The Wainwright Letters

by Hunter Davies

  At the office I do the work allotted to me, and I do it extremely well. Two or three times a day the Treasurer (a grand fellow) comes in and sprawls across my desk for a camp and a smoke. He likes me immensely; his early regard has turned to awe, for I have simply staggered him and the staff with my superb competence. Every job I touch is polished perfect, flawless. The work itself is varied and interesting, and very simple – it’s like learning the A.B.C. all over again. I am allowed to smoke at my desk, itself a boon and a blessing. The Mayor Aldermen and Burgesses are all as nice as ninepence; I get along extremely well with all of them, and am treated with deference and respect by the chief officials, who are, uniformly, gentlemen who wear cloth caps. There is complete freedom from restrictions and interference. Believe me, working here is a positive delight!

  The atmosphere of Kendal is soaking thoroughly into me, but I have not yet lost the feeling that I am on holiday. It’s a grand old town. I browse around the shops and quaint old inns and alleyways with undiminished interest. A few people now, not many, greet me with a nod and a smile as I pass along the streets. And I see walkers, heavily laden, on their way to the hills, any my silent blessing goes with them; I see them return, brown as berries, and feel sad that they must return to the towns where there are no hills. Sometimes I look in the excellent Public Library, a treasury of Lakeland lore, and bring home the books I love best to read. If the evening is mild I climb up to the castle to watch the day depart, but more often I go across the fell to Scout Scar, eight hundred feet above the Lyth Valley, and lie down on the brink of the cliff. From this exalted viewpoint my gaze roams at will over the assembly of mountain peaks before me. They are all there, all the old friends – Bowfell, Scafell, Gable, the Pikes, Fairfield and High Street. Ah yes, I have smoked many pipes of utter contentment on Scout Scar! When the sun gets low and the valleys fill with white mist, I come back at a swinging pace, calling at a little inn on the edge of the fell, an so home for a mammoth supper. It’s a grand life, mon ami!

  I am in excellent, robust health. Every weekend finds me amongst the hills, knocking lumps off Baddeley’s regulation times. There’s nothing to beat mountaineering. It keeps a man sane, stimulates his spirit. It’s what you lack, son, and precisely what you need. You were never so happy as at Carlisle, with the hills so near that you could spend your weekends amongst them. I well remember your stirring call ‘En avant’ during our Whitsuntide 1931 holiday. You were happy then. Your wants were simple. There was no vain chasing of phantoms in those days, no bitter disappointments, no disillusionment. A simple life is a happy one. The thing most worth seeking in life, Eric, is beauty. Make no mistake about that. I couldn’t be persuaded to swop this existence for any other. I have reached the foot of the rainbow, and here, sure enough, is the pot of gold I have been seeking – beauty so exquisite that it makes the heart leap with exultation, loveliness so enchanting that it brings tears to the eyes. This is wealth, real wealth; it is free of tax, and it is mine forever.

  – – –

  That’s the letter I was going to send you. Now I have yours, which calls for attention also. I have not forgotten Blackburn, nor ever will. But surprisingly it has not the grip I feared it would have. Already it is fast receding from my thoughts. I have made a few brief visits, staying with the golden-voiced singer you mention, but I have not been in the old office. Frankly, the old town seems a hell-hole after Kendal, and it is with relief that I come again within sight of the hills on my return. I find that many of the delights (pursuits may be a better word) I enjoyed there were shallow and superficial, after all. Not one of them gave me such keen pleasure as the view I had of Ullswater from St Sunday Crag last Saturday evening: the latter experience seemed to me one of the intimate joys of existence. I must be a very simple soul!

  You tell me you are still as miserably dissatisfied as ever. No wonder. All your pet theories have crumbled before your eyes. Your philosophies have had no root; how could they survive? You need a foundation to build on, a firm belief, a simple faith; then all else falls naturally into place. Get a month’s leave of absence, stay at Burnthwaite, climb Gable every day, attend the services at Wasdale Church every Sunday. If this doesn’t cure you, nothing will. I think it will. Avoid marriage. You’d be a wife-beater. A child of your own would help to restore balance considerably, but in your case it’s too big a risk. Continue with your married friend, by all means. A widow would be better, if you could find one young and attractive. Either class is far preferable to a spinster; they are easy to get on with, not prudish, ready and eager to lie down and play snails.

