Lost Years

by Christopher Isherwood

  On November 20, Christopher had supper with Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, who had just arrived in Los Angeles to give two or more concerts. The reunion was most cordial. Indeed, they both treated Christopher as the one real friend with whom they could relax from the strain of official hospitality. Christopher at once arranged to give a party, at which, he promised, they would meet as many attractive boys as he could manage to collect. The party was held on November 22. A journal entry, made earlier that day, refers to preparations for it. Christopher is jittery—chiefly because he is in the throes of nicotine disintoxication; this is his sixth day without smoking. He still fears that he will have to smoke in order to be able to write, and there is his article on Klaus Mann to be finished, as well as his current installment of Patanjali. Christopher was also jittery about the party, though without much reason, for, as usual, he had shifted the responsibility for organizing it onto someone else—Leif Argo, assisted by another friend, David Robertson. Christopher’s only legitimate worries were that he had maybe invited too many people and that he wouldn’t be able to remember all their names.27 He kept repeating them, to reassure himself.

  The party wasn’t an unqualified success. The house was certainly crammed with young men who were most of them fairly attractive. They danced together or went upstairs and necked. When invited, many had told Christopher that they were eager to meet the guests of honor, Britten and Pears—but, having done so, they quickly lost interest in them. In this gay setting, where celebrity snobbery was replaced by sex snobbery, Ben and Peter were just a pair of slightly faded limey queens, who were, furthermore, too shy and too solidly mated to join in the general kissing and cuddling. The party wasn’t really for them, though they politely pretended to believe that it was.

  In the November 22 journal entry there is also a reference to an event which isn’t mentioned in the day-to-day diary: “It’s shameful and petty to have to confess it—but I despise Jim just the least bit for his behavior the other evening. Anyhow, I despise his self-pity over it. Also, he looks so silly, all banged up. But that’s unkind, and I must be very careful not to show it.”

  On either November 18 or 19, quite late at night, Jim Charlton brought three or four boys over to Christopher’s house. They were all (I think) marines in civilian clothes. After a few drinks, Jim got into an argument with one of them (whom I’ll refer to for convenience as Red) and called him, quite casually and without venom, a son of a bitch. Red was sexy, well built and pugnacious. He declared that no one ever called him son of a bitch and got away with it, because that word was an insult to his mother. So he was going to beat Jim up. Jim said they couldn’t fight in the house, because of the furniture, or in the yard, because of the neighbors. Christopher tried to calm Red down. The other boys took no sides and didn’t seem to care what happened. But Red said that he’d either fight or go to the police and tell them that Jim had propositioned him. Finally they all drove up the hill to the Ocean Avenue park. Here Red hit Jim, who was bigger than himself, again and again until Jim’s face was bloody. Jim didn’t attempt to defend himself. He later insisted that he had done the only sensible thing. If he had fought back, the fight might well have gone on until a police car drove by, in which case they would all of them have been in trouble. Jim was right, and Christopher was right to feel ashamed of his own reactions. Nevertheless, there was something slightly repulsive about Jim’s masochistic attitude to Red when they met again in a bar, some days after this. Jim said admiringly: “You certainly beat me up!” Red, like the silly boy he was, didn’t unbend. He replied grandly that he’d do the same thing any time to anyone who called him son of a bitch because that word etc. etc.

  On November 24, Christopher ate Thanksgiving lunch with the Beesleys and Phyllis Morris. That evening, he and Jim went to a concert given by Britten and Pears, downtown. I believe it was after this concert that Ben and Peter told him that they longed to get away to the country for a couple of days and be quiet. So Christopher arranged to take them on a short trip and he asked Jim Charlton to come along. On the 26th, they drove to Palm Springs and then on to the AJC Ranch, where they saw John van Druten. They spent the night at the Rancho Mirage, ten miles outside Palm Springs. On the 27th, they drove southwest to Mount Palomar (the day-to-day diary doesn’t actually say they visited the observatory but I assume they did), then out to the coast at Oceanside, then up to Laguna Beach, where they had supper with Chris Wood and slept at a motel nearby. On the 28th, they drove back to Los Angeles.

