. Hodges & Figgis, bookstore, was then at 20 Nassau Street.
3 Seediscussionofdatingabove.
"Pas serieux" (anglicism for "pas grave" [no great matter]). Reavey may have mis understood SB's comment, as the page layout was not altered in this or in subsequent editions.
4 "Amardi"(tillTuesday).
290
1936 January 18January
24January 1 February
2March
7 March By25 March
By 9April 2May
6May
By 7 May By 9June 11June
27 June 29June
CHRONOLOGY 1936
SBpursuesinterestinfilmtheoryandmethods. VisitsJack B. Yeats.
T. S. Eliot speaks at University College Dublin. SB visitsJack B. Yeats withMorris Sinclair. Applies to study with Eisenstein.
Germans occupy the Rhineland.
SB travels with Frank Beckett to Galway. Visits Clonmacnoise.
Tells Reavey that transition can choose any poems to publish from Echo's Bones.
Declines to undertake more translations of Eluard's poems for Reavey.
Offers transition the unpublished "Censorship in the Saorstat," updating it with the censorship registry number for More Pricks Than Kicks.
Buys Jack B. Yeats's painting Morning. Finishes a first draft ofMurphy.
Opening of the International Surrealist Exhibition, New Burlington Galleries, London. Publication ofEluard's Thorns of Thunder with SB's translations.
Murphy typescript finished.
SB sends Murphy to Ian Parsons at Chatto and Windus, to Charles Prentice, and to
McGreevy.
291
Chronology 1936
July
By 7 July
15 July Mid-July By 17 July
17 July
By 6 August 12 August
18 August By 19August
c. 31 August
6 September 29September 30 September 2 October
By 5 October
7 October
3 November 5 November
13 November 4 December
Dublin Magazine publishes "An Imaginative Work! " SB's review of The Amaranthers by Jack B. Yeats.
SB sends Murphy to Simon and Schuster in New York.
Chatto and Windus rejects Murphy.
SB sends poem "Cascando" to Dublin Magazine.
Sends Murphy to Frere-Reeves at Heinemann. Receives author's copy of Thorns of Thunder.
Spanish Civil War begins. Heinemann rejects Murphy.
SB translates Samuel Johnson's Letter to Lord Chesterfield into German in his notebook.
Drafts German translation of"Cascando. "
Sends Murphy to Reavey so that he can act as agent.
Visits Arland Ussher at Cappagh with Joe Hone; sees Ardmore and Cashel.
Reavey visits Dublin from Belfast. SB leaves for Germany.
Arrives in Le Havre.
Arrives in Hamburg.
Simon and Schuster rejects Murphy. Dublin Magazine publishes poem "Cascando. "
SB settles in the Pension Hoppe, Hamburg. Visits Lubeck.
German museums ordered to remove "decadent art. "
SB refuses to accept cuts in Murphy requested by Houghton Mifflin, Boston. Asks Reavey how to acquire permission to use "apes at chess" for frontispiece ofMurphy.
Leaves Hamburg; visits Liineburg.
292
Chronology 1936
5 December
6 December
7 December
8 December
10 December
11 December
c. 16-17 December
In Hanover; visits home of Leibniz.
In Brunswick.
In Riddagshausen.
In Wolfenbiittel; visits Lessing Museum. In Hildesheim.
Arrives in Berlin.
Settles in Pension Kempt, Berlin.
