BALDWIN, Stanley, 1st Earl (1867–1947), British politician, three times Conservative prime minister (1923–24, 1924–29, 1935–37).
1 As financial secretary to the treasury, Baldwin was appalled at the extent of the British war debt after the 1914–18 war. In 1919 he wrote an anonymous letter to The Times urging the wealthy to impose a voluntary tax upon themselves to help relieve the national burden. Estimating his own personal estate at £580,000, Baldwin realized 20 percent of its value and invested £150,000 in government war-loan stock. He then destroyed the stock certificates, thus making his £150,000 a gift to the treasury. The rich, however, did not stampede to follow Baldwin’s example.
2 (Stanley Baldwin’s daughter, Lady Lorna Howard, tells a story that illustrates the relationship between her father and the workers at the family plant.)
“An embarrassed newlywed employee came to Baldwin and told him he had broken the bridal bed. Baldwin said it could be repaired free at the family ironworks, but the man feared it would make him the laughing stock of all his mates. So the broken bed was brought to the back door of Baldwin’s house at night, wheeled through the hall the following morning, and taken across the road for repair as if it were Baldwin’s own.”
BALFOUR, Arthur James, 1st Earl of (1848–1930), British statesman; prime minister (1902–05).
1 Balfour was once asked if the rumor that he intended to marry Margot Tennant (later Asquith) had any foundation. He replied, “No, I rather think of having a career of my own.”
BALMAIN, Pierre (1914–82), French couturier.
1 “During the years of cold and shortages Gertrude [Stein] and Alice [B. Toklas] became friends with a neighbour at Aix, a simple young man named Pierre Balmain, with a taste for antiques and a natural bent for designing women’s clothes. In fact he made with his own hands heavy tweeds and warm garments for Gertrude and Alice to wear during the hard winters. Now he has opened a shop in Paris. At his first showing to the Press Gertrude and Alice arrived with their huge dog, Basket. Gertrude, in a tweed skirt, an old cinnamon-coloured sack, and Panama hat, looked like Corot’s self-portrait. Alice, in a long Chinese garment of bright colours with a funny flowered toque, had overtones of the Widow Twankey. Gertrude, seeing the world of fashion assembled, whispered, ‘Little do they know that we are the only people here dressed by Balmain, and it’s just as well for him that they don’t!’”
BALSAN, Consuelo (1878–1964), US society leader.
1 (Cass Canfield, who was connected with Harper and Row, the publishers of her book, The Glitter and the Gold, entertained Mme Balsan, whose ideas were still colored by the grandeur of her first marriage to an English nobleman.)
“At Fishers Island, New York, where we have a tiny two-room house on a beach, she came to tea; we chatted on the terrace adjoining our cottage, and after a pleasant hour she rose to leave. ‘I’ve had such a nice time,’ she said, ‘and your place is lovely. But where is the house?’”
BALZAC, Honoré de (1799–1850), prolific French novelist.
1 When he was thirty-three, Balzac received an interesting letter from the Ukraine signed “The Stranger.” Following it up, he found that the writer, Evelina Hanska, was the wife of a baron. Their affair lasted for seventeen years, and although the baron died in 1841 the couple did not marry until five months before Balzac’s death. “It is easier,” wrote Balzac, “to be a lover than a husband, for the same reason that it is more difficult to show a ready wit all day long than to produce an occasional bon mot.”
2 During his years of poverty Balzac lived in an unheated and almost unfurnished garret. On one of the bare walls the writer inscribed the words: “Rosewood paneling with commode”; on another: “Gobelin tapestry with Venetian mirror”; and in the place of honor over the empty fireplace: “Picture by Raphael.”
3 A Parisian bookseller, hearing of Balzac as a young writer of outstanding promise, decided to offer him 3,000 francs for his next novel. He found Balzac’s address, situated in an obscure quarter of the city. Realizing that he was not dealing with a gentleman of fashion, he dropped his price to 2,000 francs. He went to the house, saw that the writer was living on the top floor, and dropped the price another 500 francs. When he entered Balzac’s garret, he found him dipping a bread roll in a glass of water. He thereupon dropped the price to 300 francs. The manuscript sold this way was La Dernière fée.
