The Letters of Sylvia Plath Vol 2
Page 72
I am happy that my book has had a trial run in England, as it has made me much more objective about the poems and will result, I think, in a much stronger and shorter book in America. I’m sorry, of course, about missing out on the Lamont* as a result.
I look forward to hearing about publication plans.
Sincerely,
Sylvia Plath
TO A. E. Dyson*
Wednesday 3 May 1961
TLS, University of Kansas
3 Chalcot Square
London N.W.1
May 3, 1961
Dear Tony,
A note in haste with a few recent poems.* I only have these on hand as I’m head over ears in the middle of a long prose thing and not doing anything else right now. I hope something among them seems okay to you.
I’m enclosing the Larkin* poem Brian sent. I was disappointed in it at first. Then I felt much as Brian did, & started to like it. I think it does what it does well, though what it is doing is not very large. I guess, in the end, I am just not sure about it.
I hope to have the anthology poems typed up by the end of the month. I still have a couple of fringe poems I am hunting down. For blurb, why don’t you say something to the effect that this sampling will include poems by lively American poets of all persuasions (from Beat Corso* to Wilbur the Elegant),* stressing young poets and new books (this includes Stafford,* who is an old poet, but just has an exciting first book out & needs to be known.) About 18 poets, and over 20 poems.
The memory of that corn-on-the-cob floats in my head like a celestial relic.
All the best,
Sylvia
PS: My mother will be here in July for her first visit, so Ted & I will be spending all our time showing her round and don’t dare to make any other commitments!
TO Aurelia Schober Plath
Monday 8 May 1961
TLS with envelope, Indiana University
Monday: May 8
Dear mother,
Glad to hear the details of our rising bank account and that your are as pleased about Knopf as we are. It’s as good as getting two books for one. Ted’s just had his story “Snow” accepted in America by Harper’s Bazaar,* the very fancy fashion magazine, so we should have another check to round out our 7th thousand to send pretty soon.
We are both working very hard---Ted is typing his 5 act play and has got over the 100 page mark, and I’ve finished my commissioned poem for the summer poetry festival at the Mermaid Theatre and everybody seems very pleased with it.
I am going to a first night at the opera* at Covent Garden tonight with the Secretary of the Arts Council, Eric White*---a distinguished white-haired gentleman who has taken an interest in us. His wife* is going to be out of town so he invited either one of us & Ted let me go. Last week he and his wife treated us to a box at the Covent Garden performance of Rigoletto* which delighted us---I’m very fond of opera but know nothing about it and have hardly heard any of it, a situation which I hope to remedy.
We’ve engaged you a room at a modest but, I think, comfortable place called the Clive Hall Hotel.* The rooms are small, but clean and freshly painted---it’s the nearest place we could find, as ours is a very residential district, a very nice 10 minutes walk away over Primrose Hill. Bed and a substantial breakfast is about $3.15 a night. I hope that’s all right. We plan to have you share lunch & supper with us.
I’m having Ted make out the other little check to you as well---could you send off $5 with the enclosed Alumnae Association blank? The $100 is Mrs. Prouty’s check for 10 copies of “Meet My Folks”---we’re to keep the leftovers! Deposit this in our Wellesley account, will you? That’s our gift and miscellaneous account. There’s still about $50 in it, isn’t there? I know just what supper you’re going to have on your arrival§
xxx
Sivvy
TO Charles Osborne*
Tuesday 16 May 1961
TLS, University of Texas at Austin
3 Chalcot Square
London N.W.1
May 16, 1961
Dear C. O.
Our baby unearthed this shortly after your departure. I trust it belongs and will come in handy.
