by C. S. Lewis
Sunday 14 May: . . . Caught a bus into town and returned home shortly after lunch, having got G. K. Chesterton’s Magic and Jones’ Road to Endor from the Union.
Maureen got up before lunch. D and I sat in the little alley way behind the French windows after lunch. I read Magic through. A pleasant little play—I am not sure that I understand it. Afterwards I began to read The Road to Endor aloud, and continued it for the rest of the day.41 It is the account (now famous) of two British officers’ escape from Yosgad in Asia Minor by means of faked spiritualism. We both enjoyed it greatly. The irony of reading this and Magic on the same day was quite unintentional . . .
Monday 15 May: Got to work at 9.30 and put in a good morning on the Sicilian Expedition, and memorising.
After lunch D read me from the Times the memorial article on Sir Walter Raleigh who has just died: Jenkin was always singing his praises.42 . . .
I memorised afterwards. While in town I met Poynton, and he gave me a Latin Prose to do, ‘as a trial ball’.43 He said he would only have time for one and so ‘you might as well put all your howlers into that’. After supper I worked on the Sophist and started the prose which is interesting.
D rather poorly this evening.
Tuesday 16 May: An idle day. Started work after breakfast but soon walked into town to get Freeland’s History of Sicily.
Called on Baker and drank some sherry. He had been rehearsing in London on Saturday and lunched with Ellen Terry: afterwards he had a good talk with Edith Craig at her flat and she said she could get him a job at the Old Vic. He has also been promised a part in M. Harvey’s next play. I asked whether it was not necessary to go through a technical school: he said this applied more to girls. We also talked a good deal about ‘Dymer’. I arranged to walk with him this afternoon . . .
Baker called for me soon after lunch, and we pushed our bikes up Shotover and sat there. He is trying to persuade Barfield to go on the music hall stage. I laughed heartily at the thought of my two chief literary friends ending both on the boards . . .
After tea, until nearly 7 o’clock, Baker and I had a close and good conversation again about ‘Dymer’. We agreed that the great thing was to keep the MYTH true and intrude as little invention or conscious allegory as might be. He is particularly keen on the darkness in the passage where Dymer finds the girl, and opposed to anything like a dialogue. We struck out between us the excellent idea of making the witch a ‘matriarch’. It all made me very keen, and anxious for power to do what needs to be done . . .
Wednesday 17 May: Worked at Gk. History—without much energy or interest—all morning.
A soft, wet day, such as I rather like. The Doc came to see Maureen for a few minutes before lunch. Worked again until tea time. Mrs Raymond came to tea.
I went into town for my tutorial with Carritt: he said there was no vacancy suitable for me and strongly advised me to stay up another year. I read the paper which I had done for him and he approved of it. He made some interesting remarks on Croce’s theory of universals. The true concepts (Truth, Beauty, etc.) are immanent, transcendant: the mathematical are only transcendent—that is, they have no particulars: the pseudo-concepts are only immanent, that is they are mere arbitrary groupings of particulars. He also drew my attention to the difference between Kant’s early and later views of the Noumena, which I must look up. I met Blunt, who tells me that he is starting to read Thucydides for the first time!
Forgot to mention a curious dream I had in the small hours of this morning:—Baker and I were walking in a field when suddenly there appeared from nowhere a huge bull with exaggerated sexual characteristics, going very fast. We leaped over a high wire fence and I hurt my leg. Sounds truly psychoanalytic . . .
Thursday 18 May: Today and yesterday D has had breakfast in bed, as the legs are not getting on well and need still more rest . . .
Worked in the dining room from lunch until tea . . . I then walked through Iffley, crossed the lock, and went along the meadows. Became wonderfully happy for a short time. A boisterous windy day: the river full of brisk waves and everything of an unusual brightness.
After supper I wrote a long letter home, explaining my position and proposing to stay up for another year.44
Friday 19 May: A damp morning: I worked on the Revolution of the 400, comparing Thucydides with Aristotle.
