George Orwell: A Life in Letters

by Peter Davison

  It’s odd—we have had nothing to discuss for months but the moment you leave the country there are dozens of things. But they can all be settled, or at least settled down, if you take this week’s leave when you get back. I don’t know about Garrigill.13 It depends when you come. But at worst you could come here couldn’t you? If you were here we should stay mainly in my room, indeed I suppose I’ll be there for some time after I get back in any case, and Richard will be available. Mary 14 and Laurence both spend a lot of time with me now but they could be disposed of. Laurence by the way has improved out of recognition. He has three passions: farms, fairy tales, Richard. Not in that order—Richard probably comes first. So you ought to get on nicely. He has begun to invent fairy tales now, with magic cats and things in them, which is really a great advance. The pity is that the country isn’t better but almost any country is good round about May and if I’m still at the picturesque stage of convalescence you could go out with Blackburn who knows every inch of the countryside or perhaps amuse yourself with Mr. Swinbank the farmer who would enjoy it I think. Or you could go over to Garrigill for a weekend’s fishing on your own.

  I liked hearing about Wodehouse.15 And I’m very glad you’re going to Cologne. Perhaps you may get East of the Rhine before you come home. I have innumerable questions.

  I think it’s quite essential that you should write some book again. As you know, I thought Tribune better than the BBC and I still do. Indeed I should think a municipal dustman’s work more dignified and better for your future as a writer. But as I said before I left London, I think you ought to stop the editing soon, as soon as possible, whether or not you think it worth while to stay on the editorial board or whatever it’s called. And of course you must do much less reviewing and nothing but specialised reviewing if any. From my point of view I would infinitely rather live in the country on £200 than in London on any money at all. I don’t think you understand what a nightmare the London life is to me. I know it is to you, but you often talk as though I liked it. I don’t like even the things that you do. I can’t stand having people all over the place, every meal makes me feel sick because every food has been handled by twenty dirty hands and I practically can’t bear to eat anything that hasn’t been boiled to clean it. I can’t breathe the air, I can’t think any more clearly that° one would expect to in the moment of being smothered, everything that bores me happens all the time in London and the things that interest me most don’t happen at all and I can’t read poetry. I never could. When I lived in London before I was married I used to go away certainly once a month with a suitcase full of poetry and that consoled me until the next time—or I used to go up to Oxford and read in the Bodleian and take a punt up the Cher if it was summer or walk in Port Meadow or to Godstow if it was winter. But all these years I have felt as though I were in a mild kind of concentration camp. The place has its points of course and I could enjoy it for a week. I like going to theatres for instance. But the fact of living in London destroys any pleasure I might have in its amenities and in fact as you know I never go to a theatre. As for eating in restaurants, it’s the most barbarous habit and only tolerable very occasionally when one drinks enough to enjoy barbarity. And I can’t drink enough beer. (George Mason took me out to dinner the night after I got to London and gave me to drink just what I would have drunk in peacetime—four glasses of sherry, half a bottle of claret and some brandy—and it did cheer me up I admit.) I like the Canonbury flat but I am suicidal every time I walk as far as the bread shop, and it would be very bad for Richard once he is mobile. Indeed if the worst comes to the worst I think he’d better go to Wallington for the summer, but it would be better to find somewhere with more space because you and Richard would be too much for the cottage very soon and I don’t know where his sister 16 could go. And I think the cottage makes you ill—it’s the damp and the smoke I think.

  While this has been in progress I have read several stories to Laurence, dealt with Richard who woke up (he has just stopped his 10 o’clock feed), dealt with Mary who always cries in the evening, had my supper and listened to Mrs. Blackburn’s distresses about Raymond 17 who has just got a motor bike. That’s why it’s so long. And partly why it’s so involved. But I should like to see you stop living a literary life and start writing again and it would be much better for Richard too, so you need have no conflicts about it. Richard sends you this message. He has no conflicts. If he gets a black eye he cries while it hurts but with the tears wet on his cheeks he laughs heartily at a new blue cat who says miaow to him and embraces it with loving words. Faced with any new situation he is sure that it will be an exciting and desirable situation for him, and he knows so well that everyone in the world is his good friend that even if someone hurts him he understands that it was by accident and loses none of his confidence. He will fight for his rights (he actually drove Mary off the blue cat today, brandishing a stick at her and shouting) but without malice. Whether he can keep his certainties over the difficult second year I don’t know of course but he’s much more likely to if he has the country and you have the kind of life that satisfies you—and me. I think Richard really has a natural tendency to be sort of satisfied, balanced in fact. He demands but he demands something specific, he knows what he wants and if he gets it or some reasonable substitute he is satisfied; he isn’t just demanding like Mary. I’m not protecting him. That is, he takes the troubles I think proper to his age. He gets no sympathy when his face is washed and very little when he topples over and knocks his head and I expect him to take in good part the slight sort of bumps he gets when the children play with him. But he can be tough only if he knows that it’s all right really.

