George Orwell: A Life in Letters (5 page)

Above is W’wick church as well as I can remember it. At about 5.20 pm on 27.7.31 I was sitting at the spot marked *, looking out in the direction of the dotted arrow. I happened to glance over my shoulder, & saw a figure pass along the line of the other arrow, disappearing behind the masonry & presumably emerging into the churchyard. I wasn’t looking
directly
at it & so couldn’t make out more than that it was a man’s figure, small & stooping, & dressed in lightish brown; I should have said a workman. I had the impression that it glanced towards me in passing, but I made out nothing of the features. At the moment of its passing I thought nothing, but a few seconds later it struck me that the figure had made no noise, & I followed it out into the churchyard. There was no one in the churchyard, & no one within possible distance along the road—this was about 20 seconds after I had seen it; & in any case there were only 2 people in the road, & neither at all resembled the figure. I looked into the church. The only people there were the vicar, dressed in
black
, & a workman who, as far as I remember, had been sawing the whole time. In any case he was too tall for the figure. The figure had therefore vanished. Presumably an hallucination.

I have been up in town since the beginning of the month. I have made arrangements to go hop-picking, but we shan’t start till the beginning of September. Meanwhile I’ve been busy working. I met recently one of the editors of a new paper
²
that is to start coming out in October, & I hope I shall be able to get some work from them—not enough to live on, of course, but enough to help. I’ve been making just a few enquiries among the tramps. Of the three friends I had before, one is believed to have been run over & killed, one has taken to drink & vanished, one is doing time in Wandsworth. I met a man today who was, till 6 weeks ago, a goldsmith. Then he poisoned his right forefinger, & had to have part of the top joint removed; that means he will be on the road for life. It is appalling what small accidents can ruin a man who works with his hands. Talking of hands, they say hop-picking disables your hands for weeks after—however, I’ll describe that to you when I’ve done it.

Have you ever looked into the window of one of those Bible Society shops? I did today & saw huge notices ‘The cheapest Roman Catholic Bible 5/6d. The cheapest Protestant Bible 1/–’, ‘The Douay ° version
not
stocked here’ etc. etc. Long may they fight, I say; so long as that spirit is in the land we are safe from the R.C.’s—this shop, by the way, was just outside St Paul’s. If you are ever near St Paul’s & feel in a gloomy mood, go in & have a look at the statue of the first Protestant bishop of India, which will give you a good laugh. Will write again when I have news. I am sending this to S’wold.

Yours

Eric A Blair

[X, 109, pp. 211–212; handwritten]

1
.
In 1930–31 Orwell lived with his parents in Southwold but made forays tramping and writing what would become
Down and Out in Paris and London
. When he visited London he would stay with Francis and Mabel Sinclair Fierz in Golders Green. Mrs Fierz reviewed for
The Adelphi
and her husband was a Dickens enthusiast. It was Mrs Fierz who was instrumental in getting
Down and Out
published and having Orwell taken on by Leonard Moore as his literary agent. She died in 1990 aged 100.

2
.
Modern Youth
. Orwell submitted two stories but the publication evidently went bankrupt and the printers seized Orwell’s stories with the journals assets. They have not been identified.

To Leonard Moore*

26 April 1932

The Hawthorns [School]