  I agree with you remarks re Wainwright letters. They are good, unquestionably. Actually, you know, I came here to write and draw. Wordsworth and Wainwright, these two! Here are some of the prospective titles chosen for my books:

  MEN AND MOUNTAINS, by Alf Wainwright.

  ONCE I CLIMBED A HILL, by Alf Wainwright.

  HERITAGE OF THE HEATHER, by Alf Wainwright.

  MOUNTAIN MEMORIES, by Alf Wainwright.

  Demy 8vo, profusely illustrated, 10/6 each. The real classic, however, will not be published until about 1960. My life’s blood will be in it: it will be my memorial. This of course, will be WAINWRIGHT’S GUIDE TO THE LAKELAND HILLS. Look out for these publications on the bookstalls, in vivid yellow jackets. And please buy a copy, for auld lang syne!

  You want PENNINE CAMPAIGN again. Such a fag having to find brown paper and parcel it up and send it! I intended to make minor corrections, and amend the title to PENNINE JOURNEY, but the months have sped by and nothing has been done. Who wants it this time? Anybody with ’fluence? Longland, for instance? I’d like to see it published, and anybody can have the copyright for fifty pounds: a rare opportunity for someone with business acumen, for royalties will roll in! I’ll send it, if you really want to have it. But it’s in tatters now. See that it doesn’t get amongst the salvage.

  I mustn’t forget to tell you that my deferment expires on June 30th. The Council have lodged a spirited appeal against this decision.

  When shall I see you again? When shall we sup together once more? In Munich, Vienna, Belgrade and Athens after the war? Or in England before this?

  I remember an occasion when you were too shy to urinate in a chamber at Rosthwaite.

  It’s ten years ago.

  You were happy in those days, son. Your old pal

  Alf

  LETTER 22: TO ERIC WALTER MAUDSLEY, 11 JUNE 1942

  Thursday evening,

  19 Castle Grove

  June 11 1942

  Kendal.

  Dear Walter,

  I can do no other than send the blessed book forthwith. Here it is. Bessie seems a grand girl! Your brief but eloquent description of her early-morning salute made the red blood pulsate a trifle more rapidly in certain of my veins. Caresses ‘long, luscious, and sweet as nectar’ – this reads like poetry from one I always considered prosaic! I envy you. Nectar I never tasted; my dictionary tells me it is the fabled drink of the gods, the honey of flowers. I can well imagine that your treasured privilege of sipping daily at so delicious a fountain, of submitting gladly and eagerly to the ministrations of such a charmer, is one not conducive to earnest application to your duties until long after the spell is broken. Indeed, it is by no means difficult for me to visualize the Scene of Shame: I see her jolly entry into your sanctum at the appointed moment, the beads of dishonest sweat on your brow as you tremble at her approach, the soft brushing of her hair across your ageing jowls, the gentle pressure of the soft young body against the matured, the sucking lips, the intoxications of her nearness; then she is gone. I see your lank frame sink into the chair, morally softened and organically stiffened by the incident, a prey to uncontrollable fits of shuddering until the state of ecstatic prostration is again dormant. Very gradually Hyde merges into Jekyll, a ray of clear light shines through the writhing tumult of your thoughts, then another, and ultimately your gaze fixes on the papers on your desk.

  As I say, I env
y you. She must be wonderful. Are you sure she is not the one you seek? Cannot you imagine yourself undergoing the frothy expulsions of an enchanting honeymoon with her? Dammit, I’m getting worked up about her myself! Ask her to write to me when she has read the book.

  Otherwise, your letter is again a Lament. Life has no meaning. There is no lasting pleasure, no true rapture. You drift aimlessly on through the years, going this way and that and always coming back to the crossroads. Have a care, man! The clock is ticking your life away.

  Whitsuntide I spend at Giggleswick, near Settle, in the company of some Blackburn friends (including the aforementioned golden-voiced operatic star). So far as the weather could disrupt the proceedings, it did so. It was wet, it was wild, it was windy, it was wintry. I fled the place on the Monday, and came over to lovely Grasmere, where I sat on a boulder by Easedale Tarn and witnessed a thunderstorm stalking across the mountains. This, I thought, was better far.

