George Orwell: A Life in Letters (54 page)

5 March 1946

27B Canonbury Square

Islington N 1

Dear Arthur,

It’s funny you should send me Czapsky’s°
¹
pamphlet, which I have been trying for some time [to get] someone to translate and publish. Warburg wouldn’t do it b[ecause] he said it was an awkward length, and latterly I gave it t[o the] Anarchist (Freedom Press) group. I don’t know what decisi[on they’ve] come to. I met Czapsky° in Paris and had lunch with him. T[here is] no doubt that he is not only authentic but a rather exce[ptional] person, though whether he is any good as a painter I do[n’t know. He] is the person who made to me a remark which I may or ma[y not have] retailed to you—I forget. After telling me something [of the priv-]ation and his sufferings in the concentration camp, he [said some-]thing like this: ‘For a while in 1941 and 1942 there w[as much] defeatism in Russia, and in fact it was touch and go [whether the] Germans won the war. Do you know what saved Russia at [that time? In] my opinion it was the personal character of Stalin—I [put it down to] the greatness of Stalin. He stayed in Moscow when the [Germans nearly] took it, and his courage was what saved the situation.
²
[Considering] what he had been through, this seemed to me sufficie[nt proof of] Czapsky’s reliability. I told him I would do what I [could about the] pamphlet here. If the Freedom Press people fall thro[ugh, what about] Arthur Ballard, who is now beginning to publish pamp[hlets? He might] take it.
³
Do you want this copy back? The Anarchists [have mine] and it’s a rather treasured item of my collection.

The
Observer
say, will you write for them some [reviews. I am] scouting round for people to do the main review, wh[ich must be done] by the same person every week—I do it every other [week and will] be stopping at the end of April. Apart from the mai[n review I] intend quite soon to start having essays of about 8[00 words on the] middle page under the main article. You would get a [good fee, I] think, for either of these jobs.

I’d love to come up to your place, but I dou[bt whether I can] get away. I have such a lot to do winding everythi[ng up, arranging for] the furniture to be sent and all sorts of things t[o do, almost like] stocking up a ship for an arctic voyage. Love to Ma[maine.]

Yours

George

[XVIII, 2919, pp.
136–8; typewritten]

1
.
Joseph Czapski (1896–1993), wrote to Orwell on 11 December 1945 at the suggestion of ‘mon ami Poznanski’ because he thought Orwell could find an English publisher for his pamphlet (a quite sizeable booklet)
Souvenirs de Starobielsk
.
This had originally been published in Polish as
Wspomnienia Starobielskia
in 1944; Italian and French translations followed in
1945. Czapski, a Polish painter and author, but born in Prague, studied in St Petersburg, 1912–17, and witnessed the Russian Revolution; in 1920 he returned to Poland and from 1924 to 1931 he studied and worked as a painter in Paris, being shown there and in Geneva. He fought with the 8th Polish Lancers against the Germans and then the Russians in 1939, and was taken prisoner by the Soviets. He was one of 78 of nearly 4,000 prisoners at Starobielsk prison camp transferred to a prison camp at Gryazovets. He spent twenty-three months in these camps. When the Germans invaded Russia, he was allowed to join other Polish prisoners, many of whom had suffered terrible privations, in a Polish Army under General Anders to fight the Germans.
It is known that some 15,700 Poles were murdered by the Russians at Katyn and other camps (Czapski’s figures,
Souvenirs de Starobielsk
, 1945, p. 18). A further 7,000 from camps in the Komi Republic were packed into barges which were deliberately sunk in the White Sea, causing their deaths by drowning (
The Inhuman Land
, pp. 35–36). Czapski remained in Paris after the war and was one of the founders of the influential Polish cultural monthly journal,
Kultura.

2
.
See
17.3.45
for the change to
Animal Farm
to reflect Stalin’s staying in Moscow.

3
.
Orwell and Koestler were unsuccessful. Despite the booklet’s having what Czapski called ‘une certaine actualité’ in the light of what was being presented in evidence at the Nuremberg Trial of War Criminals,
Souvenirs de Starobielsk
was not then translated into English and has never been published in Britain.

To Anne Popham*

15 March 1946

27B Canonbury Square

Islington N 1

Dear Andie,

I call you that because it is what I have heard other people call you—I don’t know what you like to be called, really. It must be nearly a fortnight since you left. I would have written earlier, but I have been ill all this week with something called gastritis. I think a word like that tells you a lot about the medical profession. If you have a pain in your belly it is called gastritis, if it is in your head I suppose it would be called cephalitis and so on. Any way it is quite an unpleasant thing to have, but I am somewhat better and got up for the first time today. Richard has been quite offensively well and prancing all over the place. I have at last got one of those pens that don’t have any ink in them,
¹
so I have been able to suppress the inkpot, which he had got hold of three times in the last week or two. He has got a new waterproof cape in which he looks quite dashing, and when we go away for the summer he is going to have his first pair of boots.

I wonder what sort of journey you had and how bearable it is in Germany now. I think in that sort of life a lot depends on having a vehicle of your own and being able to get away from the others a bit. Write and tell me what it is like and any bits of gossip you hear about what the Germans are saying about us now. I think you said you would be back in England in July. I’m not sure where we shall be by then—I intend to get out of London for the whole summer, but we haven’t yet fixed where. I have definitely arranged to drop all journalistic work for 6 months and am pining for that time to start. I’ve still got a few ghastly jobs, ie. outside my routine ones, hanging over my head, and being ill like this puts everything back. The rubbishy feature I was writing for the
BBC
got finished at last, but I now have to write a pamphlet for the British Council on English cookery. I don’t know why I was such a fool as to let myself in for it—however it will be quite short so I can probably knock it off in a week.
²
After that I haven’t any actual tripe to write. When I get away I am going to start on a novel. It is 6 years or so since I wrote any such thing and it will probably be an awful job to start, but I think with six clear months I could break the back of it.