It was much fun having you here,
sph
TO Aurelia Schober Plath
Sunday 28 May 1961
TLS (aerogramme), Indiana University
Sunday May 28th
Dearest mother,
I haven’t written for about a hundred years, due to a very huge pile of jobs & harassments. Thank you so much for the lovely booties which fit perfectly & which Frieda has been wearing daily. We loved the packet with all the good things. I have bought a featherweight pushchair (folding in one easy motion to go in the car) with a hood & weather cover so your trips to the park with Frieda will be easy & pleasant. I think Dido Merwin may let you have her room during your stay, which would be ever so much better than the rather shabby hotel (I got the best I could nearest to us). You’d have a fine view of Primrose Hill, a kitchen to cook breakfast in and be 2 minutes from us---there is also a very pleasant Australian professional woman living in another room, caring for the cat. I do hope this works out---it would save you a good bit of money & energy!
Leonard Baskin, the American artist & Smith professor, has been in London for 10 days, after opening a big show of his in Rotterdam* which will tour Europe for a year. Ted has a proverb “Guests and fish stink on the third day” which began to apply after a while. At first I was touched that Leonard came to us---it happened that no one knew him here, & he is very famous & has crowds of followers in America. Well, he more or less invited himself to stay with us---a ghastly arrangement as each night we had to move Frieda into the kitchen, & Leonard stays up late & sleeps late, which would be fine if we had a house, but difficult with the baby & in such close quarters. Also, he does not eat fish, eggs, milk, cheese, vegetables, salad, salt, pepper, onions or liquor of any sort & I got a bit fed up trying to think of what to feed him. At least Ted went to a few museums with him & on a trip to Oxford & Cambridge (our car had just come, & Leonard used Ted like a chauffeur) but about all I saw of him was dirty dishes, unmade beds and piles of dirty shirts and socks which he left for me to do. Of course neither of us wrote for 10 days & felt exhausted by the end. We began to feel used, and now face a mountain of piled up commissions & assignments. So that’s why I haven’t written.
Dido & Bill are back from America for 10 days before going to France. Then we will have 10 days respite. We want to have all our jobs done by the time you come so we can really vacation and enjoy every minute with you. I must say I will be enormously grateful for 2 weeks free of babytending. I don’t feel to have had a holiday since I’ve been in England, and the thought of driving & gourmandizing in France with Ted, & getting tan & rested, is what keeps me going just now. The car is very snug & the back seat folds down & gives lots of storage space. Ted drives beautifully (he took 4 lessons) & has a British license. I don’t drive it yet, as I want lessons & a license first---driving on the left is against my instinct!
I hate to ask anything of you at this busy date, but I wonder if you’d look in the Hathaway Bookshop or BU Library for a book of poems by May Swenson (not May Sarton---another poetess!*) and copy out 2 or 3 poems---the first one (I think there may be 2 books*) is a poem about a bruised fingernail* & I think it comes first in the book, the next “AT Breakfast” about an egg, ending “Ate a sun germ---good.”* And one called “By Morning” about snow falling. I am making a little anthology of American poems and just can’t get hold of her book here.*
I know you’re pressed for weight in your case but do you think you could wrap up those five black-and-white cups and saucers of my best teaset upstairs in your clothes (as I did to bring them over) and bring them? It would mean more to me than anything---they cost a lot & I have nothing nice for tea-serving & wouldnt dare to have them crated. I’m not bothered about the big pot or the pitcher & sugarbowl, just the cups and saucers.
Three weeks! W
hat time will you be arriving? I already know what I’ll have for supper---something quite simple but very good. You will adore Frieda. She can stand up by herself now without pulling herself up, in the middle of the floor, and is so pretty and funny. I’m glad you’re seeing her at this age, because she is so responsive & will get to know you specially, unlike a new baby, who just lies about.
Ted’s just finished typing his play---about 115 pages, and I’m working on a 20 minute radio program of my poems*---I feel we really deserve a rest and a change. I hope the weather is better when you come. May has been the coldest nastiest month of the year yet.