293
GEORGE REAVEY LONDON
9/1/35 [for 1936] 6 Clare Street Dublin
Dear George
Thanks for your card. I am more or less all right again now. Coffey left here I think last Friday, for a lecture at Sorbonne
Sat. morning, so I suppose you didn't see him in London. He said he had sent you some more Bones. 1 Yes, let me have as many more as I am due. I think he got my copy of the This Quarter in question. I said i [sic] was not keen on doing more translations, but would if necessary. 2 He appears to want to make the philo sophical series very serious & Fach. But my Geulincx could only be a literary fantasia. 3
I am glad to hear of the European Quarterly. I suppose I have odd poems, or perhaps I might let you have an excerpt from the prose work I mentioned. But there doesn't seem to be much, among my papers or in my mind. 4 I have not seen Devlin. He works in an office, you know. Then in the evening the ballroom. Codpiece Bordel de Danse, Gipsy Scrotum and his Band. Ne suis pas a la hauteur. 5
My friends here esquivent the Bones for the more part, which means the bolus has gone home. What shall they say, my not even enemies. May it stick in their anus. "I am sure you were not born with a pop. " But am I not sparkling? Then how should the birth be still? Sois calme, 6 mon souleur . . 6 Andersen was the byblow of a Frenchman from the Marne. Ca explique Dieu. 7
295
9 January 1935 {for 1936}, Reavey
How much longer London? As I broached the stairs to your
party, as to observatory platform at uranal distance from the
young lady whose name escapes me altogether don't you know,
the gan;on tirebouchon (ce qui m'interesse, c'est le tirebouchon,
non pas le Chandon - Gide) smirked his inadequacy. His heart
8
was not pure. Non pas le condom.
Hommages to Miss Cordon non pas bas bleu.
Your obedient servant s/Sam
9
Ce n'est pas au pelican Pas si pitoyable
Ni a Marie
Pas si pure
Mais a Lucie
Egyptienne oui et peaussiere aussi
Qui ne m'a pas gueri mais qui aurait pu Et a. Jude
Dontj'ai adorore la depouille Quej'adresse la cause desesperee Qu'on dirait la mienne. 10
TLS; 1 leaf, 1 side; TxU. Dating: Echo's Bones was published in November 1935, and so the year must be 1936.
1 SB had been ill with pleurisy (SB to McGreevy 31 December [1935J, TCD, MS 10402/84).
Brian Coffey left Dublin for Paris on Friday, 3 January 1936. Before he had left Paris for the Christmas holidays in Dublin, he had sent George Reavey copies ofEcho's Bones, which had been published byEuropa Press in Paris (Brian Coffey to George Reavey, 17 December 1935; TxU).
2 SBwrote"<Hecamedownheretoseeme,asIwasnotyetpromenable,>Ithink. "
Coffey had taken SB's copy of This Quarter 5. 1 (September 1932} in which SB's translations of Paul Eluard's poems ("Lady Love," "Out of Sight in the Direction of My Body," "Scarcely Disfigured," "The Invention," "Definition," "A Life Uncovered or The Human Pyramid," "The Queen of Diamonds," "Do Thou Sleep," "Second Nature," "Scene," "All-Proof: Universe-Solitude," and "Confections") had appeared (86-98). Reavey was preparing Thorns of Thunder, a collection ofEluard's poems in translation,
296
9January 1935 [for 1936}, Reavey
which included SB's translations already published in This Quarter; Reavey had appa rently asked, through Coffey, ifSB would prepare more.
3 BrianCoffeyhadinmindamonographseriesonphilosophers;hewasstudying the philosophy of science with Catholic thinker Jacques Maritain {1882-1973) at the lnstitut Catholique de Paris.
"Fach" {professional).
Despite his disclaimer, SB pursued study ofFlemish metaphysicanArnold Geulincx {1624-1669) in the library ofTrinity College Dublin, as he wrote to McGreevy: "I put my foot within the abhorred gates [ofTCDJ for the first time since the escape, on a commis sion from Ruddy. And I fear I shall have to penetrate more deeply, in search ofGeulincx, who does not exist in the National, but does in TCD" (9 January 1935 [for 1936[, TCD, MS 10402/85). SBreadandtookextensivenotesinLatinfromtheEthicaofArnoldGeulincx, in the edition Arnoldi Geulincx antverpiensis Opera Philosophica. Sumptibus providernnt Sortis spinozianae curatores, 3 vols. , ed. Jan Pieter Nicolaas Land {The Hague: apud Martinum Nijhoff, 1891-1893). For SB's notes on his reading ofGeuiincx, see TCD, MS 10971/6; EverettFrostandJaneMaxwell,"TCDMS10971/6LatinexcerptsfromArnoldusGeulincx and R. P. Gredt," Notes Diverse Holo, Special issue SBT/A 16 (2006) 141-155.