4 Balzac, who enjoyed his own celebrity, was discoursing one evening on fame. “I should like one of these days to be so well known, so popular, so celebrated, so famous, that it would permit me … to break wind in society, and society would think it a most natural thing.”
5 One night a thief broke into Balzac’s single-room apartment and tried to pick the lock on the writer’s desk. He was startled by a sardonic laugh from the bed, where Balzac, who he had supposed was asleep, lay watching him. “Why do you laugh?” said the thief. “I am laughing to think what risks you take to try to find money in a desk by night where the legal owner can never find any by day.”
6 (Edmond de Goncourt writes in his journal:)
“I have had happily confirmed the confidences of Gavarni on the economical manner in which Balzac dispensed his sperm. Lovey-dovey and amorous play, up to ejaculation, would be all right, but only up to ejaculation. Sperm to him meant emission of purest cerebral substance, and therefore a filtering, a loss through the member, of a potential act of artistic creation. I don’t know what occasion, what unfortunate circumstance caused him to ignore his pet theory, but he arrived at Latouche’s once, exclaiming, ‘This morning I lost a novel.’”
7 On his deathbed Balzac is reported to have said to the doctor attending him, “Send for Bianchon.” (Doctor Bianchon was a character in La Comédie humaine.)
8 The geographer von Humboldt once asked a doctor friend, while on a trip to Paris, if a dinner could be arranged during which he could meet a lunatic. The doctor put together a guest list, which included one man dressed in black who sat through dinner in silence and another tousled and extremely unkempt man who could not stop talking. Over dessert von Humboldt leaned over to the doctor and said that he had much enjoyed the company of the lunatic, indicating the disheveled man. “But it’s the other one who’s crazy,” exclaimed the doctor. “Your dinner partner was Monsieur Honoré de Balzac!”
9 Balzac always dressed in a particular costume when he wrote: he wore Moroccan slippers and a white robe, secured by a belt from which hung scissors, a paperknife, and a penknife. But he was ever anxious about his need to produce more books. “To be forever creating!” he would exclaim. “Even God only created for six days!”
BANCROFT, Sir Squire (1841–1926), British theater manager.
1 Sir Squire Bancroft was notoriously tightfisted, his style of management being in complete contrast to that of another contemporary theatrical impresario, Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree. Tree once took Bancroft to view His Majesty’s Theatre, which Tree had recently had built and lavishly equipped. Gazing at the building from the opposite side of the street, Bancroft remarked, “There’ll be an awful lot of windows to clean.”
BANKHEAD, Tallulah (1903–68), US actress famous for her flamboyant life-style — “more of an act than an actress,” as an anonymous wit said.
1 At the opening-night party for Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes, in which she starred, Tallulah got into an argument with the writer Dashiell Hammett. Hammett, commenting on her addiction to cocaine, told her that he did not much like people who took drugs. Tallulah retorted, “You don’t know what you’re talking about. I tell you cocaine isn’t habit-forming and I know because I’ve been taking it for years.”
2 At a party given by Dorothy Parker, Tallulah Bankhead became rather drunk and behaved indecorously. As she was being escorted out, Dorothy Parker called out, “Has Whistler’s mother left yet?”
The following day the actress, observing herself in a small mirror, said, with a glance at Mrs. Parker, “The less I behave like Whistler’s mother the night before, the more
I look like her the morning after.”
3 Alexander Woollcott took Tallulah Bankhead to see a rather bad revival of a Maeterlinck tragedy. They decided to leave, and as they rose to go, Tallulah murmured, “There’s less here than meets the eye.”
4 Tallulah’s volubility was notorious. The magician Fred Keating came away from an interview with her saying, “I’ve just spent an hour talking to Tallulah for a few minutes.”
5 When Tallulah Bankhead first became successful in London, she bought herself a Bent-ley, which she greatly enjoyed driving. The London streets bewildered her, however, and she tended to get lost. After a while she took to hiring a taxi to lead the way while she drove behind in the Bentley.
