The Parting Years (1963-74)

by Cecil Beaton

  But the Museum Folkwang with modern pictures shown in juxtaposition with ancient Egyptian objects was full of delight, and I’m sorry my eagle eyes missed many things picked out by Liliane Rothschild, such as a painting by Manet of soldiers being killed. The Renoir of a huge and ugly woman in white muslin made one realize what real painting is like; a yellow water-lily scene by Monet, very strange and rare.

  The collection is a combination of State and Krupp; a son of the family welcomed us, and then took us on with his American wife, to see the family mansion, Villa Hügel — an ugly house.

  An hour’s bus ride took us to Wasserburg to see Vischering, a very romantic castle, dating from 1550, surrounded by water; heraldic shutters, old rose brick and empty inside.

  May 20th

  Quite a long ride to Soest, a delightful little medieval town; many houses were covered with black and white beams, had fans over the doors and harlequin shutters; some of the old roofs had been cleverly restored after war damage. The verdigris on the walls of the cathedral, the Gothic church of Notre Dame des Champs, and other stone buildings created a theatrical ‘powdered’ effect. Then a delightful meander through the market, buying a bunch of freesias for Nancy Lancaster; and lunch in an old-fashioned Wilder Mann restaurant.

  Sitting alone in the bus and not talking is my greatest pleasure and this afternoon I was in an ecstasy as we drove through hilly country planted with straight and healthy trees, pale youthful green contrasting with the dark of the pines. The Germans are good foresters, and on this late-spring afternoon the greenness and the leaves of last autumn making a smooth russet carpet was very beautiful.

  I saw a boy of not more than six, clean and pink-and-white skinned, in charge of a huge herd of beige and white cows. He smiled and waved gaily at us until, with anxiety, he saw one of his beasts going astray. His sense of responsibility was at once apparent. You could see clearly that he had been brought up to know how important it was to take care of the means of his family’s livelihood.

  We visited an eighteenth-century jesuit baroque church at Büren with decoration by Cuvilliés; beautifully proportioned windows of clear glass and the sun slanting through made a striking, dramatic effect.

  A long drive to Château d’Arolsen, an imitation Versailles. The exterior with the twin porters’ lodges and caved-in tiled roofs was interesting. The Château was built by a prince but it seems the money ran out before it was finished. We laughed a great deal at some of the Edwardian and Victorian furniture, portraits, and bedroom utensils. The ‘oriental’ room was very amusing, the huge ballroom unbelievably ugly. The Tischbein portraits and some good tapestries saved the day. We walked in the azalea gardens and on terraces and thought of Conder’s fans.

  A short ride through more beautiful, sharp green trees to Kassel. The vast schloss of Wilhelmshöhe unimaginably grand in scale. We strolled in the very large gardens, and saw cascades falling from the mountain top on which there is a gigantic figure of Hercules. I loved watching the light fade in this quiet, still, false romanticism; not one frond of a branch moved.

  Sunday

  Started off in spring sunshine with lowering clouds for the super romantic château of Lowenburg. The dungeon was bombed by us in the last war thus adding to the artificial ‘ruin’ effect. Some rooms were very small and pretty and contained good glass, pictures, and objects; a circular room, with red velvet on the walls, looking over a vast panorama. The beech hedges in the garden were an inspiration to Nancy Lancaster, who was determined to copy them in her own garden.

  In pouring torrents to the Musée de Hesse, a wonderful collection of paintings, porcelain, silver-gilt, and nineteen Rembrandts, including one of an old man in black velvet painted when the artist was thirty.

  Hanover: May 23rd

  The bus driver is gentle, clever, and imaginative. The sun was very hot today, and while we waited to see the Le Notre-esque gardens of Herrenhausen, designed at the end of the eighteenth century, the guide, as usual, went on too long, so the driver gently moved forward to the shade of some avenues. Later in the day he manoeuvred the bus through arches with only an inch to spare each side so that the occupants all applauded.