  I don’t have many memories of Ben and Peter during their visit or of this trip Christopher and Jim took with them. Once, when he was alone with Ben, Christopher asked (I suppose in a more or less tactful manner) if Ben ever had sex with other people. Ben said no, he was faithful to Peter, adding, “I still feel the old charm.” Another memory is of Ben requesting Christopher, quite pleasantly, to stop singing. Christopher would do this for hours on end when he was by himself, repeating the same song over and over. A great favorite was Cole Porter’s “Ev’ry time we say goodbye . . .” because he loved attempting the transition in, “But how strange / The change / From major to minor.” This was what Ben must have found particularly painful, because Christopher had almost no ear. Also I remember that Jim asked Ben how he composed—maybe he didn’t put the question so crudely. Anyhow, Ben didn’t snub him but replied: “Well—I think I’ll begin with some strings, and then I think I’d like to bring in some woodwind, and then I think I’ll put a bit of percussion under that. . . .” (This may well be inaccurately reported and nonsense musically, but it conveys the effect which Ben’s practical, unromantic attitude had upon Christopher—who had seen so many Hollywood films about composers that he had lapsed into accepting the notion that they get their ideas by hearing a lark, or church bells, or waves on the shore.)

  The trip itself was undoubtedly a success. Ben and Peter loved the desert and the mountains. They became quite schoolboyish, laughing and joking. By the time they had got to Laguna Beach and had had supper with Chris Wood, they were so relaxed that they went over to his piano of their own accord and played and sang for a couple of hours. They both liked Jim. Peter may have found him physically attractive. Anyhow, I suspect that Christopher thought he did—for, when Peter knocked on the door of their two-bed motel room next morning, Christopher exhibitionistically called to him to come in (despite Jim’s embarrassment) so that Peter should see Jim and himself naked in Christopher’s bed, where they had just finished having sex.

  On November 30, Jim and Christopher went to another concert given by Ben and Peter, at the University of Southern California.

  On December 1, Christopher finished his article on Klaus Mann. He was quite pleased with the article—and so were Thomas and Erika Mann when they read it. But, in order to finish it, he had started smoking again.28

  On December 2, Christopher had lunch with Ben and Peter, just before they left Los Angeles.

  Nicky Nadeau had taken up with an immensely rich young man named [Karl] Hoyt. Hoyt had a big house in Bel Air. On December 3, he called up and asked Christopher if he would care to come around that evening. Hoyt’s casual tone made Christopher suppose that he was being invited over for a few drinks with the two of them, and possibly a snack in the kitchen, later. So he didn’t change his clothes or even put on a tie. But, when he drove up to the house, he was staggered to find himself in a line of cars which were being directed to parking places by several uniformed cops. Inside, a band was playing, and there were crowds of elegant guests, including some movie stars—the first person Christopher set eyes on was Hedda Hopper. Christopher was embarrassed and furious—especially when Hoyt and Nadeau greeted him in tuxedos. But he couldn’t, wouldn’t retreat—and very soon he was unembarrassed, drunk and talking to Gloria Swanson. I remember that evening as a prize specimen of the Hollywood social booby trap.

  On December 4, Christopher had supper with Jim. Afterwards they went into a bar called the Variety which was on the Pacific Coast Highway, not
far from Jim’s apartment. They had visited the Variety many times before this; hitherto it had [been] a mixed bar, chiefly heterosexual but with a tolerated minority of homosexual customers. That night, however, Christopher and Jim realized at once that it must have changed managements or adopted a new policy, for it was completely and obviously homosexual. Shortly after their arrival, the bar was raided. The cops went around taking the names of the customers. Christopher gave his name, then asked, “What’s this all about?” He was at once told he had to come along to the police station. Jim had to come with him.