  This weekend I am taking a short holiday with my cousin, who is bringing his family over for the week. Probably we shall get over into Borrowdale for a night or two: we may even realize an old ambition of mine and watch the sun rise from Gable’s grim turret. We shall sojourn at Rosthwaite, so that it is quite on the cards that the House of the Spurned Utensil will again harbour me. If so, you may be sure there will be chamber music before retiring, and I promise to spare a thought, whilst in the act, for the maidenly youth who could not and would not in an age long past. 19 Castle Grove is being deluged with relatives at present. They have been coming since Christmas, but only for week-ends; now however they are coming for weeks on end; sisters, brothers-in-laws, aunts, hordes of nieces and nephews. We are completely booked up, and sleeping three or four in a bed, until mid-August. They leave very reluctantly, too, vowing to return here to live after the war, so I can see myself being installed as the first President of a local Blackburnians Assocn ere long. No doubt about it, Kendal’s a grand place!

  News of minor interest to you may be the second marriage of your old Technical College fellow-student, Nellie Myerscough, alias Morrison, alias Lynch. She honeymooned at Arnside, and came over one day to pay me a call at the office. Thus another chapter comes to a close. Look out for a special chapter devoted to her in my Published Memoirs under the title ‘ONCE I CLIMBED NELLIE’. Ah, me!

  I was very pleased to learn that the Call of the North was again tugging. Your description of pastoral Herts did not convince me. Tree-studded backsides! Where, in Herts, is there a Mickledore, a Black Sail, a Stonethwaite, a Buttermere? There’s hope for you still if the yearning for Lakeland is not dead, and I was interested to find that names such as Broad Stand and Lord’s Rake still flow easily from your typewriter apparently without too great a strain on distant memory.

  Broad Stand – how often have I squeezed through the narrow cleft of Fat Man’s Agony and lovingly stroked its grim walls; how often have I turned sorrowfully away without attempting the climb! Other people’s lives hold regrets as well as your own, and Broad Stand is prominent amongst mine. Lord’s Rake, of course, I have flogged underfoot often.

  Let me know when the date of your visit is certain, for I would like a rendezvous with you, if only for an hour. I am anxious for more details about Bessie!

  I must close this letter here and now. If I don’t I shall have to blackout, and I resent having to do that; it reminds me there’s a war on.

  So be strong, of good courage and stout heart. There’s always tomorrow, and Bessie will not fail.

  Your old pal,

  Alf

  LETTER 23: TO ERIC WALTER MAUDSLEY, 21 JULY 1942

  Tuesday evening,

  19 Castle Grove

  July 21 1942

  Kendal.

  Dear Walter,

  Your letter of the 17th, reeking with pungent wit, is before me.

  I enjoyed every word of it.

  Tonight, unfortunately, I have not time to reply at length, but write tonight I must if you are to receive my letter before you set your face to the frozen north. Only the scurvy machinations of unkind fate prevent me from shouting ‘Yoicks!’ in a loud voice and rushing to join you at an appointed rendezvous. Yet I cannot, and I deeply regret the circumstance. The fact is that at present Wainwright no longer stands majestically aloof from his fellows, but forms the geometric centre of a turmoil of frantic humans who descend upon him singly and in droves. This Queen Bee with a myriad workers is the Secretary of Kendal’s Stay-at-Home Holiday Week (August 3rd–8th). In a way, the work is decidedly enjoyable, as it is permissible to stroke my female assistants at odd moments during the preparation of the programme, and it adds to a man’s stature to have his telephone ringing all day, and have a stream of callers and a fan-mail like a film-star. It would be a reasonable assessment of the present position to say that as a result of my efforts these past few weeks the arrangements have been methodically reduced to chaos. So I’m sorry, but you are not to know the intimacy of my brace of bony knees this time. A pity! I would have loved to be awaiting you on Mickledore as you came toiling up Hollow Stones at noon on the 30th. Then we could have shoved each other up Broad Stand and rushed down to Wasdale to celebrate our triumph in a succession of foaming flagons. And later, beneath the coverlet, I should have heard from your drooling lips the Story of Bess, told with maudlin simplicity and punctuated with intervals of noisy urination. Alas, these things cannot come to pass this year! Thanks for the invitation. I shall reply more fully to your letter in a week or two, and I must thank The Girl for her criticism of my book.