Station Rd

Hayes, Middlesex

Dear Mr Moore,

Thank you for your letter. The history of the ms. ‘Days in London and Paris’ is this. About a year and a half ago I completed a book of this description, but shorter (about 35000 words), and after taking advice I sent it to Jonathan Cape. Cape’s said they would like to publish it but it was too short and fragmentary (it was done in diary form), and that they might be disposed to take it if I made it longer. I then put in some things I had left out, making the ms. you have, and sent it back to Capes,° who again rejected it. That was last September. Meanwhile a friend who was editor of a magazine had seen the first ms., and he said that it was worth publishing and spoke about it to T. S. Eliot, who is a reader to Faber and Faber. Eliot said the same as Cape’s— i.e. that the book was interesting but much too short. I left the ms. you have with Mrs Sinclair Fierz and asked her to throw it away, as I did not think it a good piece of work, but I suppose she sent it to you instead. I should of course be very pleased if you could sell it, and it is very kind of you to take the trouble of trying. No publishers have seen it except Faber’s and Cape’s. If by any chance you
do
get it accepted, will you please see that it is published pseudonymously, as I am not proud of it. I have filled up the form you sent, but I have put in a clause that I only want an agent for dealings with publishers. The reason is this. I am now very busy teaching in a school, and I am afraid that for some months I shan’t be able to get on with any work except occasional reviews or articles and I get the commissions for these myself. But there is a novel
¹
that I began some months ago and shall go on with next holidays, and I dare say it will be finished within a year: I will send it to you then. If you could get me any French or Spanish books to translate into English I would willingly pay you whatever commission you think right, for I like that kind of work. There is also a long poem describing a day in London which I am doing, and it
may
be finished before the end of this term. I will send you that too if you like, but I should not think there is any money for anybody in that kind of thing. As to those stories
²
you have I should shy them away, as they are not really worth bothering with.

Yours truly

Eric A Blair

P.S. I tried to get Chatto & Windus to give me some of Zola’s novels to translate, but they wouldn’t. I should think somebody might be willing to translate Zola—he has been done, but atrociously badly.
³
Or what about Huysmans? I can’t believe
Sainte Lydwine de Schiedam
has been translated into English. I also tried to get Faber’s to translate a novel called
A la Belle de Nuit
, by Jacques Roberti. It is very good but apallingly° indecent, & they refused it on that ground. I should think somebody might take it on—do you know anybody who isn’t afraid of that kind of thing? (The book isn’t pornographic, only rather sordid.) I could get hold of the copy I had & send it if necessary. I could also translate old° French, at least anything since 1400 A.D.

[X, 124, pp. 243–3; typewritten; handwritten postscript]

1
.
Burmese Days.

2
.
These stories do not appear to have survived.

3
.
Zola’s novels had been published in England by Henry Vizetelly (1820–1894), who also established the Mermaid Series of Dramatists and published translations of Dostoevsky, Flaubert, and Tolstoy. The publication in English of Zola’s
La Terre
(though ‘amended’) led to Vizetelly’s being fined and in 1889 jailed on the charge of obscenity. British publishers, and Gollancz in particular, feared expensive legal costs if charged with defamation, libel or obscenity. (See
14.11.34,
n.2.)

To Eleanor Jaques*

Tuesday [14 June 1932]