Lots of love to you and Warren,
From Sivvy
TO Aurelia Schober Plath & Warren Plath
Tuesday 6 June 1961
TLS (aerogramme), Indiana University
Tuesday, June 6th
Dear mother and Warren,
You have no idea how happy your wonderful letter made us! I have been hoping and hoping Warren would come, and now my wish is granted! We shall sample good restaurants in Soho and there should be some good plays on then. Should I reserve a room with a double bed for Warren? Most single beds are so short, and a double would give him room to stretch out.
Is it Monday morning the 19th you are coming, mother? I had thought it was Sunday the 18th, but of course that is probably the day you leave. You should see a lovely sunrise. I believe there is routine transportation from the Airport into London. Maybe you could call us from the airport as soon as you get in, let us know where and when you’ll be arriving in London, and we could meet you in the car. I think you’ll be a lot more comfortable at the Merwins. It is so near, and Dido’s room is so lovely, and Molly,* the little Australian hairdresser is at work all day. I’ll be working in the study over there in the morning and Ted in the afternoon, probably, and then there won’t be a mile trek everytime you want to rest or get something. The Merwins get an indefinable something out of knowing us (Ted being a British lion in Dido’s eyes) and we have got over feeling we can’t repay them in kind, especially as it gives them a certain odd pleasure to see us living on things out of their attic.
One important thing, before I forget: could you airmail my American driver’s license to me immediately???* I believe I did get it renewed and you kept it over there. I’m having my driving test here next week and need the license to turn in. I have very little hope of passing the test, as driving with a left-hand floor gear with 4 gears, and on the left of the road, and with all sorts of military forms to turning the steering wheel and signalling with both hand and light I find very difficult. I am having a few lessons, though. At least Ted passed his test, so we are mobile. The car is small, but roadworthy, and should make our Maugham trip to Europe with the baby a pleasure instead of a laden march. Frieda loves riding in her baby car seat in the back and is securely strapped in.
Ted went to receive his 100 pounds Hawthornden award last Wednesday, the speech given by the poet C. Day Lewis,* who is charming. Yesterday morning I spent at the BBC recording a 25 minute program of my poems and commentary, with an American boy reader* for some of them, for my “Living Poet” program in July. There is a Living Poet every month, and I am on a list of Americans among Robert Lowell, Stanley Kunitz and Theodore Roethke, which I find quite an honour.* We’ll miss the program as we’ll be in France, but you must listen and tell us how it is. Got $60 for the morning’s work, and will be paid for the poems separately. We’ve taken on the Merwins accountant* to figure our income tax as it is absolutely hopeless to do it ourselves, with all the conflicting American and UK laws. I think he’ll be well worth a fee in peace of mind to us. UK tax, unfortunately, is much worse than American!
The one thing I long for now is a house! As soon as our income tax for this year in the UK is cleared we will see how much of a mortgage the St. Pancras Council would give us and try to line a place up by winter here. As Ted says, he could treble his income as soon as he has a study where he could keep his papers and not be interrupted, and I also could afford a morning babyminder and am interested in working on a novel. Then, too, you and Warren could count on a guest room---if you have that, then everybody can lead their own lives and there is no overcrowding. Oh, it would be so nice if you could plan 6 weeks over here every summer! If you just had to save up for the round-trip fare and we had a guest room, you’d have next to no other expenses, and then Ted and I could take an annual two-week holiday in the middle of your stay while you got reacquainted with your grandchildren. I feel I haven’t had a proper holiday for 4 or 5 years! Our summer in Northampton was depressing, and our tour around America magnificent but the pace tiring, and since the baby’s come I haven’t had a day off! The thought of going off alone with Ted for 2 weeks is just heaven. We have reservations for June 30th to July 14th, and plan to take a little 5 or 6 day trip alone in France before going to the Merwins. I think you will be very comfortable here with the baby---I have a 3-day a week diaper service, a laundromat around the corner, and all shops, and she is so pretty and funny you will just adore her. Yesterday she took down a saucer from the kitchen shelf & put it on the floor. Then she took down a cup & put it on the saucer. Then she picked up the cup & pretended to sip, & put it back in the saucer & burst out laughing in pleasure at herself. This must come after a year of watching us drink tea!
