EVELYN WAUGH NEWSLETTER

Volume 3 Number 1 - Spring 1969

WAUGH'S LETTERS TO THOMAS MERTON

Sister M. Thérèse (Milwaukee, Wisconsin)

Recalling Waugh's visit to Merton at the Abbey of Gethsemani and his editing of two of Merton's British editions, as well as Merton's dedication of his Waters of Siloe to Waugh, the editor of EWN wrote to Thomas Merton for further information and received a cordial reply directing him to Sister Thérèse, who is archivist of Merton's letters and manuscripts reposing in Wisconsin. With Merton's very cooperative approval, Sister Thérèse discovered, transcribed and photostated five letters sent by Waugh. Since Waugh's handwriting is often illegible, Sister spent many hours on the transcriptions and sent the photostats to EWN. In a forthcoming issue we will publish, with Merton's permission, the letter to EWN in which he speaks of his "great admiration of Waugh as a creative writer." This letter was written before Merton's untimely and truly tragic death. The help received from both Thomas Merton and Sister Thérèse, as well as her generous gift of the photostats, deserves the deep appreciation of those interested in Waugh's work. Sister Thérèse's graciousness and helpfulness is best epitomized in a particular sentence of one of her letters written to EWN: "I am happy," she remarked, "to have been of a little help in honoring Mr. Waugh." In so many ways this statement could serve as the motto of EWN. All of Waugh's letters to Merton were sent from his Piers Court home in Gloucestershire. (PAD)

27th May (1949)

Dear Fr. Louis (Merton's name in the Trappist Order)

First, my joy for you on your ordination. Your letter came just in time to engage my feeble prayers at the Ascension Day mass.

Secondly, my eager acceptance of the dedication of Waters of Siloe. It is an enormous honour I do not at all deserve.

Thirdly, my deep thanks for the beautiful copy of Seeds of Contemplation. I have perused it hastily - just enough to know that it is a book I shall read and reread constantly. Thank you very much indeed.

Elected Silence (British title of The Seven Storey Mountain) comes out immediately. I await the reviews with curiosity and confidence.

I am struggling with the 'Life' article on American Catholicism feeling daily more and more that it is an intolerably presumptuous undertaking.

By the way another anecdote from the Springfield town-diocese shop. A traveler came with a new type of plastic crucifix and said: ' Its great advantage is that it is so strong you can throw it on the ground and stamp on it.' ...

At Downside at Easter I had a long talk with a delightful and very holy Benedictine monk whose ambition for years has been to transfer to a Cistercian house. Permission for this transfer has now been finally refused at Rome. He had some knowledge of Parkminster and said that in his opinion the contemplative life was better lived among Cistercians than modern Carthusians whose solitude is constantly broken by bells calling them to mental prayer for specific objects. All these high matters are infinitely above me. I merely report what I am told in the hope it may interest you.

I am sending you a volume of sermons by a great, very English, priest, Ronald Knox. I wonder how they will strike you. I have made efforts everywhere including Paris to get you the Dominican spiritual book but so far without success. I will go on trying. While writing this I have just thought of another possible channel.

Please pray for me.

Yours very sincerely
Evelyn Waugh

28th August (1949)

Dear Fr. Louis,

The Waters of Siloe arrived this morning. A beautifully made book. I am proud to see my name on the fly-leaf. Thank you again for the dedication. I shall read the book at once.

I have now finished Seeds of Contemplation. It is most kind and should do much (for) Catholics and heathen alike. I am greatly impressed by your assurance. You write as if you had been a director of souls for a life time. Except perhaps that an experienced director would not, as you sometimes seem to do, press the need of contemplation on all so eagerly. Is it not rather a question of rate of growth. Of course the contemplative's ideal is what we must all come to before we reach heaven, and of course if one can it is convenient to stop wasting time and get through as much as possible of purgation here. But don't you think most souls are of slow growth? It is not the most precocious child whom the parent loves most. Is there not a slight hint of bustle and salesmanship about the way you want to scoop us all into a higher grade than we are fit for?

Do you see English press-cuttings? Elected Silence has had a very respectful reception here - not particularly understanding in most cases, but it has been chosen by the magazines and papers as an important book.

Apart from its primary, religious value the book is doing good service, I think, in showing England a side of America they seldom meet. They think of America as a kind of Coney Island and it is a great thing for them to hear of Gethsemani.