6 Dropping a $50 bill into the tambourine held out to her by a Salvation Army player, Tallulah waved aside the man’s thanks. “Don’t bother to thank me. I know what a perfectly ghastly season it’s been for you Spanish dancers.”
7 (Former Tonight show host Jack Paar related the following Tallulah story. Miss Bankhead was in a stall in a ladies’ room.)
“She could not find any toilet paper in her stall, and asked the lady in the next booth, ‘Darling, is there any tissue in there?’
“ ‘Sorry, no.’
“ ‘Then have you any Kleenex?’
“ ‘Afraid not.’
“Then Tallulah said, ‘My dear, have you two fives for a ten?’”
8 Miss Bankhead’s father, William Brockman Bankhead, was Speaker of the US House of Representatives. Checking in at a New York hotel one evening, he was pleasantly surprised by the receptionist’s exclamation: “Not the Mr. Bankhead?” He replied, “Why, yes — Congressman Bankhead.” The receptionist’s face fell. “Oh,” she said. “I thought, maybe, you were Tallulah’s father.”
9 A fellow actress once said of Miss Bankhead: “She’s not so great. I can upstage her any time.” “Darling,” retorted Tallulah, “I can upstage you without even being onstage.” At the next performance, she set out to prove her point. In one scene, while the other actress was engaged in a long telephone conversation, Tallulah had to put down the champagne glass from which she had been drinking and make her exit upstage. That evening, she carefully placed the half-full glass in a precarious position at the edge of the table, half on and half off. The audience gasped, their attention riveted to the glass, and the other actress was totally ignored. She later discovered that Miss Bankhead had surreptitiously stuck a piece of adhesive tape on the bottom of the glass to ensure the success of her moment of triumph.
10 Miss Bankhead had been to see a screen adaptation of Tennessee Williams’s play Orpheus Descending, and was unimpressed. She later told the playwright: “Darling, they’ve absolutely ruined your perfectly dreadful play.”
11 Actor Donald Sutherland had a memorable first encounter with Tallulah Bankhead. He was making up in his dressing room when he heard a noise behind him. Turning around, he was astonished to see Tallulah standing there, stark naked. “What’s the matter, darling?” she asked. “Haven’t you ever seen a blonde before?”
BANKS, Sarah Sophia (1744–1818), sister of Sir Joseph Banks, the British naturalist and explorer.
1 A visitor once idly remarked to the eccentric Sophia, “It is a fine day, ma’am,” to which she retorted, “I know nothing at all about it. You must speak to my brother upon that subject when you are at dinner.”
BARBIROLLI, Sir John (1899–1970), British conductor of French-Italian descent.
1 One of the players in the Hallé Orchestra had an affair with a singer and after a time his wife heard of it. Intending to enlist Sir John Barbirolli’s help, she went to his room in Manchester’s Free Trade Hall and sobbed out her story. Sir John listened sympathetically and when she had finished tried to find words of comfort for her. He concluded, “You know, there’s nothing to worry about. He’s playing better than ever.”
BARHAM, Richard Harris (1788–1845), British clergyman and humorist.
1 At Oxford Barham regularly failed to attend morning chapel. His tutor demanded an explanation. Barham excused himself. “The fact is, sir, it’s too late for me,” he said. “Too late!” said the astonished tutor. “Yes, sir,” Barham continued. “I’m a man of regular habits and I can’t sit up until seven o’clock in the morning. Unless I get to bed by four, or five at the latest, I’m good for nothing next day.”
2 Richard Bentley, the publisher of Bentley’s Miscellany, in which many of the Ingoldsby Legends first appeared, mentioned to Barham that he had had trouble in selecting the name for his magazine, and had first intended to call it The Wits’ Miscellany. “Well, you needn’t have gone to the other extreme,” remarked Barham.
BARNES, Djuna (1892–1982), US novelist; author of Nightwood and other experimental works.
1 Eccentric and reclusive, Djuna Barnes lived for many years in a tiny Greenwich Village apartment. Her neighbor E. E. Cummings would occasionally shout across to her from his windows: “Are ya still alive, Djuna?”
2 Guy Davenport, learning that poet Louis Zukofsky frequently saw Djuna Barnes when he went for his morning paper, inquired whether they ever exchanged pleasantries. “No,” replied Zukofsky. “What do you say to the Minister’s Black Veil?”