  Now I’m going to bed. Before you get this you’ll probably have the message about this operation and you may well be in England again if you keep what Ivor Brown calls on the move. What a waste that would be.

  All my love, and Richard’s.

  E.

  Mary calls Richard Which or Whicher or Which-Which. I suppose he’ll call himself something like that too. Whicher I find rather attractive. She is better with him now and I must say I am proud to see that she is more apt to be frightened of him than he of her, sad though it is. I actually heard her say to him yesterday ‘No no Whicher, no hurt Mamie.’ She takes things from him but she runs away from him, relying on her mobility; once he can move himself I don’t believe she’ll dare to—she never stays within his reach once she has the thing in her hand. She tries to gain confidence for herself by saying Baby wet all the time—generally with truth because he has now got to the stage of rejecting his pot (this is the usual preliminary to being ‘trained’ and I hope we’ll reach that stage soon though at present I see not the slightest indication of it), but when she dirtied her pants for the second time today I heard this conversation with Nurse: ‘No cross with Mamie Nurse?’ ‘Yes I am cross this time’ ‘Iodine no cross?’ ‘“Yes, Iodine’s cross too.’ ‘Whicher cross?’ ‘Whicher says he’ll have to lend you some nappies.’ ‘No. . . . Baby’s.’ And she began to cry—so she’s not sure of her superiority even in this. She isn’t so superior either. This has been a bad day, but she never gets through one with dry pants poor little wretch.

  Dearest thank you very much for the books—Psmith in the City 18 has been making me laugh aloud. By the way, he arrived yesterday and the other three this afternoon although according to your letter you posted the three first. The oranges came too, and the fats.19 I think you’re being too generous but as the oranges have come I’m going to eat them. Blackburn got some the other day and I gave all mine and most of Richard’s to the children so they’re all right for the moment. Richard has the juice of half an orange every other day and Mary has his other half and Laurence a whole one.

  This is being typed under difficulties as Mary is on my knee and trying to contribute.

  Tomorrow I’m going to Newcastle, primarily to see the man in charge of Welfare Foods for the North of England. So far as I can see I can’t get Richard’s back o
range juice as Stockton Food Office has stolen the coupons, but I hope to arrange that they won’t bring off the same coup again. I now have some reason to think that they take orange juice out of stock on these extra coupons and sell it but of course I’m not proposing to mention this theory to Watkins. I’m also going to three food meetings and two infant welfare clinics with Nell.20 If I stay the course. It will be very interesting and I hope profitable because I ought to lay hold of some Ostermilk 21 somewhere.

  Don’t bother about blankets. I’ve bought two from Binns’ in Sunderland—they cost 22/– each and are more like rugs than blankets but they’ll do quite well. I hope to make one into a frock for myself. They’re dark grey which isn’t I think the colour of choice for blankets but they’ll come in useful one way or another and they’re certainly cheap. I hope you have enough at home and are not economising by leaving out the underblanket because without that you’ll be cold if you have a dozen on top of you.

  The playpen has come and all the children are entranced by it. Richard laughed heartily as soon as he was put in and then the others joined him and there was a riot. I don’t know how he’ll take to it when he is left alone but I think he’ll be OK. I have made him some strings of beads which he passionately loves and he will now play by himself quite happily for as long as you like. He’s had more trouble with his teeth but no more are through. He might have another couple by the 21st though. As for his appetite, he ate for his lunch the same food as Mary and very nearly the same quantity, but he didn’t want his milk. I’d just announced that I was going to replace the midday milk by water so this came very aptly. But I’ve had to replace the cereal after his evening bath. I gave him Farex 22 for a couple of nights and the last two he has had MOF again made much thinner. When he had just milk he was restless at night and screaming for his late feed by nine o’clock. So I’m just going to risk his getting overweight—he’s still below the average for his age and length I’m sure. He’s beginning to drink cows’ milk instead of Ostermilk but I can’t go ahead with this as fast as I might because I’m terrified that he’ll turn against the Ostermilk and we’ll be dependent on that when we’re in London. The other thing that doesn’t progress well is his drinking. He’s much worse at it since he had the teeth. But I think part of the trouble is that he can’t manage the mug which he’s supposed to use now. I’ll try to buy one or two cups or mugs in Newcastle (I’m staying the night there and coming back on Friday to fit all these things in).

  I’ve been dressed every day since you went away but I’ve done very little else except give Richard most of his food and have him for his social between five and six and play with Mary for half an hour or so after feeding Richard because she’s so jealous of him, quite naturally. This morning

  [Handwritten] At this point typing became impossible—I am now in the train but I got your wire last night (Wed). I hope you’ll be able to do the Court 23 but of course you mustn’t mess up the French trip.

  Could you ring me up on Friday or Saturday evening? It’s quite easy— Stillington, Co. Durham, 29. A trunk call of course—you dial TRU & ask for the number. Then we can talk about the plans. Unless of course you’re coming up this weekend which would be nice. I’ll be home at Greystone on Friday afternoon.