I have lately had the good news of the reception into the Church of a most improbable convert - Eddy Sackville-West. ... a music-critic and writer ... Do please, remember him in your Mass, and me too.

Yours ever
Evelyn Waugh

29th August (1949)

Dear Fr. Louis,

I have now read The Waters of Siloe and I must write to repeat my thanks for the great honor you did me by dedicating it me. Most of the subject matter was entirely new to me and I found it enthralling. It is a fine feat to have distilled such a narrative - continuously exciting - from what must have been a vast body of material, much of it, I suspect, rather monotonous.

If your superiors intend you to go on writing would it not be a valuable work to write a history of Catholicism in the United States. I tried to find such a book when I was there and was disappointed. There are, of course, excellent, full diocesan histories for some parts. What I mean is a comprehensive, middle-brow history four or five volumes emphasizing all the things which protestant and atheist histories have omitted or neglected. The New England histories have established their version of American origins, very much as the Whig historians did in England. I believe you could make an important book of it.

May I, without presumption, make one or two technical criticisms of The Waters of Siloe. The arrangement seems to me a little loose. I do not see any need far the Prologue at all which strikes the wrong artistic note, smacking of popular journalism in the way you try to catch the attention with an anecdote and I don't really see that the Note on Contemplative Orders is required. Everything you say in it, is said better and more fully later on in the book. I have nothing but admiration for the narrative passages, except that there is no consistency of style. Sometimes you write literary English and sometimes slang. ...

And in the non-narrative passages, do you not think you tend to be diffuse, saying the same thing more than once. I noticed this in The Seven Storey Mountain and the fault persists. It is pattern-bombing instead of precision bombing. You scatter a lot of missiles all round the target instead of concentrating on a single direct hit. It is not art. Your monastery tailor and boat-maker could not waste material. Words are our materials. Also it encourages vice in readers. They will not trouble to study a sentence for its proper meaning if they have learned to expect much the same thing to be said again later on.

Does it seem like looking a gift-horse in the teeth, to criticize like this? You must remember that you caused a great stir with your first book and it is the way of the world to watch enviously for signs of deterioration. I know you have no personal pride in your work, but you do not, I take it, want hostile critics to be able to say: 'You see what religion has done for Merton. A promising man ruined by being turned on to make money for the monastery'. That is what many of them will tend to say if you give them the chance.

Anyway they can't say it about this book which is full of vitality and interest. But I wish I saw the faults of the Seven Storey Mountain disappearing and I don't.

Yours ever
Evelyn Waugh

I wish you had said more to reconcile the Cistercian vocation with work for the Resistance in France. On the face of it, it seems to offer an excuse to an occupying power to shut monasteries if monks are allowed to house centers of underground movements.

August 30th (1949)

Dear Fr. Louis,

...It is extraordinarily generous of you to take my editing of Waters of Siloe in such good part. (I was paid in church candles for the dining-room table). It was a difficult book to prepare for the European reader who doesn't like discursive writing nowadays. I enclose a review you may or may not have seen. It is a priggish bit of writing but typical of English 'high-class' journalism. I don't know who wrote it. The editor, by the way, Alan Pryce-Jones became a Catholic a few days ago. Perhaps he wrote the review. Then thought about the book more seriously. Anyway a name to remember at your mass.

I am delighted that you liked Helena. I will send you a copy in October. I hope it has a safer voyage than the Knox sermons, which I will try to reinforce. I am particularly glad you approved of the witches' song - something I never tried before.

I have had another son born since last writing to you - named Septimus. (We have one child who died in infancy).

I expect to be in New York for a brief visit in October. Too brief, I am afraid, to hope to get to Kentucky. This writing paper comes from Naples.

Yours ever
Evelyn Waugh

Dec. 27th (1951)

Dear Fr. Louis

I have taken an unconscionable time in thanking you for present of The Ascent to Truth. I was greatly touched when I received it at your kind thought in sending it; I decided to postpone writing until I had read it; read it with the deepest interest and then inexcusably cut off writing again until with Christmas I suddenly realized that I had left the most valued present of the year unacknowledged. I also remembered I had promised to send you Ronald Knox's Enthusiasm and had failed in that too. I have put that right at last. Please accept my humble apologies for my lack of courtesy.

The Ascent is a most impressive work. I hope it is having the success it deserves. It has only just come out over here. All the opinions I have heard have been respectful and appreciative.