  The police sergeant who was in charge of the raid proved to be a foulmouthed bull of the old school. The other cops were younger and nicer—or at least more sophisticated. The sergeant declared that he recognized Christopher from the “faggot bars” downtown. Christopher assured him that this was impossible because he never went to them. When they got to the Santa Monica police station, the sergeant phoned headquarters to ask if Christopher and Jim had criminal records and was told, to his disgust, that they hadn’t. This made him even more aggressive. He asked Christopher and Jim, “Are you two having a romance?” Then he had Christopher and Jim taken into separate rooms and questioned. Both of them were asked, “Are you a queer?” Jim said, “You must ask my psychiatrist.” When the question was repeated, he answered, “No.” Christopher also said, “No.” While the sergeant was out of the room, some of the other cops apologized, more or less, for his behavior, saying, “He’s always like that.” They asked Christopher how many times a week he did it. They weren’t bullying now but giggly and teasing, like sexually inquisitive little boys. Christopher answered, “I don’t have to tell you that,” but, when they laughed and agreed that he didn’t have to, he did give them some kind of jokey answer, I forget what it was. After this, Christopher and Jim were let go, with warnings not to visit that kind of bar again. It’s just possible that the cops had decided that Christopher and Jim weren’t queer, after all, and were warning them lest they should be doped or made drunk by the fiendish faggots and then raped!

  This actually not very dreadful ordeal has haunted Christopher ever since. Even as I write these words, I feel bitterly ashamed of him for not having said that he was queer. And yet I’m well aware of the counterargument: why in hell should you give yourself away to the Enemy, knowing that he can make use of everything you tell him?29

  On December 5, Christopher had supper with Tito Renaldo. (He refers to this in the journal entry of December 6.) Tito had recently left Trabuco after a short try at being a monk. Christopher writes that, “Tito feels sad and lost between two worlds. He sits in his horrid moderne little apartment, waiting for the call to work at the studio, and drinking [. . .]. Soon he’ll start having sex again, then asthma.” Poor Tito’s life became, from then on, increasingly unhappy [. . .]. He returned to live at Trabuco later, but he couldn’t settle there. He developed dark resentments against some of the other monks and revealed them in outbursts [. . .]. And yet he yearned for the Vedanta Society whenever he turned his back on it. “He clings to me,” Christopher writes, “as the only person who can understand the particular kind of mess he’s in. But I can’t really help him.”

  The December 6 journal entry also contains a passage about getting up early and going down to the kitchen for breakfast which Christopher echoed, fifteen years later, in A Single Man. And there are a couple of paragraphs about his decision (made after talking to Dodie Smith at lunch on the 4th) to write the novel in the third person, because “I simply cannot believe in Stephen Monkhouse, or any other fictitious character, as the narrator,” and because “I can’t narrate this myself.”30

  On December 9, the day-to-day diary records that Christopher had supper with Don Coombs and that he stayed the night. Don Coombs taught English at UCLA. Christopher had first met him at a party at Jay’s. Maybe Jay had recommended him to Christopher as a good lay; it was Coombs who later told Christopher that he had enjoyed going to bed with Jay because “he made me feel beautiful” (see here). Anyhow, Christopher had kissed Coombs at that party and it had been agreed that they would soon have a date together.

  Coombs was a pretty blond with big lips. He looked much better naked than in his demurely faggy clothes. His smooth cream-skinned body was well built. He was lively and shameless and he loved to be fucked. He had big firm, hotly inviting buttocks. (The day-to-day diary also records that Christopher had been visited that afternoon by [. . .] a tall muscular good-looking young man [he] had met on the beach. [The young man] had flattered Christopher by saying he wanted to fuck him and I believe this was the occasion on which [he] did it. Christopher was excited to be playing the passive role for a change but he didn’t much enjoy the fucking; [the man’s] cock was too large and it hurt him.)

  After Coombs’s uninhibited behavior in bed that night, Christopher was greatly surprised when he later confessed that he had been horribly 1eting Christopher. He had arrived much too early for their appointment, gone into a nearby bar and downed several martinis to fortify himself, thrown up, and then managed to pull himself together so successfully that Christopher had noticed nothing strange in his manner when they finally met.

  Coombs and Christopher met and fucked often after this. Coombs was prepared to admire Christopher and be amused by his jokes; he once said that Christopher had more vitality than anyone else he had ever known. Christopher had only one fault to find with Coombs; he was inclined to be stingy and never even offered to pay his share at a restaurant. Christopher finally spoke to him about this. Coombs took the rebuke in good part and afterwards told Christopher that he had been right.