After lunch I walked into Oxford with a vague idea of sending off a new venture to a periodical. Calling on Baker to get the address of Youth I found him anxious for my advice. He is to go to the Old Vic. for an audition some day soon, and was trying to choose what lines he will spout . . .
After tea I bussed back to College and called on the Mugger.45 He had just had a letter from ‘Mr Wyllie’ asking him to recommend some one for a studentship tenable for one year in Cornell University (New York State). He said I was the only person he would care to offer: but as the money, tho’ adequate for the year out there, did not include the travelling expenses, it was hardly to be considered. We then talked of my plans. He said the days were past when one could walk out of the Schools into a Fellowship: even in minor universities there was a demand for men who had done something, and this had been intensified at Oxford by the Royal Commission.
He advised me however to take the extra year. He said that College was very hard up, but that he thought that they could manage to continue my scholarship. I asked him whether if I ‘came a cropper in Greats’ he would still advise the extra year, and he said he would. He said that I should try to pick up another University prize: and that there were possibilities in the University Extension jobs. I thanked him for his kindness. A dear old man, but the inexhaustible loquacity of educated age drove me to the ‘City and University’ to recoup on a Guinness.
A long conversation with D after supper, telling her about old times, Tubbs, Miss Cowie etc.46
Afterwards I made a start on my next paper for Carritt and did 45 min . . . An outbreak of feminism from Maureen during supper about the ‘easier life’ of men: D thinks there was no knowledge behind it—but interesting.
Saturday 20 May: Worked in the morning on early Attica and Solon. After lunch I rode to the Union and took out The Admirable Crichton:47 thence rode beyond Marston with the idea of going to Beckley and seeing Barfield.
I met him, however, just beyond the village, riding in with a suit case, as he was going to the All Souls’ dance. After trying vainly to get into a pub, we went into a field and sat. He has lately seen Peer Gynt at the Old Vic. Archer’s translation in a loose kind of Hiawatha metre, which he says is very effective in dialogue. I congratulated him on his dancing: he is quite seriously thinking of the ‘Halls’. He did not know when I should get the proofs of ‘Joy’. Arranged to lunch with him at the Old Oak at 1 o’clock next Wednesday.
Home for tea, where I found the Doc and Mary who soon went to school sports with Maureen. For the rest of the day I worked on the second Canto of ‘Dymer’, with wonderful enjoyment. A very warm evening with a silver mackerel sky: we had supper in the garden.
Sunday 21 May: A blazing hot day. Rode to Merton St. after breakfast and called for Jenkin. We then cycled through Marston to Elsfield and Beckley, where we called at Bee Cottage. Barfield was out, but Harwood gave us water and we rested for a while.48 Jenkin arranged to go back there for lunch and I left the 1st Canto of ‘Dymer’ for Barfield’s criticism.
We continued our ride down hill from Beckley, the objective being Joseph’s Stone: but after riding through some very bad marsh country, over ruts of petrified mud, we came to an evil, low lying swamp, and had to stop. Jenkin climbed an oak tree.
He said he never could bring himself to like Harwood—he always found something condescending in his manner. I said it was merely an unlucky voice and face. Baker had had the same trouble, and Barfield used to be very angry with him about it.
Today, for the first time since I have known him, Jenkin complained bitterly of the ill health which is always checking every physical and mental activity he takes u
p. I hardly knew how to answer him, but congratulated him, in spite of it all, on having refused to become a valetudinarian . . .
Monday 22 May: A stiflingly hot day. Bussed into College, in accordance with a note which arrived at breakfast, and paid Farquharson £5 entrance fee for Schools.49 Went on and saw Allchin, arranging for Maureen to see him at 3.30 on Friday next. Came home and worked, finishing my notes on Solon. The Doc was in the garden with D most of the morning.
After lunch I bussed out to Wadham and saw Baker. He has had two hours with Bernice de Bergerac preparatory to his audition and is doing Romeo’s speeches before the entrance of the apothecary . . .
I then told him my dream about the bull and this led to a long talk on psychoanalysis . . .
I arrived home to find a wire from P[apy] saying ‘Stay on’ in answer to my letter. This is really very decent good form . . .