  I would appreciate a card from Wasdale, if you get there – a picture of jagged mountain-tops, please.

  Have a good holiday, son.

  Alf

  for x Bess

  AW, writing this next letter to Lawrence in Blackburn, also tells him about the great success he has made of Kendal’s Holiday Week. This was a Government-inspired scheme to encourage people to have holidays at home, as there was a war on, and stop them from travelling. AW was made Secretary of the Kendal Holidays at Home Week, 3–8 August 1942, and was given a free hand to organise dances, concerts, sports events, competitions to amuse and attract the locals. AW himself did the illustration for the front of Holiday Week Programme. It did him a lot of good, socially, and also workwise, increasing his status in the office and in the town.

  LETTER 24: TO ERIC WALTER MAUDSLEY, 12 AUGUST 1942

  Wednesday evening

  19 Castle Grove

  August 12 1942

  Kendal

  Dear Lawrence,

  Kendal’s Holiday Week is over.

  It’s been an outrageous success, of course. It couldn’t have been otherwise, with me bossing the show. Talk about superb efficiency! Everything went like clockwork, and the sun appeared whenever he was wanted. The arrangements, planned to the last detail, worked so smoothly that I was left with nothing to do during the week but watch the events and eat ice-cream. Aldermen and Councillors were my errand-boys. The Mayor came at a whistle…. A Wainwright Production!

  It’s all been very enjoyable, and there’s no doubt the experience has been a profitable one for me. You will have realized that I have at last decided to pull my light from under the bushel, the result being that I have been acclaimed on all sides as an artist of outstanding ability. I have had commissions to draw landscapes, which for the moment I have declined; I have other plans, big plans. My next job is to design a new cover for the Kendal Parish Church monthly magazine, at the request of the Vicar; then I shall start on the biggest and loveliest job I ever undertook, that of putting Kendal right on the map. It’s a grand grand place, Lawrence. I intend to do a series of sketches of the town and neighbourhood, accompany then with a narrative, and offer the lot to the Council as the Official Handbook for the years of peace when the holiday crowds return. This isn’t something you’ll get by enclosing a stamp; it will have to be paid for, but, believe me, what a success it will be! Out of the immaturity of countless expedition handbooks will come the Super G
uide-book, and I shall love preparing it, for Kendal was just built to be drawn and written about. It will be my book, all of it; written, illustrated and designed Wainwright – and I have found just the printer who will make a really high-class job of it.

  So I’m a big noise here now. I’m in a town where ability is appreciated, and civic pride counts a lot. There’ll be a statue to me before I’m through.

  Now that the Stay-at-Home week is ended, I am stealing away-from-home for a holiday. On the 15th instant I am coming to Blackburn for a few days. I shall be Jekyll by day, Hyde by night. Then I shall wash my hands and return to Kendal the well-beloved and a rosy future. The last thing I am likely to do whilst in B. is to call at the old office. The thought appalls! Life only started for me when I fled the place. I should not, however, want to deprive you of the opportunity of basking in the radiance of my company, and if anything goes awry with my arrangements re the womenfolk I will invite you and Jim to quaff vimto with me in some suburban inn. You will understand, of course, that I shall have to depart when darkness cloaks the earth.

  I saw Jimbo the other Saturday afternoon and we spend an idle hour lying on our backs on a warm hillside overlooking the town, talking of old times. ’Twas a pleasant meeting. Tell him, will you please, that I’ve asked Dot to write to him.

  I was interested to learn of your holiday in Keswick and endorse our remarks anent the beauty of the hills: my eyes still turn to them as I walk about Kendal, and no view containing hills ever disappointed me. I am well qualified to extend sympathy regarding your train journey, for I too have had to stand in corridors with the window at elbow-level. Pity you didn’t see Shap: it’s grand wild country.

  Maudsley was over in Wasdale last week. He wanted me to join him there, but I wasn’t able to, unfortunately being submerged just then in the Holiday Week. Dorothy, too, was in Keswick again, and tells me she climbed Scafell (I wonder!).