Lots of love to you both,
Sivvy
TO Brian Cox
Saturday 17 June 1961
TLS, University of Kansas
3 Chalcot Square
London N.W.1
June 17, 1961
Dear Brian,
Many thanks for your letter. Here are the proofs.* I shall have the whole anthology to you within a week, and have just received books or poems from the last few poets I’ve been waiting for. I sent a small blurb to Tony Dyson* at the Other Place,* saying simply that this Small Anthology of American Poets includes a selection of youngish or new (this covers the few old poets who are new, with first books) American poets ranging from Gregory Corso to Richard Wilbur (i.e., encompassing the Beats and the Elegant Academicians). Over 15 poets. Over 20 poems.
Sincerely,
Sylvia Plath
TO Howard Moss
Saturday 17 June 1961
TLS (aerogramme), New York Public Library
3 Chalcot Square
London N.W.1, England
June 17, 1961
Mr. Howard Moss
THE NEW YORKER
25 West 43rd Street
New York, New York
U.S.A.
Dear Mr. Moss,
I am very happy you like TULIPS.* I am giving a small reading of poems here in London next month and have promised to include TULIPS among them. I wondered if it would be all right with you to have TULIPS mimeographed on the program sheet.*
With all good wishes,
Sincerely,
Sylvia Plath
TO Brian Cox
Sunday 25 June 1961
TLS, University of Kansas
3 Chalcot Square
London N.W.1,
June 25, 1961
Dear Brian,
Here is the little anthology.* I’ve put under the name of each poet (arranged alphabetically) the publisher and book title, or magazine, where I found the poem.* On second thought I’ve left out any poems of my own as my own reaction to anthologists who take anthologies as opportunities for publishing their own poems is not a very kind one.*
Let me know what you think of this, what outrages or pleases you.
All good wishes,
Sylvia (Plath)
Sylvia Plath
TO Warren Plath
Tuesday 27 June 1961*
ALS (photocopy), Indiana University
Dear Warren –
Mother is at the moment bathing Frieda, I halfway through making a strawberry chiffon pie & Ted typing a letter to T. S. Eliot. Its taken mother about a week to recover from that sleepless night & the usual strain of getting used to a new
place, but her being just about across the street in the Merwin’s grand bedroom (free too) with a corner to cook her own breakfast, & us being settled here, & the lovely Park, she is thriving, Frieda is at her best – so pretty & loving – she & mother get on wonderfully, so I shall feel relatively easy leaving them. I’ve got in a large store of food, so they should have fun. I am dying for a holiday not having been free of the baby or cooking for well over a year & no respite since our American tour. We are overjoyed at your coming & shall go off to Italy with Frieda after you depart. We’re both doing a reading of our commissioned poems for the poetry festival at the Mermaid Theatre on July 17th – then all up to Yorkshire for a week where we have mother a lovely room reserved at a nearby farm Inn. We took her to see “Ondine”* with Leslie Caron (the play) the other night – just her thing, all magic & fairytale. We miss you & can’t wait till you come. Write mother at this address.
Love,
Sivvy
TO Aurelia Schober Plath
Thursday 29 June 1961*
ALS (picture postcard),* Indiana University
Thursday –
Dear mother:
We are sitting under an umbrella waiting for our café au lait in Rouen, a wonderful antique town with an open market just beyond this beautiful clock bridge where we have bought a lunch of milk, bread, cheese & fruit for a picnic. A heavenly boat trip over yesterday* – calm, bright sun. We stopped for a French lunch in a sleepy town & drove to a superb beach,* swam, collected shells for Frieda & sunned. Drove on to Rouen through green wheat fields We find no tourists – only holidaying French people, which is very fine. Now on to Mont. St. Michel. Twenty kisses to our little angel.