Tuesday 23 May: Worked all morning in the alley way, memorising Gk. History notes. Mary and the Doc called.
After lunch I bussed into Oxford, took Croce’s Essence of Aesthetic out of the Union and walked to bathe at Parson’s Pleasure.50 As I went in, I met Wyllie coming out: we regretted to have missed each other and arranged to bathe together in future. A beautiful bathe (water 63 degrees) but very crowded. Amid so much nudity I was interested to note the passing of my own generation: two years ago every second man had a wound mark, but I did not see one today.
Came home and had tea in the garden, and then finished the paper for Carritt, time compelling me to end in the middle of a sentence. I finished the Croce: a difficult and provocative book. The different activities of the spirits apparently grow out of one another in a cycle. Emotion leads to image, and when we have made the image we want to understand: from understanding we turn to action which leads to new emotion and the cycle repeats. He assumes the unreality of matter, regarding it as we regard the news Queen Anne is dead.
D better today. Early to bed. After coming in from the garden I wrote one ‘gastronomic’ stanza of ‘Dymer’.
Wednesday 24 May: . . . I left home at about 12.45 and bussed into Oxford, meeting Barfield outside the Old Oak. After finding a table we decided to go to the Good Luck instead. An excellent lunch, the ices being particularly good and having, as Barfield says, the true butter like consistency.
From here we walked to Wadham gardens and sat under the trees. We began with Christina dreams: I condemned them—the love dream made a man incapable of real love, the hero dream made him a coward. He took the opposite view and a stubborn argument followed.
We then turned to ‘Dymer’ which he had brought back: to my surprise, his verdict was even more favourable than Baker’s. He said it was ‘by streets’ the best thing I had done, and ‘Could I keep it up?’ He did not feel the weakness of the lighter stanzas. He said Harwood had ‘danced with joy’ over it and had advised me to drop everything else and go on with it. From such a severe critic as Barfield the result was very encouraging. We then drifted into a long talk about ultimates. Like me, he has no belief in immortality etc., and always feels the materialistic pessimism at his elbow.
He is most miserable. He said however that the ‘hard facts’ which worried us, might to posterity appear mere prejudices de siècle, as the ‘facts’ of Dante do to us. Our disease, I said, was really a Victorian one. The conversation ranged over many topics and finally died because it was impossible to hold a court between two devil’s advocates.
The gardens were ripping—lilac and chestnut magnificent. I find Wadham gardens fit my image of Acrasia’s island very well. I walked with him as far as Magdalen, took a turn in the cloisters, and then came home for tea.
This we had in the garden, being suddenly put to flight by a thunderstorm. Went in again to Carritt at 5.45, and read him my paper. Interesting discussion: he was on his usual line of right unrelated to good, which is unanswerable: but so is the other side.
Found a short letter from P. in College confirming his wire. I don’t know why, but something in it was uneasy to me.
Came home to find that the Doc had been here. There appears to be some danger that the pain in D’s arm may be the veins breaking out in a new place. Horrible news! . . .
Thursday 25 May: . . . worked hard on memorising in the morning. The Doc came shortly before lunch and examined D’s arm and shoulder which are very swollen, tho’ less painful than yesterday. He said he would not undertake the case of his own sister, and that if it was not better in a few days, we must get a doctor. He admitted that it might be a lot of unpleasant things. He and D were most afraid of thrombosis or a ‘benign’ tumour. On the other hand it might be merely muscular. This is our iron ration of hope . . .
D and Baker were discussing my going to Ireland when I came in. Baker at first deprecated ‘putting my head in the lion’s mouth’. I said I didn’t omit my stay on account of danger, when my father and my brother were there: especially as nasty things beginning ‘I had hoped’ and ending up ‘far be it from me’ not only might, but would be said. It is of course true that I have had my share of being shot at in greater measure than they—but what can one do? Baker finally agreed with me. He said I shd. go to the Mugger and Truslove if I wanted some tutoring work in September . . .