  The gardens were well worth waiting for, quite wonderful parterres laid out with black and white pansies, a triumph of artifice, nature completely subjugated to man’s whims; statues, hedges, gravel in baroque shapes. We were then received by the Prince and Princess of Hanover who were standing in the garden of a very pretty little house which they have now turned into a museum. My friend Felix Harbord had redecorated it and had helped to save some of the furniture which now adorns these beautifully proportioned rooms. The Princess has an eye for colour and the enfilade was extremely effective with red, yellow, green, and blue rooms full of gilt-framed pictures. The dining-room had enormous paintings of the family and their entourage, the keeper of the falcons and owls, and other servants, framed in white on green backgrounds; very successful.

  Arrival at the extraordinary ‘new’ medieval castle of Marienburg, built in the English nineteenth-century style. Here again we were escorted by the Hanovers who showed us their magnificent collection of Georgian silver, tables, chairs, mirrors, and cupboards full of wine containers, canisters, beakers, and bowls. We peered into every bedroom and nook and looked at every photograph. We then went to the farmhouse where the Hanovers now live in severe simplicity. Decorated with charm and no pretension, the house is part of a huge farm complex made up of blue and white painted buildings and a duck pond.

  Hamburg

  In the wind and the rain we drove through flat country to reborn Hamburg. Our guide feels no self-pity for the bombing of his country, but told us that over ninety per cent of Hamburg had been destroyed in ‘saturation bombing’, that one night the fiery holocaust sent the inhabitants fleeing to the river, but the huge fire bombs set the water alight and thousands were burnt in the sulphurous flames.

  The Germans are an extraordinary race; sentimental, musical, law abiding, but cruel beyond imagination. They have a determination to survive which manifests itself in no small measure in the Hamburg of today, an entirely new industrial town of great richness. Its inhabitants thrive and do business with people from all over the world.

  Lanfranco Rasponi and I went to the new huge opera house to hear Don Carlos, and later we ‘went on the town’ and walked down the Broadway area where all the sex shows and bordellos are situated along and off the Reeperbahn.

  Lubeck: May 27th

  It was what I saw in the Museum of St Anne at Lubeck that made me feel that all this effort of travel had been worthwhile. It was a miraculous altar-piece by Hans Memling; a triptych of the Passion of Christ. The picture was strange and wonderful, the Mother Mary so sorrowful, the Christ so pitiful, the green ground littered with odd-shaped bones, the tufts of growth, flowers, and herbs, the sanctity of expression on the faces of the men witnesses to the scenes. All were painted with tenderness, delicacy, and a consistency of love. I felt I had really been enriched. My heart went out to Memling, and to Lubeck and its museum.

  Paris: May 28th

  I woke early to hear Lilia Ralli’s familiar chirp announcing the death of the Duke of Windsor. I felt callously indifferent, no pang of nostalgia. Certainly he had been a great figure in my adolescence, full of charm and dash, glamorous, and a good Prince of Wales. Then the sensational abdication and marriage. As a photographer, I came into that scene in a big way, but throughout the years the Duke had never shown any affection for or interest in me. In fact, perhaps rather presumptuously, I felt he disliked me. It was only at the last meeting when I went to have a drink with ‘Darby and Joan’, and all his men friends were dead, that he thawed towards me, and talked about the ‘old times’. He was always cold in his friendships, and could cut them off overnight. He was inclined to be silly. When James Pope-Hennessy told him he was writing a book about Trollope, he roared with laughter and turned to Wallis saying: ‘’E’s writing a book about a trollop!’

  I am
sorry for the Duchess. She will be sad. Another milestone passed.

  Windsor

  The Duke’s funeral was noble and dignified. The military knights in their scarlet uniforms, medals clinking, marched with a loud stamp-shuffle. The slowness and the muffled metal sound was impressive, and the fact that these knights were all aged, with clear pink skins, made it that much more remarkable.

  The coffin, borne by eight sturdy Welsh Guardsmen, arms linked and heads bowed, was draped with the Duke’s personal standard, and covered with a huge trembling mass of Madonna lilies. Members of the Royal Family followed; the King of Norway, extra tall; the Duke of Edinburgh, grey and drawn and yet emitting strength; the delightful, charming young Prince of Wales; the young Kents and Gloucesters; and Lord Mountbatten.