  Eileen24

  [XVII, 2638, pp. 95–103; typed and handwritten]

  1.Greystone was the O’Shaughnessy family home. Joyce Pritchard, the O’Shaughnessys’ nanny, told Ian Angus in a letter of 27 September 1967 that Eileen visited Greystone frequently between July 1944 (when the children were taken there) and March 1945.

  2.Laurence (born 13 November 1938) was the son of Gwen* and Laurence O’Shaughnessy,* both doctors. Eileen was the sister of the elder Laurence.

  3.George Kopp,* Orwell’s commander in Spain, married Gwen O’Shaughnessy’s half-sister Doreen Hunton. He and Doreen lived a few doors away from the Orwells in Canonbury Square so he had not got far to go to collect the mail, but he failed to forward it.

  4.Raymond Blackburn was gardener and odd-job man at Greystone.

  5.Harry Evers was Eileen’s surgeon.

  6.Gwen O’Shaughnessy’s husband (see n. 2).

  7.Eileen owned a house, Ravensden, at Harefield, Middlesex; this was let. See her letter of 25 March 1945 (XVII, 2642), and for a reference to its disposal, 11 January 1946 (XVIII, 2856, p. 33).

  8.Evelyn Anderson, foreign editor of Tribune. She had studied at Frankfurt and came to England as a refugee. Orwell had ‘volunteered Eileen’s help . . . in correcting her English for a book’ (Crick, p. 446). This was Hammer or Anvil: The Story of the German Working-Class Movement, reviewed by Orwell in the Manchester Evening News, 30 August 1945 (XVIII, 2734, pp. 271–3).

  9.Presumably Miss Sparrow was a secretary at the Ministry of Food, where Eileen had worked until June 1944.

  10.George Mason was a surgeon and one-time colleague of Laurence O’Shaughnessy.

  11.In his Diary for 20 June 1940 Orwell writes, ‘Thinking always of my island in the Hebrides’ (see Diaries, pp. 257 and 258). This may have been prompted by his reviewing Priest Island by E.L. Grant Wilson on 21 June 1940 (XII, 640, pp. 190–1). Jura itself was doubtless chosen because it was recommended by David Astor who owned land there. He also suggested Barnhill which had been empty for several years. Avril describes Barnhill in her letter of 1.7.46.

  12.Margaret Fletcher (1917–; later Mrs Nelson) went to Jura with her husband, Robin, when he inherited the Ardlussa Estate, on which stood Barnhill.

  13.Garrigill, a village near Alston, Cumbria, about midway between Penrith and Hexham.

  14.Catherine Mary, Gwen O’Shaughnessy’s adopted daughter, who was known as Mary until her cousin, Mary Kopp was born, when she took Catherine as her first name. She was also known as ‘Mamie’.

  15.Orwell had taken P.G. Wodehouse and his wife to a small restaurant near Les Halles in Paris.

  16.Eileen and Orwell had hoped to adopt a little girl as a sister to Richard.

  17.Raymond Blackburn, son of Mrs Blackburn, the housekeeper.

  18.Psmith in the City, a novel by P.G. Wodehouse (1910) is discussed by Orwell in ‘In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse’ (XVII, 2624, pp. 51–63).

  19.Oranges were unobtainable for most of the war and fats were severely rationed. A special allowance of concentrated orange juice was made available to children as a Welfare Food.

  20.Not identified with certainty, but probably Nell Heaton, a friend of Eileen’s. They met when they worked together at the Ministry of Food. In 1947 Nell Heaton published The Complete Cook, the foreword of which states: ‘I owe a debt of gratitude . . . to George Orwell and Emily Blair, to whose sympathy and encouragement I owe so much.’ Eileen was known as Emily at the Ministry of Food.

  21.Ostermilk is a proprietary brand of milk powder for babies.

  22.Farex is a proprietary brand of food for newly weaned babies.

  23.This may possibly mean attend Court in connection with the final formalities for Richard’s adoption, although Eileen, in her letter to Lettice Cooper (23.3.45), says ‘Richard’s adoption was through’. An alternative possibility is the kind of law court Orwell refers to in his report, ‘Creating Order out of Cologne Chaos’, Observer, 25 March 1945 (XVII, 2641, pp. 106–7).

  24.The signature is an indecipherable scrawl.

  Eileen Blair* to Lettice Cooper*

  23 March 1945 or thereabouts

  Greystone

  Carlton

  Dear Lettice,

  I’m sorry about the paper and the typewriter but Mary got at both. You practically can’t buy paper here so I can’t waste that and although I could do something about the machine I am bored with it after about twenty minutes spent in collecting the ribbon and more or less replacing it. A typewriter ribbon is the longest thing in the world. It will go round every chair leg in a good sized house. So I’ve just discovered.