Joan
Page 18
On his arrival at St Wandrille, Paddy asked the black-robed monk at the gatehouse if it would be possible for him to stay. The monk went to speak to the abbot and returned smiling. He seized Paddy’s heavy bag and led him to a cell. On the inner side of the cell door were the printed rules of the guest wing. They contained a mass of cheerless information. While the monks’ day began at 4 a.m., a guest’s began at 8.15 with the office of Prime, after which breakfast was served in silence. The rest of the day was laid out with meals, offices and duties until the service of Compline at 8.30 p.m., then at 9.00 the monastery once again fell silent. During the hours of night, when everyone else was in bed, Paddy continued to work. From his window, he watched the lights in the other cells go out and he settled down to fill the empty hours in front of his pile of manuscripts, maps of the Caribbean islands, and photographs of the Central American jungle and the faces of the Maya Indians. This was how it must have been to witness François Fénelon, the eighteenth-century divine. ‘Rien ne change dans la vie monastique. Chaque jour est pareil à l’autre, chaque année comme celle qui la précédait, et ainsi jusqu’à la mort . . .’1*
Paddy, who was not used to looking inward, at first found being alone with himself and his thoughts depressing, but his mood lifted. He gave the writings of Joris-Karl Huysmans as his excuse for his interest in monasticism. ‘I was living a lot in France, much under the influence of Huysmans, and I haunted quays and bookshops and libraries,’2 he wrote. The erudite and idiosyncratic novels of Huysmans are concerned with the spiritual progression which led to the French writer’s own conversion to Catholicism. If conversion would have been a step too far for him, Paddy was, all the same, curious – like a little boy with his face pressed against a sweetshop window – to acquire what might be inside. Whatever his original purpose for staying in the monasteries, he was profoundly affected by the experience, yet found it difficult to say what his feelings amounted to.
The story of what happened over those months when they were apart from one another is best told in their own letters.
Paddy Leigh Fermor, St Wandrille, Monday
My darling Pet,
What a sweet funny letter. Oxford sounds as if it had been heavenly. I’m a bit more resigned to this place at the moment, and now that I’ve established my rights as a defaulter at Mass every day, it’s not too bad. The weather has been perfect, and I have been writing away out of doors under a chestnut tree. But all the same, if I get the slightest excuse to come to London, I’m going to do so. Probably even if there isn’t. There are tons of things I want to look up for the last three chapters, and I can’t bear the thought of your (a) enjoying London like mad without me or (b) the reverse. I really do miss you like anything. At this distance you seem about as nearly perfect as a human being can be, my darling little wretch, so it’s about time I was brought to my senses. So don’t get too sentimentally embroiled for heaven’s sake.
How kind these monks are! I’m not feeling an atom more disposed to religion at the moment, but the discrete [sic] and good manners and general aura of kindness and sweetness of nature of these people is something extremely rare. I wander about under the trees for ½ an hour after luncheon with the Abbé or the Père Hôtelier every day, talking about religion, philosophy, history, Greek and Roman poetry, etc. Very pleasant and satisfactory. The Père Hôtelier confided to me today that his conversion from atheism and monastic vocation was entirely under the influence of Huysmans, especially books like ‘L’Oblat’ and ‘La Cathedrale’! V. interesting.
I feel such a relief having finished the Windward, Leeward and Virgin Islands. The Leeward Islands were becoming a positive incubus – exorcised now at last. Once I tackle a chapter I feel I’m alright. After a page. But what a tormenting accidie period of hesitation beforehand. I’m feeling much happier about this book now, and terribly excited. I’m longing for you to read and criticize the latest stuff. Must be going on scribbling now so good night my darling little mite! Please go on writing. I adore your letters and they stop me from feeling like Ariadne,
all my love P. xxxx
P.S. Compline takes place in broad daylight – 8.30 – and it’s not dark for nearly an hour afterwards, which makes the evening seem very lonely and long. But it’s rather like one’s childhood, when grown-ups would still be playing tennis when one was supposed to be asleep. The trout rise in the Fontanelle and make little circles, and an old farmer has just ridden past on a huge cart horse to the thatched farmyard down the road. For some reason I hadn’t noticed the first and last lines of compline till tonight. They are very fine, I think: (both out of Psalms translated by St. Jerome) or is it an Epistle of St Paul? I think it is.