3 Barnes once wrote a play that she showed to T. S. Eliot. He told her that, while it was obviously a magnificent work, he couldn’t understand it. Later she showed the play to her friend Janet Flanner, who admired the vocabulary but was unclear about its meaning. Scornfully, Barnes told her, “I never expected to find that you were as stupid as Tom Eliot.”
BARNUM, Phineas Taylor (1810–91), US showman. He founded his famous circus — “The Greatest Show on Earth” — in 1871.
1 In 1841 Barnum purchased Scudder’s American Museum in New York, soon turning it into a prize attraction. So many people flocked to see the exhibits that it was a problem to keep them moving, and long lines built up outside the entrance. Barnum solved the problem by posting up inside the museum a sign reading “TO THE EGRESS.”
2 For a time Barnum employed an elephant to do the plowing on his farm. A neighboring farmer, a friend of Barnum’s, noticed the beast at work. He then got into an argument with its owner, who insisted the elephant was just another working animal about the farm. After wrangling for a time about the economics of feeding it and the amount of work it could do, the farmer said to Barnum, “I would just like to know what it can draw.” Barnum smiled. “It can draw the attention of twenty million American citizens to Barnum’s Museum,” he said.
3 Barnum’s business instincts did not desert him on his deathbed. His last reported words were: “How were the receipts today in Madison Square Garden?”
4 In April 1891, the great showman realized his end was near. Hearing that his last wish was to read his own obituary, the New York Evening Sun obliged, running a four-column death notice the day before he actually died. Barnum was said to have greatly enjoyed reading it.
BARR, Stringfellow (1896–1981), US educator, co-founder of the Great Books program at St. John’s College, Annapolis, Maryland.
1 The four-year Great Books program was based on the works of great writers and thinkers from Homer to such twentieth-century giants as Freud. Someone once asked Barr, why a Great Books program? “Don’t you feel sorry for all the students in all the other colleges who have no one to teach them but oafs like me?” Barr asked.
BARRIE, Sir J[ames] M[atthew] (1860–1937), British journalist and playwright known especially for Peter Pan.
1 Barrie had for a long time looked forward to meeting A. E. Housman. When this was eventually arranged and the two placed next to each other at a dinner in Cambridge, neither found much to say to the other. Barrie, returning to London with this unprofitable encounter weighing on his mind, penned the following note to Housman: “Dear Professor Houseman, I am sorry about last night, when I sat next to you and did not say a word. You must have thought I was a very rude man: I am really a very shy man. Sincerely yours, J. M. Barrie.” Back from Cambridge came Housma
n’s reply: “Dear Sir James Barrie, I am sorry about last night, when I sat next to you and did not say a word. You must have thought I was a very rude man: I am really a very shy man. Sincerely yours, A. E. Housman. P.S. And now you’ve made it worse for you have spelt my name wrong.”
2 The pallbearers at Thomas Hardy’s funeral included distinguished writers (Rudyard Kipling, G. B. Shaw, A. E. Housman) and politicians (Stanley Baldwin, Ramsay Mac-Donald). Shaw, the tallest and most obviously impressive, later remarked that he himself had looked well at the ceremony, but “Barrie, blast him! looked far the most effective. He made himself look specially small.”
3 Peter Pan premiered in London in 1904. In it Peter told the Darling children that if they believed strongly enough that they could fly, they would fly. Barrie soon began to hear from parents with children who had taken Peter’s word literally, and hurt themselves in consequence. Barrie at once included in the play a cautionary statement that the children could fly, but only if they had first been sprinkled with “fairy dust.” From then on, fairy dust being in short supply, all has gone well.
4 The success of Barrie’s play owed a great deal to the author’s close attention to production details and his presence at rehearsals. Late one night after an exhausting and unsatisfying rehearsal of Peter Pan, when the director had just told the cast that they could go, Barrie suddenly demanded that they all be brought back onto the stage. “Impossible,” shouted the weary director. “Why?” asked Barrie. “Crocodile under fourteen — gone home,” was the response.
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