  The service was short and poignant. An anthem. Prayers. Another hymn, then a dramatic moment when Garter King of Arms read out the Styles and Titles of the late Duke: Knight of the Garter, Knight of the Thistle, King Edward VIII of England, Ruler of India ... and the ribbons and badges of the orders were carried on cushions. One was reminded of Shakespeare’s kings and princes.

  Majorca: August

  Am really sorry for myself. So far I’ve enjoyed more than average good health, but lately a blight has been put on my existence by my not being able to read or write without being punished with a nervous head pain that stretches over my left eye, over the head and down the nape of my neck. It puts such a damper on my activities. I live by my eyes. It is being particularly annoying during the holiday when there is little to do but read.

  Dr Gottfried does not seem optimistic. He says that the headache is caused by the arteries to the brain getting tight, due to brain fag and overstrain. I have been many times to excellent oculists and they say there is nothing wrong with my eyes, that eye strain does not exist. However, I do know that if I have used my eyes more than average, the pain strikes. It is very hard to know what to do, especially when I had hoped my old age would be spent reading and writing if not painting.

  Visited the Cuevas del Aria: huge, cavernous grottoes, millions of years old with stalactites and stalagmites that have taken all these aeons of time to form; one’s mind boggles.

  It was cool, damp and dark, but the stalactites and stalagmites were lit theatrically with coloured lights.

  With a jolly guide to show sightseers around, he turned the lights off for a moment and created havoc. The terror of finding oneself lost here would be enough to cause one’s heart to stop. Then the lights were turned on full to red and a hidden orchestra blared out Wagner.

  I thought immediately of the theatre, for this is the sort of stage effect that we no longer see there: magical and mysterious. I long to see a Shakespearean production given an elaborate, imaginative setting. This would be an inspiration for The Tempest. I would be thrilled to design such a production with sculpted torrents and flags and Renaissance candlesticks all made of some new fibre fabric. It could be transparent and give infinite varieties of light against this elaborate background. The costumes would be very simple, in basic colours, mostly white, grey, blue, green. Only the masque characters would be in gold and silver.

  NOËL AT ‘LES AVANTS’

  Montreux: September 1972

  I had heard about Noël’s Swiss retreat. ‘It’s very typical of him, lots of signed photographs, a house that might have been brought from Eastbourne.’ It is true the house suits Noël perfectly. It has no real character, is ugly, is decorated in the typical theatre-folk style, but it is warm and comfortable and it works.

  I found Noël in a scarlet jacket hunched and crumpled in a chair, looking very old and resigned and fatter. He seemed a bit surprised to see me although, no doubt, as he later said, he had been looking forward to my visit. A glass of brandy and ginger-ale was within reach and the cigarettes at hand. Noël is only a bit more than seventy. He suffers from a bad leg; the circulation cannot be relied upon and if he walks he can be in great pain. As a result, he doesn’t walk, and spends most of his time in bed. This is not good for anyone. But Noël has aged into a very nice and kind old man. He is really a darling, so trim and neat, his memory unfailing. His intelligence was as quick as ever and within a few moments we were enjoying each others’ jokes and laughing a lot.

  You know that when Noël gives an evaluation of someone else’s talent or personality, he will be absolutely ‘on the ball’ and never prejudiced. There are certain types that he despises. He has no time for amateurs, or people that tell lies or are phoneys. But he is incredibly generous in his appreciation of most people, particularly those who have succeeded in the theatre.

  Naturally we reminisced about the first times we met; how he gave me a deserved ‘going over’ during a return journey from America, and more recently about the production of Quadrille. He complimented me on my professionalism and said I was a most direct and workmanlike designer.

  Later in the evening it was wonderful to hear him singing in a quiet but musical voice the songs that had meant so much to him since he was a boy. Noël still remembers all the lyrics; Vesta Tilley songs, Albert Chevalier songs from a terrible Jack Hulbert musical called The Light Blues in which Noël had learnt to tap dance, and snatches of songs from long-forgotten musicals.