May I venture one criticism? ...( Here follows a discussion of some Greek words). If you use words like that without a footnote you are obviously addressing specialists. Yet the next chapter might be a talk to a youth club. So, too, with 'We'. You use it constantly but seldom in the same sense - sometimes as meaning priests in their teaching capacity, sometimes the whole world.

I do think the power of your writing would be greatly increased if you decided on a single level for each book - or write four books instead of one explaining the same matter to the four categories I have suggested.

My family are all at home for Christmas and the house crowded as a Harlem slum and as dirty and noisy, but they are very healthy and pious and humorous in their ways.

I am just coming to the end of the first volume of what I hope will be a series of works covering the whole of the last war. It has some good bits of pure farce but much that is dull and trite.

Ever yours very sincerely
Evelyn Waugh

EVELYN WAUGH: A SUPPLEMENTARY CHECKLIST OF CRITICISM

Heinz Kosok (University of Marburg, Germany)

This checklist is intended as a supplement to my bibliographies of Waugh criticism, published in Twentieth Century Literature, XI (1965/66), 211-215, and Evelyn Waugh Newsletter (EWN), II, i (Spring, 1968), 1-3. It includes books and articles published since 1967, as well as some items omitted from the earlier lists.

Bender, Elaine, "Sour Grapes", EWN, II, ii (Autumn, 1968), 4-6.

Borrello, Alfred W., "A Visit to Combe Florey: Evelyn Waugh's Home", EWN, 11, iii (Winter, 1968), 1-3.

Bowra, C.M., Memories 1898-1939 (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), pp. 165, 172-6, 250.

Butcher, Maryvonne, "Evelyn Waugh", Dokumente (Cologne ), XXII (1966), 236-238.

Burgess, Anthony, The Novel Now: A Student's Guide to Contemporary Fiction (London, 1967), 54-60.

Churchill, Randolph, "Evelyn Waugh: letters (and Post-cards) to Randolph Churchill", Encounter, XXXI, i (July, 1968), 3-19.

Churchill, Thomas, "The Trouble with Brideshead Revisited", Modern Language Quarterly, XXVIII (1967), 213-228.

Davis, Robert Murray, "The Mind and Art of Evelyn Waugh", Papers on Language and Literature, III (1967), 270-287.

Davis, Robert Murray, "Notes Toward a Variorum Brideshead'", EWN, II, iii (Winter, 1968), 4-6.

Davis, Robert Murray, "Some Textual Variants in Scoop", EWN, I, ii (Autumn, 1967), 1-3.

Davis, Robert Murray, "The Year's Work in Waugh Studies", EWN, II, i (Spring, 1968), 3-5.

Davis, Robert Murray, "Textual Problems in the Novels of Evelyn Waugh", PBSA (Second Quarter, 1968), 259-263.

Donaldson, Frances, Evelyn Waugh: Portrait of a Country Neighbour (London, 1967).

Dooley, D. J., "Waugh and Black Humor", EWN, II, ii (Autumn, 1968), 1-3.

Doyle, P.A., "Decline and Fall: Two Versions", EWN, I ii (Autumn, 1967), 4-5.

Doyle, P.A., and Charles E. Linck, Jr. , "Some Unpublished Waugh Correspondence", EWN, II, i (Spring, 1968), 6; II, iii (Winter, 1968), 3-4.

Eimerl, S., "The Why of Waugh", Reporter, XXXVIII (May 2, 1968), 38, 40.

English, William A., "Some Irish and English Waugh Bibliography", EWN, I, iii (Winter, 1967), 5; II, ii (Autumn, 1968), 3-4.

Featherstone, Joseph, "The Ordeal of Evelyn Waugh", New Republic, CLV, ii-iii (July 16,1966), 21-23.

Greene, Graham, "Graham Greene's Tribute", EWN, I, i (Spring, 1967), 1.

Jebb, Julian, "Evelyn Waugh", Writers at Work: The 'Paris Review' Interviews: Third Series (London, 1968), 103-114.

Jervis, Steven A., "Evelyn Waugh, Vile Bodies, and the Younger Generation", South Atlantic Quarterly, LXVI (1967), 440-448.

Keily, Robert, "The Craft of Despondency - the Traditional Novelists", Daedalus, XCII (1963), 220-237.

Kranz, Gisbert, Europas christliche Literatur (Paderborn, 1968), 492-495.

