The Letters of T. S. Eliot, Volume 1: 1898-1922 (126 page)

MS
Lilly

Wednesday [9 August 1922]

9 Clarence Gate Gdns

My dear D. P.

I arrived back from my weekend at Bosham, last night, went to the doctor about my cold, tonight had to have a shorthand typist in for correspondence (she comes twice a week) so is there any hope of my finding you tomorrow, of your not leaving town till Friday? If so, will you send me a line to Eliot, Information Branchage, Stock, London and I will come in. I hope so. If not, when?
¹

Booklets – about what? I have asked Orage, but he says he writes no more, and I am told is taken up by the Gotcheff system.
²
I shd like to get him. Novels – difficult in a quarterly – unless short – and one does not wish to commit oneself until one knows how good it is. Has anyone seen it?

Shall be disappointed if impossible to see you before you go to Paris.

Yours ever
T.

 1–Dorothy Pound could not make any of the days TSE suggested, so he wrote again on 12 Aug.: ‘I am indeed very disappointed, but do let me know as soon as you return. TSE.’ (Lilly).

2–After fifteen years as editor of the
New Age
, A. R. Orage had stepped down to follow George Gurdjieff in the summer of 1922. See Carswell,
Lives and Letters.

CC

9 August 1922

9 Clarence Gate Gdns

My dear Sydney,

I have several letters from you which I am anxious to answer, but I have been away over the weekend and I was also suffering from a heavy cold with neuralgia, and therefore have arrears to make up.

I will write you on Sunday. In the meanwhile I have forwarded your letter to Conrad Aiken and fully concur with your opinion of his review.

I will take up the point about Austin Harrison
¹
when I write you. These things are very vexing.

Yours always affectionately,
[T. S. E.]

1–Austin Harrison, editor of the
English Review
. SS wrote on 3 Aug.: ‘Austin Harrison has printed my translation of Hesse’s first essay “The downfall of Europe” without acknowledging or mentioning me as translator … I had no little difficulty in getting Harrison to take it. He now places it first in the August number The Times.
> as though he had discovered Hesse or as though Hesse had selected the
English Review
in which to make his bow to the English public …’

TS
Real Academia de la Historia

9 August 1922

9 Clarence Gate Gdns

Cher Monsieur,

Je m’empresse de vous accuser réception de votre très intéressante étude;
¹
recevez mes vifs remerciements. Puisque c’est un genre d’article dans lequel j’ai moi-même fait des tentatifs, j’apprécie fort bien que l’auteur se sacrifie à ses collègues; et j’espère recevoir de vous plus tard quelque chose où vous vous ‘raconterez’ (dans le sens de Gourmont) plutôt que vos contemporains; et je n’ai aucun doute que le public anglais desirera vous connaître davantage.

Votre article paraîtra dans le second numéro; on vous enverra la petite bonification au mois de novembre. Je vous ferai parvenir un exemplaire de
The Criterion
dès le début; et j’espère que vous continuerez de m’envoyer
Indice
, que je trouve (en dépit de ma connaissance exiguë de la langue espagnole) d’un très grand intérêt. Votre article me poussera à recommencer mes études espagnoles.

Le premier numéro contiendra des contributions de Larbaud, G. Saintsbury, Sturge Moore, Gómez de la Serna, Hermann Hesse, moi-même,
et un inédit de Dostoevski.
²
Dans le second, Ernst Curtius et Marcel Proust ou Paul Valéry.

Merci de vos compliments gentils, et croyez-moi votre dévoué

T. S. Eliot
³

1–Antonio Marichalar, ‘Contemporary Spanish Literature’, C. 1: 1 (Oct. 1922).

2–The list of authors largely matches those in the first C. On 16 Sept., TSE would send Marichalar a revised list of the contributions to the first two numbers, while thanking him for his kind letter and ‘
bénédiction
’.

