Under the Sun (6 page)

Priory House | Marlborough College | Wiltshire | Sunday [September 1953]

 

Dear Mummy and Daddy,

I am thoroughly enjoying myself here and I am settling down well. The Shell form that I am in is Shell A. There are six Shell forms. Shell A is the first. I have made several friends already. I get on very well with Edwards. I have made friends also with a boy called Ghalib,
¹⁷
whose father is a Turk. The food in Priory is excellent and I have had no need to delve into my tuck-box yet. Don't bother to send on the cycle-clips as we have to cycle in shorts. I don't know what the Master's name is yet and he is always called the Master.
¹⁸
Yesterday he had a talk with all the new boys and he is very nice. My bicycle has proved invaluable as we have to clear out of the house for one hour every day and we have 3 half holidays a week. Please will you send me some books because for an hour in the evening we have to read. I have seen all the other ex Old Hall boys . . . Massey
¹⁹
is a house captain and is in charge of my dormitory. Any band instrument can be taken. I can have free coaching for the first term and if the music master thinks I am good enough he will ask for it to be continued. Most boys here play the trombone. But I don't think I will have enough time.
²⁰

With Love

Bruce

 

At the end of his first year at Marlborough, the Bratt family in Sweden contacted Charles through a friend. Would Chatwin like to stay the summer at their lake-side home south of Stockholm and teach English to their son, Thomas, who was the same age? Margharita saw him off at Tilbury on the SS
Patricia
. Aside from family sailing holidays in France, it was Chatwin's first experience of abroad.

 

 

Lundby Gard | Sweden | [July 1954]

Friday

 

Dear Mummy and daddy,

I arrived safely yesterday and had a wonderful crossing . . . It was rather unfortunate that the passengers in my cabin were a young man who was hoping to become a monk and said his prayers aloud all night in Latin and another who I think was a Polish Jew who snored all night. So what with snoring and Latin I did not get much sleep. But I was sitting at table with some very nice people. They were Swedes living in Finland and both of them had a most marvellous sense of humour. They have a boat in Finland and had just been to Lymington to see Laurent Giles
²¹
about designing another. He and I talked boats solidly all afternoon.

When the boat docked everything went smoothly until I came to the customs. The officer thought that I was French, why I don't know and then proceeded to take out everything from my case, searched all the pockets in my suits and then stalked off. After I had got all my things together again I only just caught the train. But when I was sitting down I discovered the reason for the customs officer. A boy came in and produced from various places 1000 cigarettes! The train went very fast and by lunch we came to Katrineholm. I got out and there was only the station-master there. But after waiting about ten minutes came Mr Bratt. I had expected Thomas to be fair-haired etc but he has jet black hair and dark skin which makes him look like an Italian. We packed into their huge Cadillac and soon came to Lundby Gard which is just about a village not a farm. There is Mr Bratt's brother in one house,
²²
in another his father, and another his uncle Percy!
²³
The lake is only the odd 30 miles long and joins up with several others; opposite the farm is an island on which is a castle and that is nearly five miles long and two and a half wide. There is not a shop for miles and everything has to be ordered, so my £10 may come back unmolested, especially as I earned 10 kroner this morning. They have a motor boat, rowing boat, sailing dinghy, an ordinary canoe, a Canadian birch bark and a very narrow canoe in which I went in several times trying to balance it.
²⁴
We are going to Stockholm next week. I hope Hugh has got his post card. I tried to get you a picture of the Smorgasbord, the Swedish national dish which is a kind of hors d'oeuvre only on a far bigger scale. Hope you got the cable. Bruce

 

 

Postcard, b & w photograph of Lake Yngaren | Sweden | 20 August, 1954

 

This is part of their lake. All the land you can see the other side is an island. Their house is between the island and the mainland. We are going on a boat trip to another lake; all the lakes are just about joined up with each other. We spent 3 days in Stockholm and saw it thoroughly. It's a pity I didn't bring my camera because it is so beautiful country. We went down a very deep iron mine the other day;
²⁵
it was very interesting. I will telephone you as soon as I get to London and let you know what train I am going on. Bruce

 

B2 | Marlborough College | Wiltshire | [autumn 1957]

 

Dear Mummy and Daddy,

Thank you very much indeed for that wonderful surprise. It really is a wonderful book, and on really looking at it closely it seems even better. Like many French books it is eminently sensible in that it does not deal exclusively with those fabulous rarities that are locked behind glass cases in museums, and on that account are apt to be dull. But most of the things are all first rate examples that one would be likely to come across. It is not a book for the super expert, because volumes could be written on each of the subjects but it gives a very clear picture of what was going on, and of course those wonderful pictures help immensely, because it would be nonsense to suggest that the best way of learning about such things is to see them personally or failing that to look at them by photographs. I have been reassured on several points. Firstly that it is justifiable to refurnish French furniture completely, and secondly that the two chairs are definitely genuine . . . The second chair really is a rarity, it appears; square-backed Louis XVI
bergère
chairs with that standard of carving and those spiral legs are very very highly sought after, and even in that book there are few that have its elegance. Also the book does not appear to worry too much about
ébénistes
stamps, though of course, they add to the value to a large extent.
²⁶

What is the name of the painter of your picture of ‘
The America
' at the office? for I think you will be interested to learn that during April a picture, painted contemporary with the first America Cup, by a hitherto obscure painter named Carmichael,
²⁷
showing the
America
,
²⁸
was sold to an American bidder, I think at Christie's, for somewhat over £2,000 owning to the exceptional interest show over here by the new challenge.

The book has made my birthday. Thank you very much.

Love B

PS Buns lovely! Best for a long time. Aunt Cicely and Uncle Philip
²⁹
sent 10/ – for a Wallace Collection catalogue. Hugh gave me a blue and white striped mug to replace one that I broke.

Love B

 

Rome | Italy | 2 April 1957

 

We had a fairly uneventful journey; wonderful scenery from the train. The sun was blazing as we crossed the Alps, but a confectioner from Scarborough, and a German girl in the same carriage insisted on having the windows firmly shut. We got here rather tired, took a taxi driven by a very smooth gent and before we knew what had happened he charged us £1. We argued and argued, and when he began to get nasty we gave him half, but it only should have cost about 2/6. The pensione was very grand, and now we have got a nice, much cheaper place. We went on a tour of Rome today with Father O'Flaherty
³⁰
, Richard's friend, and tomorrow morning, together with several hundred other people, we are going to an audience with the Pope himself. Frankly, except for the Coliseum, the arch of Constantine, and Trajan's column, the Roman remains are rather dull to compare with the fantastic Medici palaces and the like. But it really is an incredibly modern city moving at a colossal speed. We have been made honorary members of an English club where we had tea with five very jolly Irish fathers. Love B