4 As SB wrote to McGreevy, "A card from Reavey, decided to launch European Quarterly . . What would I like to give him for nothing? " (9 January 1935 [for 19361). It is not known what poems or prose SB had in mind, although a poem appears at the end of the present letter. Reavey did not establish a quarterly journal.
5 DenisDevlin(see5May1935,n. 1).
"Borde! de Danse" (Dance Brothel). "Ne suis pas a la hauteur" ([I'm] not up to it).
6 Echo'sBoneswasmentionedasforthcominginthe"Irishman'sDiary:IrishWriters," The Irish Times 7 December 1935: 6. "Esquivent" (are dodging); "the more part" (Gallicism for "the most part"). SB wrote to McGreevy: "No professional reactions to the poems in any quarter that I know of. Con & Ethna were able to get out ofthe awkward position by remarking that they were already familiar with most ofthem. Ruddy had only feuillete" (9 January 1935 [for 1936[, TCD, MS 10402/85). "Feuillete" (leafed through).
SB imagines a response to the line from "Sanies I": "I was born with a pop with the green ofthe larches" (Echo's Bones, [191). He mentally prepares a retort with wordplay based on sparkling wine/water and still, birth, and stillbirth.
In "Sois calme, 6 mon soiileur" (Be calm, oh my intoxicator), SB makes play with the opening line of Baudelaire's poem "Recueillement": "Sois sage, 6 ma Douleur" (Behave, my sorrow) (Baudelaire, Oeuvres completes, I, 140; Baudelaire, Les Reurs du Mal, The Rowers ofEvil, 173).
7 Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) was born in wedlock, his parents having married two months before his birth (1805); his father, Hans Andersen, was a journey man shoemaker from Odense (Elias Bredsdorff, Hans Christian Andersen: The Story ofHis Life and Work, 1805-75 [London: Phaidon Press, 1975[ 15-16).
·c;;a explique Dieu" (That explains God).
8 Theyoungwoman,asfardistantastheplanetUranus,hasnotbeenidentified.
"Gar�on tirebouchon (ce qui m'interesse, c'est le tirebouchon, non pas le Chandon - Gide)" (The waiter with the corkscrew [what interests me is the corkscrew, not the Chandon - Gide]). Reference unclear.
"Non pas le condom" (Not the condom).
297
9 January 1935 [for 1936}, Reavey
9 "Hommages to Miss Cordon non pas bas bleu" (Respects to Miss Cordon not bleu): "bas bleu" (bluestocking). Punning combines this with "Cordon bleu. " The subject of SB's reference is not known.
10 This version of the poem varies from that published in French in SB's Dream of Fair to Middling Women, 21. For a discussion of sources and nuances, see also Pilling, A Companion to "Dream of Fair to Middling Women," 54-55. SB did not translate this poem.
It is not to the pelican Not so pitiable
Nor to Marie
Not so pure
But to Lucie
Yes, the Egyptian (and in the leather trade) Who did not cure me but who might have And to Jude
Whose hide I adorored
That I put the desperate case
That might look like mine.
THOMAS McGREEVY LONDON
16/1 [1936]
Foxrock [Co. Dublin]
Dear Tom
Very glad to have your letter & poems. The verdict ofOxford
is final & excellent. I do not care so much for its preparation. Davies matters as little as the jelly. j'irai dans le desert I liked
1
tion ofVollard's new book.
I found Devlin the other day among his external affairs &
am lunching with him to-morrow. His poems are in hand & he has a new prose-cum-verse romance. But he said he had written to you himself. He wondered were you bose with him. I said: Macche! 3
298
also. But is it not rather from the desert. Call it camp foutu. Rutter turns out to be ofsome service at last - in his indica
2
16January {1936}, McGreevy
The weather is dreadful & I cannot get warm. I trailed down to Newcastle one day with Cissie to see Boss. Always when I get there I am glummer than the whole institution put together. On the way back a hard hit publican in Bray quoted Daniel O'Connell to prove there was no hope remaining for this coun try. A cow, a cow, my Free State for a cow. In the train from Bray, vainly unrecognized, the pestiferous Michael Farrell fresh from Kilmacanogue & next doordom to All Forlorn (whose elucubra tion on Coriolanus at the Abbey I trust you read in the Chelsea Library). He is finishing a work, really very beautiful, & admired by All Forlorn, himself naively 5 minutes later extolled by Farrell as a critic! 4
No news from Coffey since I saw him here. I shall have to go
into TCD after Geulincx, as he does not exist in National Library.