3–
Translation
: Dear Sir, I hasten to acknowledge receipt of your very interesting article; receive my hearty thanks. Since it is the sort of piece that I have sometimes tried to write myself, I appreciate very well how the author has to sacrifice himself in the interest of his colleagues; and I hope later to get something from you in which you ‘talk about yourself’ (in the sense Gourmont uses the expression), rather than about your contemporaries; and I have no doubt that the English public will be keen to know you better.

Your article will appear in the second number; the small fee will be despatched in November. I will send you a copy of
The Criterion
as soon as it appears; and I hope that you will continue to send me
Indice
, which, despite my meagre knowledge of the Spanish language, I find very interesting. Your article will push me to take up the study of Spanish again.

The first number will contain contributions by Larbaud, G. Saintsbury, Sturge Moore, Gómez de la Serna, Herman Hesse, myself, and an unpublished Dostoevsky text. In the second, Ernst Curtius and Marcel Proust or Paul Valéry.

MS
Beinecke

12 August [1922]

Hotel Continental, Paris

Cher S. T.

Eliot seems in a conciliatory mood. The poem is not so bad. Shall I try to persuade him to sell us the poem at our regular rate with the award in view? We should have to ask
him
in advance whether he would accept it unless we wanted to run the risk of being turned down – as the king by John Galsworthy.
¹
It seems to me the award is a more important matter than the poem anyway, and I should favor giving Eliot the prize even without the poem, magnanimity not of course for me entering into the transaction.
The Dial
would then demonstrate its likeness to the Russian steam-roller – shining that is upon the just and unjust – at once impartial and relentless.
And
you could write comment on Eliot –
and
Gilbert [Seldes]’s publicity would make him squirm like any conger eel. In fact a whole muster of peacocks could be done in at one shot. (Do I quote?)

Failing which I must say I favor Pound as second choice – ill as we get along.

Somehow the idea of E. E. C. [E. E. Cummings] as recipient grows less and less supportable. First it would probably make Cummings sore. Second it would probably be the most unpopular choice we could hit upon. You may be right about
The Enormous Room’
s popularity, however. I shall be better able to tell about that when I get back to Gilbert.

It is said that Eliot has sold Liveright the first publication rights, but I am certain Gilbert could get round Liveright if necessary.

S. W.

Telegraph me care ‘Francheul Paris’ if you want me to try persuading Eliot. I sail Aug 19th.
²

1–The novelist John Galsworthy had declined a knighthood.

2–Four days later, Watson wrote again: ‘In response to Pound’s letter Eliot has assumed a more conciliatory attitude and has sent on a copy of
Waste Land
for our perusal. I am forwarding it to you. I am sorry that Pound’s vagueness in writing caused Eliot to send the copy to Paris instead of to you direct, but I suppose it will do for a starter. Anyway I wrote him more plainly about the prize and await his answer. I found the poem disappointing on first reading but after a third shot I think it up to his usual – all the styles are there, somewhat toned down in language <(adjectives!)> and theatricalized in sentiment – at least I thought so … If Eliot accepts the prize and sells us the poem politely at our regular rate – and you aren’t satisfied I suppose I shall bloody well have to come out with 2000 to bel esprit.’

TS
Bonn

14 August 1922

9 Clarence Gate Gdns,
N.W.1

My dear Herrn Curtius,

Thank you for your letter of the 10th instant. I should be very glad to have the essay on ‘Balzac and the magical tradition’, and look forward to receiving it by the 1st November with great pleasure.
¹
And for a later number I should certainly be very glad to have the essay on Hölderlin and/ or George.
²

Allow us to hope that we may some day see a work from you on English literature comparable to your book on contemporary France.
³
Such work seems to me of very great value. You shall receive the
Criterion
regularly. I should very much like to know whether you think that [there] would be an English-reading public in Germany, no matter how small, which would care to buy the
Criterion
provided that we could sell it in Germany at a possible price. It would of course have to be a price from which we could expect no profit, and I shall have to discuss with the publisher at what price we could afford to supply it to Germany; but the project seems to me
a worthy one, and I should be very grateful if you would let me know what you think of it. The difficulties of international communication are very great: in fact, even German books are sold here in England at prices beyond
my
means, and are only obtained after a long delay.