Fratres, sobrii istate, et vigilate, Quia adversarius vester diabolus, tanquam leonem rugiens circuit, quaerens quem devoret, restitate fortes in fide.
Brothers, be sober, and watch, For your adversary the devil like a roaring lion ranges abroad, seeking whom he may devour, whom resist strong in the faith.
And
Sub umbra alarum tuarum protege nos!
Under the shadow of thy wings defend us!
P.P.S. Important Darling, I’ve suddenly remembered that I haven’t sent Mondi Howard’s* brother £17 for the electric light. I’m, alas, £1 overdrawn. Do you think you could possibly send £18 to the Manager, Messrs Glyn Mills, (Holts Branch), Whitehall, S.W.1. and post the enclosed letter a day later. Darling, I know it’s the sort of thing you loathe doing more than anything in the world (not the pennies, I mean, but writing to banks), but I do think it would be a good idea to give it back now. It might make all the difference between being allowed to live at San Antonio another winter, and not. There’s still more trouble though. I’ve lost his address. But it is Dean Farm, I know, something-something, Glos. So could you look up Ld Howard of Penrith* in Who’s Who in the London Library, and fill it in. Please, please, don’t be savage with boredom at all this! It won’t take long!3
PLF, Abbaye de St Wandrille, Feast of St Jérome [30 September], Thursday
Darling Angel,
I’ve been wondering about what can be done about these silent meals in the refectory, and am just beginning to see daylight. In the library, piled up in a dark corner in a trunk and covered with dust, I’ve discovered a mass of 10th–16th century folios bound in vellum all dealing with the point where mysticism and necromancy merge. Chaldean magic, the Cabbalah, Hermes Trismegistus, astrology, the Rosy Cross, etc. I think that within a fortnight by dint of reading these books, by fasting and by prayer, and resort to the abbeys arsenal of flails and hair shirts, I ought to have mastered certain powers. I shall then initiate some of the likelier monks, beginning with the ones that look like Philip [Toynbee], Brian [Howard], Maurice [Bowra] and Cyril [Connolly] (no doubt more tractable in their monkish shape than I’ve found them in real life). Then, at a prearranged tap of the abbot’s mallet, we shall all levitate ourselves three yards in the air, and no sharp words will bring us down in fact nothing will, until we obtain a number of concessions: no more reading aloud from the Doctors of the Church, an end to the rule of silence, half a bottle of wine with each meal and a glass of Benedictine afterwards; all very reasonable demands. It might be the beginning of reform for the whole order.
I got up at 6 this morning, and went for a long walk in the beech forest above the abbey. The valley was full of mist and only the ruined arches and gables and chimneys of the abbey stuck out. There are romantic rides running through the forest, carpeted about with rotten leaves and smelling damp and autumnal like your description of Haut Brion. Every now and then where the rides cross there is a pillar supporting a grey stone urn, or there is a rococo archway crowned with a scallop shell containing the lilies of France, or the mitred arms of the abbey. Squirrels are everywhere. I haven’t drunk anything for 3 days and feel wonderfully clear-headed and light, the whites of my eyes are becoming as clear as porcelain, and bones are slowly emerging. I can’t quite remember what a hangover feels like.
My darlin
g pet, don’t stay in England forever and above all, don’t run away with anyone or I’ll come and cut your bloody throat. This is on the road between Havre and Rouen. You might come and pick me up here, or we might meet at Amy’s, or in Paris. All my love, dear little Joan, & kisses & hugs from Paddy.
p.s. I’ve forgotten which day my Voodoo broadcast is. Could you keep your eyes open in the Radio Times and wire me. I think it’s October 12th.
p.s. I brought the 130 Journées* here by mistake, but sent it back to Paris by registered mail before actually entering the abbey. If I hadn’t either the suitcase and I would have gone up in a sulphurous cloud, or the abbey would have come crashing down like Jericho.4
Joan Rayner, Dumbleton Hall, Wednesday
My darling Paddaki
I do love getting your letters so much. How fascinating the mystical mss. sound – do remember every word & tell me what they say. Would it be amusing to do an article on them for Horizon or Cornhill? Also would it be possible at any point for me to take photographs of the monastery for American or French Vogue?