  On December 10, Christopher gave a party for some of the patients from Birmingham Hospital. I don’t remember anything about this party, as distinct from my memories of other such parties later. There was always the problem of getting the quadriplegic patient—my impression is that Christopher only knew one of these personally—out of the car and into the house. And there was always a polite awkwardness until the patients were sufficiently drunk to be able to relax. The day-to-day diary says that this party included George Bradshaw and Fred and Renée Zinnemann; these were obviously invited because of their suitability as cohosts. I don’t know how many patients came to the party, but there can’t have been more than ten at the very most, considering the smallness of the living room and the extra space required for the wheelchairs.

  Christopher’s last journal entry for 1949—on December 14—is full of self-scoldings.31 Christopher has decided that he is going through the “change of life”; he says that Gerald Heard put the idea into his head. About Caskey, Christopher writes that he hates being alone but that he doesn’t “exactly” want Caskey back “—at least, I certainly don’t want him the way he was when he left.”

  On December 17, Christopher drove down to the AJC Ranch with Russ Zeininger. John van Druten and Carter Lodge were both there and Dave Eberhardt (see here) was staying with them. Dave and Christopher hadn’t seen each other for a long time. No doubt they picked up their flirtation where they had dropped it, which would explain why Christopher went round to Dave Eberhardt’s place in Los Angeles two days later, to have supper with him. (I believe Dave and Don Forbes had now [stopped sharing an apartment].) At Dave’s, that evening, was a youth named Michael Leopold. There was a lot of talk and drinking, at the end of which Christopher decided to stay the night; perhaps he was too drunk to drive home. I’m almost certain that he didn’t go to bed with either Dave or Michael Leopold on this occasion. It could be that Dave and Michael had sex with each other. Anyhow, Michael came to visit Christopher at Rustic Road on December 23 and they started what was to be an on-and-off but longish affair.

  Michael was then about eighteen; a Jewboy with thinning hair, a high forehead, spectacles (his sight was very poor), a cute cheerful face (resembling Anne Francis, a starlet of the period), a hideously ugly Texan accent (which Christopher tried to persuade him to modify) and a pair of long sturdy legs (of which Christopher thoroughly app
roved). He was intelligent, ardently literary, a tireless talker and sex partner. He had a wild laugh. He amused Christopher and flattered him outrageously and excited him considerably. Christopher later discovered that he was a pathological liar. His taste in males was catholic—ranging from boys of his own age to men in their sixties, so Christopher had no reason to feel embarrassed by the age gap. Besides, Michael was evidently drawn most strongly to elder brother and father figures. He often talked of a marine sergeant who had taken him up to a hotel room and kept him there several days a prisoner, well fed and well screwed. (This may of course have been one of Michael’s many fantasies.)

  Christopher often found Michael exasperating but nevertheless became very fond of him. It was easy to love Michael in bed, he enjoyed himself so heartily, he gave his body so completely to the experience—kissing, wrestling, rimming, sucking, being fucked and fucking with equal abandon. (Once, when Christopher had got drunk and passed out, Michael greased Christopher’s asshole and fucked him—or so he later claimed.) When Michael was reaching an orgasm, he would utter screams of lust which could surely be heard by the neighbors.

  Michael stayed with Christopher at the Rustic Road house from December 26 through the 28th and returned on the 31st to spend the night—or what was left of it, by the time Christopher had got back from two New Year’s Eve parties—at Salka Viertel’s and Gottfried Reinhardt’s.32 (Despite all the pleasure he had had with Michael, Christopher’s loneliness or his mental itch caused him to get Don Coombs to come and have sex with him on December 29—either for variety or because Michael wasn’t available.)

  But Michael had more than sex to offer. He was also eager to become Christopher’s literary disciple. He asked Christopher endless questions about writing. He dipped into the books on Christopher’s shelves and then wanted to hear Christopher’s opinion of them. He brought a story with him which he had begun to write and worked on it down in the living room while Christopher was working upstairs in the glassed-in porch.33 Thus their brief acquaintance was already taking on an aspect of domesticity. Christopher was under no illusions that he and Michael could set up housekeeping together. Christopher wasn’t in love with him, wasn’t at ease with him when he chattered and showed off, didn’t believe that he had much, if any, literary talent. And yet, Christopher and Michael came close to each other; Christopher felt an unwilling kinship with this freaky young creature. They were somehow two of a kind.