Please give my kind regards to M. Gide, and believe me,

yours very cordially,
T. S. Eliot

I shall then expect your essay by November1.

1–See E. R. Curtius, ‘Balzac’, C. 1: 1 (Jan. 1923).

2–The German poets Friedrich Hölderlin (1770–1843) and Stefan George (1868–1933).

3–Curtius,
Die literarischen Wegbereiter des neuen Frankreich.

TS
Beinecke

14 August 1922

9 Clarence Gate Gdns

Dear Mr Seldes,

On looking over my letter to you on the 9th inst.,
²
I think that I may have expressed myself obscurely or ambiguously and I wish to make the issue quite clear.

Personally, as I have told you, I feel that my London Letters have been of very poor quality. I should myself prefer to write articles for you such as the one you suggest, but I do not think that it is within my powers, considering how little time I have, to do both such articles and a regular London Letter. If however the
Dial
considers that it would lose more by my ceasing to write London Letters than by my not writing anything else, I am quite prepared to go on with London Letters in the same way.

The point is that I cannot undertake to do both. Putting aside my personal preference I should like the
Dial
to consider simply its own interest and let me know what it wants me to do.

Thanking you again for your kind letter,

I am,
Yours faithfully,
T. S. Eliot

1–Passing this letter to Thayer, Seldes wrote on it, ‘Note form and substance.’

2–TSE’s letter of 9 Aug. has not been found, but see his letter of 28 July to the
Dial
.

TS
Beinecke

14 August 1922

Clarence Gate Gdns

My dear Sir,

Thank you for your letter of the 1st inst. I should be very glad to do for you such an article as you suggest.
²
For the next two months I shall be far too busy to attempt such a thing, but I think that I should be able to provide one during October or November if that is satisfactory to you. As for a poem, I am afraid that it is quite impossible at present as I only have one for which I have already contracted.

Will you kindly let me know whether you would be glad to have an article in November?

I will look into the question of a photograph. Mr Wyndham Lewis has recently done a drawing of me of which I wish to have a photograph made, and this might suit you as well as a direct photograph. But an excellent photograph was taken years ago by Mr E. O. Hoppé and I will see if he can have a print made and sent to his agent in New York for you.

Yours sincerely,
T. S. Eliot

1–Edmund Wilson (1895–1972), American journalist, literary and social critic and novelist; author of
Axel’s Castle: A Study of Imaginative Literature
1890–1930
(1931) among other books; managing editor of
Vanity Fair
from July 1922 to May 1923. EP had written to Jeanne Foster on 6 May, ‘What wd. Vanity Fair pay Eliot for “Waste Land”[?]’, and suggested that John Peale Bishop write to TSE. Bishop met EP in Paris on 3 Aug., and on 5 Aug. he reported to Wilson: ‘Eliot is starting a quarterly review: he is to run “Waste Land,” the new series of lyrics in the first number: he and Thayer have split and the
Dial
will not publish it. Perhaps you might want to arrange for the American publication. Pound says they are as fine as anything written in English since 1900.’

2–TSE’s contribution was to be ‘Contemporary English Prose: A Discussion of the Development of English Prose from Hobbes and Sir Thomas Browne to Joyce and D. H. Lawrence’ – a translation of ‘Lettre d’Angleterre’,
NRF
19: 3 (1 Dec. 1922), 751–6 – in
Vanity Fair
20: 5 (July 1923). Wilson was to write to TSE on 26 Feb. 1923: ‘I have just seen your thing on English prose in the
Nouvelle Revue Française
and I wish you could let us reprint it in
Vanity Fair
… I think it is so admirable that it would be a great pity for it not to appear in English. We could pay you about $75.’