  I asked Noël to tell me about the stars he had seen from the pit when taken to the theatre by his mother on birthday treats. ‘Lily Elsie, the way she moved, very slowly, but with incredible grace; those long arms and never a coy gesture. She was such fun too — a darling! And her voice true.’ Of Gertie Millar: ‘She could dance like a wisp, with those long legs, and she was a star and like all stars she had vitality. No one without vitality can have any glamour.’ He talked lovingly of Gertie Lawrence, as someone with whom he could never quarrel for she was such a perfectionist. He had great praise for Maisie Gay, whom he considered more a brilliant dramatic actress than a comedienne. She played each part as if it were written by Chekhov.

  It was time to go to bed. In the lift, recently built for Noël’s comfort, he plopped himself down on the stool and said, ‘It’s awful. I’m so old!’

  Visit to Vaynol: October 1972

  Vaynol used to be the centre of much frivolity and inspired gaiety; charades, improvisations, elaborate dressing-up, practical jokes, youthful gaiety of all sorts. Now two wings of about thirty rooms have been pulled down. It has become more and more difficult for Michael[11] to maintain the place as in the old days.

  Michael has a very busy life attending to his various responsibilities, so, because he was at a meeting, we were met at the station by the old chauffeur; an old butler came out of the front door as we drove up, made a little speech regretting Michael’s absence, and then said that the first time he had seen me was in 1936! Patrick Procktor on hearing this was staggered, as it was the year of his birth, and I could not believe that forty years had passed since I first came to this house. So the visit took on the colour of a journey into the past.

  Soon Michael appeared and cheered us with the readiness of his interest, his curiosity, his humour. For someone who started as a backward child, he has come a long way and has made a very interesting life for himself. He and I have shared so much of the past together that we necessarily veered towards subjects that we had both enjoyed.

  In the house there were many bibelots and pieces of furniture that had belonged to Michael’s mother, Juliet. Juliet’s scrapbooks were brought out and I was staggered that the well-remembered events here recorded had taken place so long ago. It seemed to me as if they had happened but yesterday. It was with a haunted fascination that we looked at those old milestones. People who had to us seemed so old and decrepit then, now appeared to look young, and even beautiful.

  Michael gave me a feeling of strength. He has survived well, so why shouldn’t I? He had no regrets, so why should I feel sad. Maybe it had all been frivolous, but it had been a creative frivolity, and it must have taught one something about certain aspects of life. Anyhow it was no use sighing.

  BABA’
S ILLNESS

  November

  New York — St Regis; breakfast just begun when telephone rings unexpectedly early. It is my brother-in-law, Hugh, from England with a note of anxiety in his voice. Obviously he was very emotionally het-up: ‘It’s about Baba. You know they examined her and thought it gall trouble.’ ‘Yes, yes.’ ‘Well she’s had an operation, but they find she has cancer of the pancreas, and they can’t do anything about it. She may last another two weeks, but they’re going to keep her under sedation. They’re going to tell her. We all think she’d prefer it to us all telling her a lot of lies.’

  How terrible! How terrible! I now know what we had all feared and it is worse than we could have imagined. Up until now my sister Baba has never been ill for a day. She has always been strong; but she has been sad, her life never really a happy one. Her husband was killed in the war and much of the time since she has spent being brave and making excuses for her loneliness. Her lover, after twenty-five years, went off without a word. Baba became ill.

  A piece of my childhood is about to disappear.

  Hawarden Castle: March 1973

  As the doctor prophesied, Baba’s condition has slowly deteriorated. She has come up to be with her beloved daughter, Rosamund, for the last time. She is desperately weak but she has not given in, and it makes her angry that she is not strong enough to come down to lunch, write her name, or light a cigarette.

  She looks incredibly beautiful; so thin as to be hardly recognizable; the bone formation of her face is marvellous, high cheekbones, noble nose and brow, and her forehead is without wrinkles.