Lehmann, John, A Nest of Tigers: The Sitwells in Their Times (Boston, 1968), pp. 5, 81, 114-115, 252-256, 275.

Linck, Charles E., Jr., "Waugh Letters at the Texas Academic Center", EWN, I, iii (Winter, 1967), 1-5.

Lunn, Arnold, "Evelyn Waugh Revisited", National Review, XX (February 27, 1968), 189-190, 205.

Mitford, Nancy, "Nancy Mitford's Commentary", EWN, I, i (Spring, 1967), 1-2.

Muggeridge, Malcolm, "Zum Tode des englischen schriftstellers Evelyn Waugh", Die Zeit, XXI, No.17 (1966), 19.

Rutherford, Andrew, "Waugh's Sword of Honour", Imagined Worlds, (London, 1968), pp. 441-460.

Sobreira, Alberto, "Evelyn Waugh", Broteria: Revista contemporanea de cultura (Lisbon), LXXXII (1966), 838-840.

Sykes, Christopher, "Evelyn Waugh - A Brief Life", Listener, LXXVIII (August 24, 1967), 225-229. Also in Good Talk, ed. Derwent May, London, 1968), 11-34.

Tracy, Honor, "Evelyn Revisited", New Republic, CLVIII (March 23, 1968), 39-41.

Waugh, Alec, "My Brother Evelyn", Atlantic, CCXIX (June, 1967), 53-60.

Waugh, Alec, My Brother Evelyn and Other Portraits (New York, 1968).

Wiley, P. L., "Evelyn Waugh", Contemporary Literature, IX (Spring, 1968), 261-264.

SOME TEXTUAL VARIANTS IN BRIDESHEAD

Alan Clodd (London, England)

In R. M. Davis's article on the text of Brideshead (EWN, Winter, 1968), Mr. Davis mentions at least five variant printed states but there is at least one more (and an important one) to which he makes no reference. I refer to the 'Author's edition' of which an unknown number of copies were made in advance (presumably) of the Chapman and Hall printing. I have a copy of this edition and also what is I think the first Little Brown printing and I have made a few notes at random which show some very interesting variants in the two texts. I do not have the first Chapman and Hall 'trade' edition so have not been able to make comparison with it.

Here are some of the text changes I have noted: -

There is also considerable variation, which I haven't space to quote in detail, in the description of Charles Ryder's first view of Brideshead, which occurs at the foot of p. 34 of the Little Brown edition. The pagination of the two quoted editions is different so it is not very easy to give references which correspond. The above are a very random sampling of variants culled late at night in a drowsy mood; but it seems obvious that there must be many more, possibly of greater importance; it seems likely that Waugh revised all the way through as there is even a variant in the last sentence. The Little Brown edition ends on "second-in-command." The Author's edition continues "; have you had a good morning?"/ /"Yes, thank you," I said: "a very good morning." There is also no mention in the Author's edition of the dates of composition at Chagford.

Another interesting point is that the Readers Union edition of Brideshead (incidentally on the title-page of this volume the description 'A Novel' is dropped) has the 1960 Penguin text, with the reference to the cupolas of Chambord, in its description of Brideshead which occurs on p. 26 (of the RU edition). So it is possible there may be other variants in this text as well.

THE YEAR'S WORK IN WAUGH STUDIES

P. A. Doyle

In Imagined Worlds: Essays on Some English Novels and Novelists in Honour of John Butt (ed. Maynard Mack and Ian Gregor), published in London 1968 by Methuen (75s) and distributed in the USA by Barnes and Noble, Andrew Rutherford has written the highlight 1968 Waugh study - an elegant, penetrating, and appreciative essay entitled "Waugh's Sword of Honour" (pp. 441-460). Rutherford regards the trilogy as Waugh's masterpiece and lauds its stylistic excellence ("one of the very few modern novelists whose phraseology and syntax are themselves a source of delight, illumination, and discovery"). Rutherford argues that the recension form considerably improves the trilogy's structural organization and theme. He applauds the blending of the comic and satiric with the presentation of an "authentic record and joyous celebration of British regimental life." He effectively contrasts Kipling's handling of such material (overemphasis and false tone) with Waugh's treatment which is "a perfect blend of knowledge and detachment, of enthusiasm and stylistic tact, of love and irony." Except for this contrast there is relatively little in Rutherford's essay that is new, but he traces expertly the thematic importance and continuity of Guy's disillusion and dispels the notion that these books are interesting only because of their entertaining anecdotes and fascinating characters. In accomplishing this result and in presenting perhaps the best reasoned appreciation of some of the trilogy's excellences, Rutherford's work deserves wide attention. It is both scholarly and appreciative - a rare combination in Waugh studies. As a postscript it should be noted that the particularly exciting issue of a preference for the three separate volumes vs. the recension is briefly but interestingly discussed, and again we see that Waugh's claim to have removed only "repetitions and discrepancies" from the original books is exaggerated (TLS's comment - March 17, 1966 - on this matter is especially valuable). This preference for the three individual novels vs. the one volume edition or vice-versa will be a never-ending debate among Waugh readers and critics.