I suddenly see that Murphy is break down between his ubi nihil
vales ibi nihil velis (positive) & Malraux's Il est difficile a celui
qui vit hors du monde de ne pas rechercher les siens (negation).
I have not done a tap since I saw you. Shelves are going up slowly
in the room where I hope to dig in, and books slowly from Clare
5
The X-Ray shows nothing. Je m'en doutais.
I was hoping to see JBY last Saturday but went to the Gallery
6
299
Street.
instead. Not a picture touched, only two "British" rooms closed. Bion in his last acknowledgment of the filthy "trusted I had by now taken up my work with pleasure and satisfaction", as he was sure I must "even though not entirely freed from neuroses"! Mother's whole idea of course is to get me committed to life here. And my travel-courage is so gone that the collapse is more than likely. I find myself more than ever frightened by the prospect of effort, initiative & even the little self-assertion of getting about from one place to another. Solitude here, perhaps
16 January {1936}, McGreevy
more sober than before, seems the upshot of the London
Torture. Indeed I do not see what difference the analysis has
made. Relations with M. as thorny as ever and the nights no
7
provenistheliterary. Wartenur. . . FrankIfeelcensoriousas
9
I have not seen Ruddy since. It is very difficult to get across
10
better. Aheartattacklastnightthatwouldhavedonecreditto three years ago. The only plane on which I feel my defeat not
8
not before. He is so successful. To-day gone to Galway, not to return till Saturday.
from here, and when one does . . . But I hear he gets on well.
I
have seen all the Jew faithful, Con etc. , but really feel I do not
want to see them any more. If nothing has survived but the
11
Geoffrey seems to be working too hard at the Maudsley. He
has applied for a demonstratorship in physiology, 4 hours a
week well paid & work that would give him no trouble. Then
he could give up the Maudsley. I should say he has a very good
chance ofgetting in. He will be upset by the death ofAndy Frank
Dixon announced in to-day's paper. One of the few good minds
12
your gaffe will save her. Greetings to her & Hester & Raven. 13 Write very soon again.
Love Sam
300
habit, to insist is like doffing to the Cenotaph.
seem to have committed myself to some months here, London & you & Geoffrey seem the sanctuary & reality. Perhaps the flight will be sooner than I expect, but no more Bion. As I write, think, move, speak, praise & blame, I see myselfliving up to the speci men that these 2 years have taught me I am. The word is not out before I am blushing for my automatism.
Now, just as I
left in the place.
Poor Dilly, in the running for Lynd's good opinion. Surely
Sean O'Sullivan was over taking plan & elevation of Shem.
He asked did I dive with my glasses on. Sean liked Leon (for Leon].
They all got jolly together, chez Fourquet [for Fouquet]. Parait
16January {1936}, McGreevy
14
ALS; 2 leaves, 3 sides; env to Thomas McGreevy Esq, 15 Cheyne Gardens, Chelsea,
London SW 3; pm 20-1-36, Dublin; TCD, MS 10402/86. Dating: from pm.
1 McGreevy'slettertoSBhasnotbeenfound;itisnotknownwhichofthepoems he enclosed.
W. B. Yeats selected and introduced the poems included in The Oxford Book ofModem Verse: 1892-1935 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1936).
McGreevy was aware that his poems "Aodh Ruadh 6 Domhnaill" and "Homage to Jack Yeats" would be included (333-335). Since his friend George Yeats (nee Bertha Georgie Hyde-Lee, 1892-1968) was handling permissions and compiling the index for the anthology in early January 1936, McGreevy is likely to have seen the other poems selected (Ann Saddlemyer. Becoming George, 495-496).
Welsh-born poetWilliam Henry Davies (1870-1940) was represented in the anthol ogy by seven poems (128-133).