I find your life very hard to imagine – I try to think of you tucked up in your cell at night or sitting silent and undrinking among the monks at meals, but it is difficult and it makes me feel very far away from you. God, I do hate not having you in bed with me – I suffer from loneliness, cold, the feeling of being unloved, angst, guilt & every form of fear from death to burglars.
I’m in a terrible muddle about my plans at the moment but I must see you SOON. The Colossus [George Katsimbalis]* is supposed to be arriving about the 16th, but everyone is very vague & hasn’t the slightest idea of how long he is staying. I would like to see him sometime. Then the H. wants me to go back to Bordeaux as some of the photographs were on a bad film & are all messed up. I wish it was June now – there seems to be so much still to do before the winter begins.
Here are some more Ds for you if you promise to take them only for work. I’ve stuck them up in this curious way as they are in a box and I thought they would get broken if I didn’t.
I got the curse so late this month I began to hope I was having a baby, & that you would have to make it into a legitimate little Fermor. All hopes ruined this morning. I think perhaps you should rape me one day when I am all unprepared – Aquarians can never decide about their lives & like being forced into everything.
The H. writes daily, mostly very sweet & gay letters. He poured out his heart to Graham who takes no sides, but warned him, among other things, that I was as promiscuous as any homosexual. Not true at all. The H. apparently surprised G. a great deal by saying I was really incestuous & that all my troubles came from G. not having had an affair with me years ago!*
I’m going to London Monday or Tuesday – I may stay at Sussex Place* – it is safer than anywhere since Lys is always there – but I don’t really want to if I can get anywhere else nice. I’ll let you know as soon as I do, but write here until then as they will be sent on. I’ll try to find Xan as soon as I get there.
Best love my darling Angel – I do so long to hug you again
Joan xxxx5
Paddy Leigh Fermor, St Wandrille, Tuesday
in a terrible hurry for the post
My darling Mopsa,
Just got your lovely two letters. Hooray! Darling, you have been efficient and brisk. The pullover is the smartest thing that has ever been seen in Saint Wandrille.
So the H. has been very attentive, eh? Hm. ‘I can-no-longer-exist-without-you’ I suppose . . . well, bugger it, neither can I. Oh dear, what fun London sounds! I can’t bear all these creatures having you to themselves. Late at night is a dangerous time. I wake in my cell at 1.a.m. when you are letting yourself into the flat for a last drink with whoever you have been dining with, and pray to Saint Wandrille to put the words ‘thus far and no further’ into your mouth . . . Grrrr! . . .
On Sunday, Christopher Buckley* (do you remember a tall, rather moose-like journalist in Greece?) and his wife arrived here and took me out to luncheon. (I had met him in the street in Paris, and told him where I was going.) I always thought him rather a bore but he is far from it.
This morning I bicycled down to the Seine to see the monthly tidal wave sweep up the river, a huge foaming well of water. Last night, the lights went out in the refectory. The pulpit had been fitted up with the electricity the same day so the solitary voice reading fell silent at the same moment, as if it had been the [unveiling?]. Very eerie. Dead silence except for munching and the swishing robes of the waiting monks. Huge candles arrived at last making the Norman room still more medieval. Important. Do find out when my broadcast is. Could you possibly, my poor darling, ring up Miss Rowly, Talks Dept, BBC, and say how sorry I am not to be able to give a live broadcast, and explain. Longer letter tomorrow. All my love my darling pet from Paddy.6
Paddy Leigh Fermor, Saint Wandrille, 13 October 1948, 10 p.m.