I wonder if you were angry or surprised when I sort of made advances to you that night before you went away. You don’t have to respond—what I mean is, I wouldn’t be angry if you didn’t respond. I didn’t know till you told me about your young man.
³
I thought you looked lonely and unhappy, and I thought it just conceivable you might come to take an interest in me, partly because I imagined you were a little older than you are. But I fully realise that I’m not suited to someone like you who is young and pretty and can still expect to get something out of life. There isn’t really anything left in my life except my work and seeing that Richard gets a good start. It is only that I feel so desperately alone sometimes. I have hundreds of friends, but no woman who takes an interest in me and can encourage me. Write and tell me what you think about all this. Of course it’s absurd a person like me wanting to make love to someone of your age. I do want to, but, if you understand, I wouldn’t be offended or even hurt if you simply say no. Any way, write and tell me what you feel.

I wonder if there is anything I can do for you or send you. Are there any books you want? Or any papers? Would you like to be sent
Tribune
, for instance? I should think some of your brother officers wouldn’t approve of it much. Talking of books I have been able to get some of Henry Miller’s books again—they seem to be reprinting them in Paris and a few copies get into this country illegally. I don’t know what else of interest has appeared lately. Nearly all the books I get to review are such trash one doesn’t know what to say about them. Would you like to be sent
Polemic
? The third number is supposed to appear towards the end of April, but lord knows whether it will, as there is always some mess-up about the printing. They now have some wild scheme of printing it in Eire, but then one might bump up against the censorship. Write to me soon and tell me whether there is anything you would like, and how you are getting on, and what you feel about things.

Yours

Geo. Orwell

P.S. I am not sure how to stamp this letter, but I suppose threepence is right?

[XVIII, 2931, pp. 153–4; typewritten]

1
.
A Biro. Orwell had first tried to buy one in February 1946. They were then quite hard to obtain and very expensive – about £3 (over half-a-week’s wage for an unskilled worker). Orwell found them particularly useful because, when ill, he could write in bed. His use of a Biro can be a clue to when he wrote certain letters and documents.

2
.
The ‘rubbishy feature’ for the BBC was probably the dramatisation
The Voyage of the ‘Beagle’
, broadcast 29 March 1946 (XVIII, 2953, pp. 179–201). The text of the booklet,
British Cookery,
is reproduced in XVIII, 2
954, pp. 201–13. Although it was considered to be excellent it was decided not to publish it to avoid offending continental readers at a time of such stringency (though the recipes are hardly exotic). Orwell was paid £31 10s for his script.

3
.
He had been killed when serving in the RAF (Crick, p. 485).

To Arthur Koestler*

22 March 1946

27B Canonbury Square

Islington N 1

Dear Arthur,

The
Manchester Evening News
want to know whether, when I stop my reviewing for them (ie. end of April), you would like to take over my job for 6 months. I told them I didn’t think it was awfully likely you would, but that I would ask you. It’s rather hackwork, but it’s a regular 8 guineas a week (that is what they pay me—I expect you could get a bit more out of them) for about 900 words, in which one can say more or less what one likes. The chief bore is reading the books; on the other hand one gets out of this from time to time by doing general articles or dealing with reprints which one knows already. One retains the second rights. You might let me know as soon as possible if this idea has any attraction for you, as otherwise they will have to scout round for someone else.

Love to Mamaine.

Yours

George

P.S. [
handwritten
] I’ve contacted Malory° Brown
¹
who thinks he will probably be able to come up at Easter. I’m going to have lunch with him on April 3rd & talk it over. Meanwhile could you let me know exactly
what date
he should come up to your place?

[XVIII, 294
1, pp. 164–5; typewritten with handwritten postscript]

Koestler replied on 23 March. He decided not to take on the work for the
Manchester Evening News
— ‘for once I shall let puritanism get the upper hand over hedonism (dig)’, a reference to Orwell’s statement that there is ‘a well-marked hedonistic strain in his writings’ in the penultimate paragraph of Orwell’s essay on Koestler.

1
.
Mallory Browne was then the London editor of the
Christian Science Monitor
.
On 22 October 1944 he contributed ‘The New Order in France’ to the
Observer
.

To Arthur Koestler*

31 March 1946

27B Canonbury Square

Islington N 1

Dear Arthur,

I enclose a letter from the
IRRC
¹
people, about whom I wrote to you before, and a copy of their bulletin. The part of [it] about Jennie Lee* and Michael Foot
²
is rather vague and I am not sure what it is he wants me to do, but I hope to see Jennie Lee* tomorrow and will speak to her about it. Michael is in Teheran, I think.

I am seeing Malory° Brown on Wednesday and will tell him the Easter conference is off. Has anyone told Michael?

I think my Jura cottage is going to be ready by May and I am arranging to send my furniture up about the end of April and then, if all is well, go up there early in May. If anything falls through I shall go somewhere else, but in any case I shall leave London and do no writing or anything of the kind for two months. I feel desperately tired and jaded. Richard is very well and active but still not talking.

I have at last got hold of a book by that scientist I spoke to you of, John Baker.
³
He is evidently one of the people we should circularise when we have a draft proposal ready. He could probably also be useful in telling us about other scientists who are not totalitarian-minded, which is important, because as a body they are much more subject to totalitarian habits of thought than writers, and have more popular prestige. Humphrey
[Slater]* got Waddington,
⁴
who is a borderline case, to do an article for
Polemic,
which I think was a good move, as it will appear in the same number as our opening volley against the
Modern Quarterly
.
⁵
Unfortunately it was a very bad article.