The Hawthorns

Dear Eleanor,

How do things go with you? I hope your father is better, & that you have got your garden into shape. I have been teaching at the above foul place for nearly two months. I don’t find the work uninteresting, but it is very exhausting, & apart from a few reviews etc. I’ve hardly done a stroke of writing. My poor poem, which was promising not too badly, has of course stopped dead. The most disagreeable thing here is not the job itself (it is a day-school, thank God, so I have nothing to do with the brats out of school hours) but Hayes itself, which is one of the most godforsaken places I have ever struck. The population seems to be entirely made up of clerks who frequent tin-roofed chapels on Sundays & for the rest bolt themselves within doors. My sole friend is the curate—High Anglican but not a creeping Jesus & a very good fellow. Of course it means that I have to go to Church, which is an arduous job here, as the service is so popish that I don’t know my way about it & feel an awful B.F.
¹
when I see everyone bowing & crossing themselves all round me & can’t follow suit. The poor old vicar, who I suspect hates all this popery, is dressed up in cope & biretta & led round in procession with candles etc., looking like a bullock garlanded for sacrifice. I have promised to paint one of the church idols (a quite skittish-looking B.V.M.
²
, half life-size, & I shall try & make her look as much like one of the illustrations in
La Vie Parisienne
as possible) & to grow a marrow for the harvest festival. I would ‘communicate’ too, only I am afraid the bread might choke me. Have you read anything interesting lately? I read for the first time Marlowe’s
Faustus
, & thought it rotten, also a mangy little book on Shakespeare trying to prove that Hamlet = Earl of Essex,
³
also a publication called
The Enemy
of Wyndham Lewis (not the professional R.C
⁴
), who seems to have something in him, also something of Osbert Sitwell, also some odes of Horace, whom I wish I hadn’t neglected hitherto—otherwise nothing, not having much time or energy. Mrs. Carr
⁵
sent me two books of Catholic apologetics, & I had great pleasure in reviewing one of them
⁶
for a new paper called the
New English Weekly
. It was the first time I had been able to lay the bastinado on a professional R.C. at any length. I have got a few square feet of garden, but have had rotten results owing to rain, slugs & mice. I have found hardly any birds’ nests—this place is on the outskirts of London, of course. I have also been keeping a pickle-jar aquarium, chiefly for the instruction of the boys, & we have newts, tadpoles, caddis-flies etc. If when you are passing, if you ever do, the pumping station at the beginning of the ferry-path, you see any eggs of puss-moths on the poplar trees there, I should be awfully obliged if you would pick the leaves & send them me by post. I want some, & have only been able to find one or two here. Of course I don’t mean make an expedition there, I only mean if you happen to be passing. What is Dennis
⁷
doing these days? I want to consult him about an extraordinary fungus that was dug up here, but of course he never answers letters. I may or may not come back to S’wold for the summer holidays. I want to get on with my novel
⁸
and if possible finish the poem I had begun, & I think perhaps it would be best for me to go to some quiet place in France, where I can live cheaply & have less temptation from the World, the Flesh & the Devil than at S’wold. (You can decide which of these categories you belong to.) By the way, if you are ever to be in London please let me know, as we might meet, that is if you would like to. Please remember me to your parents, also to Mr and Mrs Pullein
⁹
if you see them.

Yours

Eric A Blair

P.S. In case you see Dennis, you might tell him the fungus was like this (below.) It was dug up underground.

P.P.S. I trust this adress° is all right.

[X, 129, pp. 249–50; handwritten; dated from postmark
¹⁰
]

1
.
B.F.: Bloody Fool

2
.
B.V.M.: Blessed Virgin Mary

3
.
Probably
The Essential Shakespeare
by J. Dover Wilson (1932)

4
.
D. B. Wyndham Lewis (1891–1969), a Roman Catholic and a
bête noire
of Orwell’s. He was one of the contributors to a jokey column in the
Daily Express
under the pseudonym, ‘Beachcomber’.

5
.
A Southwold friend of Orwell and Eleanor Jaques.

6
.
The Spirit of Catholicism
by Karl Adam. Orwell’s review appeared in
New English Weekly,
9 June 1932 (X, 127, pp. 246–8).

7
.
Dennis Collings.

8
.
Burmese Days
.

9
.
Collett Cresswell Pulleyne, a Yorkshire barrister and his mother. He was a friend of both Orwell and Collings. Orwell had some difficulty spelling his name.

10.
Published by kind permission of Richard Young.

In addition to Orwell’s letters to Brenda Salkeld which have been published in the
Complete Works
, he wrote at least nineteen others to her, seventeen of them between 13 May 1931 and 25 June 1940. These letters survive in private hands. Gordon Bowker was permitted to read them for his biography,
George Orwell
(2003) and summaries of the letters derived with permission from his biography are given in
The Lost Orwell
, pp. 92–8. Many of the letters described events in Orwell’s life but there is a thread running through them indicating his wish to have an affair with Brenda. She refused such attentions but they remained friends throughout his life. In his penultimate letter of 15 February 1946 he invited her to high tea at 27b Canonbury Square to see Richard. She accepted, as she did an invitation by Orwell’s sister, Avril, to stay at Barnhill, Jura. In the last of these letters, 30 June 1946, Orwell sent Miss Salkeld instructions for the journey.