Darling, I’ve just had the most frightful shock. After compline I went to the library to make some more notes about Stylites and stayed there till a few minutes ago, all the monastery being in bed and asleep. I put all the lights out, locked up, felt my way through the dark refectory (full of the noise of rats gnawing and scuttling), and out into the cloisters, a square pool of icy starlight. At the other side of the cloisters is a dark Gothic doorway opening into a passage that leads to my part of the abbey. Still thinking about the deserts of Chalcedon and Paphlagonia. I walked through the archway and happening to look to my left, saw a tall monk standing there, his face invisible in his cowl, his hands folded in his sleeves, quite silent. It was so frightening I nearly let out a scream and can still feel my heart thumping. Phew!
Sweet darling, thank you so much for your telegram about the broadcast. I managed to hear it on the curé’s wireless set – there are more in the Abbey. I would never have recognised my voice if I hadn’t known who it was. Does it really sound like that? I thought it sounded rather affected and la-di-da, and frightfully gloomy, as if I were about to collapse into floods of tears. Did you manage to hear it? I don’t expect you did in London. You didn’t miss a great deal. Oh darling, in case it came garbled by telegram, the Cephalonian Saint is S. Gerasimos . . .
I addressed my last letter c/o Cyril, as I knew you were having dinner there tonight. Is 56 Curzon Street nice? It must be the opposite end from our lovely nest. Has Isabel’s flat petered out? I say, your dinner tonight sounds alright. You’ve probably just about got to the party by now. Do tell me all about it. Duke and baron indeed.
A curious thing que je constate is that the Humanist’s devotion to you makes him much more sympathetic to me than before. It’s about our only thing in common. But, please, my darling, I think it’s absolutely essential – I’m studying his interests as a writer – that it should be an unrequited devotion . . . I wonder how it’s all going. Any obstacles can be overcome by dogged perseverance. Parturit ridiculus mus et nascuntur montes.* And if not the Humanist, what about the tenebrous stranger? Eh? Do tell me about your London life. I’m afraid it’s dreadfully exciting . . . Oh, oh, oh! And tell me about your new clothes. I wish you were in France . . .
The room is an extraordinary mixture of austerity and splendour – the tiles, the bare white walls, and then the four-poster, the arras, the peculiar column. It has some slight analogy to the disparate elements of some Guatemalan churches . . . It’s a wonderful room to wake up in. The sunlight streams in through all those great windows, and from my bed, all I can see through them are layer on ascending layer of chestnut leaves like millions of superimposed green hands, and then the pale crystalline October sky, framed by thin reflected blue-white, or thick milk-white, or, where the sun strikes, white-gold surfaces of the walls and window arches in embrasures. A miraculous, feather-light, innocent, clear awakening!
My darling angel, I meant this to be a short, brisk letter. I see it’s straggled over several pages already: I’m so alone here at night, I can’t stop talking to you, it’s such a luxury. Darling, don’t feel ever o
bliged to write long letters, and put them off, in any way, because you haven’t got time to settle down to a whopper. You’re in a capital city, I’m in an abbey, don’t I know what it means! I do enjoy and look forward to your letters so – you’ve sent me some lovely long ones. But do write often, even if it’s terribly shortly. I wake up in a dither about the postman. And don’t you think these accounts of cenobitic splendour mean I’m O.K. here alone! I miss you the whole time my dearest angel and launch armadas of kisses in the direction of Curzon Street, great hugs and feverish clinches, and long, angelic, tender and gentle ones as if we were on the verge of falling asleep tangled up together.
All my love to you, darling, mignonne, sweet Joan from Paddy.7
Eventually, Paddy left St Wandrille de Fontanelle and its damp and autumnal beech forests like Haut Brion. After all he had felt and seen, he found his departure very hard.
If my first days in the Abbey had been a period of depression, the unwinding process, after I had left, was ten times worse. The Abbey was at first a graveyard; the outer world seemed afterwards, by contrast, an inferno of noise and vulgarity entirely populated by bounders and sluts and crooks. This state of mind, I saw, was perhaps as false as my first reaction to monastic life; but the admission did nothing to increase its unpleasantness. From the train which took me back to Paris, even the advertisements for Byrrh and Cinzano seen from the window, usually such jubilant emblems of freedom and escape, had acquired the impact of personal insults. The process of adaptation – in reverse – had painfully to begin.8