Another intriguing element in 1968 Waugh bibliography is a biography entitled Brian Howard: Portrait of a Failure compiled by Marie-Jaqueline Lancaster (London: Anthony Blond, Ltd. 1968), 70s. There is no question but that Howard was the real-life figure represented as Ambrose Silk and Anthony Blanche (Howard himself rages about Waugh because of the Silk portrait). While we have effective views of Howard in Harold Acton's Memoirs of An Aesthete, we here receive a complete study of one of the Bright Young People from his many quoted letters, journals, and from reminiscences of acquaintances. We are given a very full picture of the time and settings used in such novels as VB and BR. It is startling to read Howard's letters and see how Silkish and Blanchish they sound and to observe the many parallels from his conversational "my dear," to his work in the war office (POMF), and his companionship with his Toni (forming the basis for Sebastian and his German companion episode in BR?, even though Sebastian is said to be primarily based on Hugh Lygon). Jaqueline Lancaster wrote to Waugh for permission to quote Ambrose Silk and Anthony Blanche "where the remarks seemed to be particularly characteristic of Brian." Understandably, he refused; but the reader of her biography and of POMF and BR can perform much of this Sherlockian exercise for himself.

Randolph Churchill's Evelyn Waugh Letters and Post-Cards to Randolph Churchill, Encounter, XXI (July, 1968), 3-19, has several rewarding observations but, in general, is disappointing - perhaps, because so much more was to be expected. Churchill prints fifty-seven Waugh items - "nearly all" the letters he received - and some of his own letters which cast light on Waugh's correspondence. Some illuminating bits and pieces appear, but too much of the material involves trivia or gossip which has no importance; e.g., numerous letters are devoted to comments about Waugh signing first editions of his books for Churchill's collections. I suppose we should be grateful for the occasional amusing material; for instance, Churchill's comment about Waugh's military activity: "He was usually more interested in driving his immediate superiors mad than in bringing about the defeat of the enemy," or Waugh's statement in reaction to the British left-wing critical attack on Brideshead: "What they can't stand about BR is that the hero has two love affairs both with women of his own class. One they might forgive, but two is a sure indication to left-wing intellectuals of reactionary cryptofascist ideology." Such gems are unhappily uncommon, and what is particularly frustrating is that there are hints of more fertile material. Thus, in speaking of the final volume of his war trilogy, Waugh writes, "It may bring some memories of Bari and Topusco." Since Churchill served with Waugh in these areas, it would be helpful to know the similarities in the book involving fact and fiction; or again when Randolph asserts that the trilogy will "be a great tease on our Aunt Tito," we recall the Tito lesbian idea mentioned in Christopher Sykes' Listener article of 1967. Obviously this subject was a conversation piece that doubtless had more detail and humor. Much more interesting information about other matters is also, alas, left untold. One apparently previously unnoticed bibliographical item turns up, however - a preface written by Evelyn for Francis Crease's book Thirty-Four Decorative Designs.

Valuable as signpost directions is Robert Murray Davis' Textual Problems in the Novels of EW (PBSA, LXII (Second Quarter, 1968), 259-263). Professor Davis convincingly demonstrates the need for a really thorough bibliography of Waugh's writings, the kind of study Anthony Newnham is presently engaged in. Davis demonstrated his point by discussing the importance of the 1960 revised edition of BR and how knowledge of this text can affect scholars' conclusions. Davis also presents a brief, but tantalizingly interesting, discussion of alterations in the text of Work Suspended and comments appropriately on some other changes, e.g., the prefatory material in DF and the dust-jacket data of OGP. His thesis that the "text of Waugh's novels deserves and repays the attention of the descriptive bibliographer" is well-taken and most urgent.