Friday 26 May: Much cooler today. Bussed into Oxford after breakfast and did a Gk. History translation paper under schools conditions in the Union. Came home shortly after twelve. Maureen out for lunch (which by the by was one of our best, fried sole, new potatoes, and asparagus). Read Bosanquet’s Theory of the State in the afternoon: an attractive book on the whole.
The Doc and Mrs Stevenson came to tea. She was as lively as a tennis ball on a hard court, and singing the praises of Mr Clarke. D advised her to marry him, chiefly for the house.
An excited conversation between the Doc and Mrs S. on spiritualism. D retired as she felt she couldn’t refrain from sceptical interruptions. I was less kind and asked why ghosts always spoke as though they belonged to the lower middle classes. We talked a little of psychoanalysis, condemning Freud . . .
After supper I started reading Strachey’s Queen Victoria to D. A very beautiful sky this evening. D’s arm was much less swollen today and very little pain: the Doc seemed to take an encouraging view of it. Sat up late talking: a memorable conversation.
Saturday 27 May: . . . I called on Stevenson and asked him to let me know of any tutorial work for the vac, which he might hear of. I then called on Carritt and made the same request of him. He also promised to give my name to the Manchester Guardian for some reviewing. In the course of the morning I met Blunt who said he was sure he could get me a school boy to coach from Lynham’s, as he is an O.D. and often there.
I also visited Williams, who is the local agent for Trueman & Knightley: he gave me a form and said that by narrowing the field to Oxford I reduced my chances, but that if there was anything my qualifications would get it. He advised me also to put an advertisement in the Oxford Times . . .
After lunch I worked on ‘Dymer’ in the garden: bicycled to town after tea and bathed (water 68 degrees). Some pups there, who, even naked, I divined to be either Sandhurst cadets or very young officers. They conducted the sort of conversation which proceeds theoretically on the principle that it doesn’t matter how many damned civilians are listening, but of which every word, in practice, is uttered for the benefit of the spectators.
As Harwood, whom I met just outside, said, ‘You can see them looking out of the corners of their eyes to see whether you’re admiring them.’ . . . He praised ‘Dymer’ rather extravagantly . . .
Monday 29 May: After lunch I cycled into town and went to Baker: we at once adjourned to Wadham gardens . . . I at once began talking of my difficulties with the erotic passage in ‘Dymer’. I told him I was putting broad leaves and damp stems in it: he said this altered the symbolism from his point of view and made it auto-erotic. He was reassured when I told him about the smell.
He told me a good story about how he had woken Pasley up in hospita
l one night and said ‘I’ve thought of a good line’. Pasley grunted and said good lines were a damned nuisance as one was always trying to write poems round them. A few days later Baker showed him a poem. ‘Capital,’ said Pasley, ‘but I’d leave that bit out.’ ‘That bit’ was of course the good line . . .
After tea I had to go and see Miss Wiblin of 43, Hamilton Rd. Allchin had sent us a letter recommending her to teach Maureen technique until he had a vacancy for her. He spoke encouragingly of her natural talents.51 . . .
Supper of boiled eggs, plums and cream in the garden. We all decided that it was the only meal for this weather. Afterwards Mary and the Doc called. I went indoors and worked on my Latin prose. We are sitting in the dining room tonight.
Thursday 1 June: . . . In College I found a note from Carritt telling me that Farquharson thought he could get me a job in Oxford for the vac. and also drawing my attention to a Fellowship at Magdalen by examination, in today’s Gazette.
I then called on Baker and gave him the new ‘Dymer’. He described the usual blind with which Wadham had celebrated the end of Eights—all the wooden seats removed from the latrines of course, and burned. He agreed with me that this represented stopped energy and lack of originality.
I then came back and saw Farquharson: he thinks he can get me some good tutoring with some people on Boar’s Hill. We discussed my plans. He said he would like College to send me to Germany for a year. I wish this man wasn’t so oily. When I asked if he had some minutes to spare he said he was never too busy to see me. Silly old man!
I left him, had my hair cut, came home, and took a cold bath. Worked in the drawing room, which was coolest, after lunch. Tea in the garden and in to Parson’s Pleasure for a bathe—disturbed by people with a football. I notice that the chestnut bloom is nearly over now.