Paul Wiley's Evelyn Waugh, Contemporary Literature, IX (Spring, 1968), 261-264, is a belated but generally favorable review of James Carens' 1966 book The Satiric Art of EW. Wiley believes that Waugh's method of handling satire is still open to discussion since, as Carens would admit, "it is perplexing to decide what Waugh's satirical perspective actually is." Problems of a satiric attitude and with satiric form plus personal and/or homogeneous moral standards are complex. Wiley also stresses the difficulties raised by a satirical norm based on religious faith - "a problem further complicated by uncertainty as to the exact nature of Waugh's thinking with regard to an issue so personal." (One feels that perhaps this problem is more an ogre raised by critics like Donat O'Donnell than a genuine dilemma caused by Waugh himself.) Like Carens, Wiley holds a generally denigrating attitude toward BR; yet while Carens finds Helena "apologetic fiction" - which it essentially is, Wiley regards it as an excellent imaginative historical novel. Wiley also feels that Carens tends to "undervalue" Stopp's book which is, he argues, important because it demonstrates Waugh's "growing reliance on an apparatus of character types belonging to the realm of psychic imagery." What Wiley's review accomplishes is to point up some of the never-ending areas of debate and disagreement found among those who study Waugh both as man and writer.

There are some passing references to Waugh and the Sitwells in John Lehmann's A Nest of Tigers: The Sitwells in Their Times (Little, Brown, 1968, $6.95), but nothing that was not previously known. Much of Evelyn's article in praise of the Sitwells and of Osbert in particular is quoted verbatim (cf. Sunday Times, Dec. 7, 1952 or New York Times Magazine, Nov. 30, 1952). ... One is disappointed with Honor Tracy's review-article Evelyn Revisited re Alec's Portraits and the Donaldson book (New Republic, CLVIII (March 23, 1968), 39-41). A perceptive humorist and novelist of her standing should be able to produce something more illuminating than the old bogey that Waugh would rather have been a duke than anything else and that his true self was really Basil Seal. ... Sarel Eimerl's The Why of Waugh, Reporter, XXXVIII (May 2, 1968), 38, 40 repeats essentially the same chestnuts about Basil Seal being the real Waugh and compounds this nonsense by claiming that Waugh turns to forms (such as religion, the Tory past, and gossip) rather than face the "realities of human society and relationships."

To end this panoramic tour on a pleasant note, I cite Sir Arnold Lunn's article Evelyn Waugh Revisited, National Review, XX (February 27, 1968),189-190,205. Lunn stresses Waugh's abiding commitment to Catholicism, but the essay is of significance chiefly because it reports several delightful anecdotes about Waugh's comic tendencies. EWN wrote to Lunn who allowed us to quote this delightful extract, which will give an idea of much of the essay's flavor. Waugh "took me to his club, White's and ordered a bottle of champagne. To the barman he said, 'I'd like you to produce a really nourishing sandwich for my friend. He's an author, but not successful like I am, and he looks rather underfed.' I went with him to Paddington in a specially chartered limousine, where he missed his train. Back to White's where Waugh ordered another bottle of champagne. He asked me to come down to spend the night with him in the country, but I never accept that kind of invitation after the second bottle of champagne. I did, however, again drive with him to Paddington. 'How do you propose,' he said, 'to go back to the slum in which you live?' I replied that I'd take the Underground. 'No, my friend,' said Waugh, 'You shall go back in my car. This is a day in Fairyland for you."' Let us hope for many more such Waugh reminiscences and anecdotes in the future.

ESSAY COLLECTION

Robert M. Davis announces a proposal for a collection of original essays on Waugh. He writes, 'The editorial policy for such a collection should not be too rigidly set, but the book might well cover each of Waugh's major novels as well as broader topics dealing with his art, his ideas, and his achievement as critic, journalist, and biographer. Suggestions for other topics, names of scholars who might be interested, and papers for consideration would be welcome. It must be emphasized that at this point no publisher has offered a contract or assurances of publication - only expressions of interest. But a collection of good essays on Waugh should find a publisher."

Send all correspondence to Dr. Robert Murray Davis, Dept. of English, University of Oklahoma, 780 South Oval, Room 127, Norman, Oklahoma 73069.

QUERY

Mr. Chester Sullivan of the Austin College faculty, Sherman, Texas 75090, wonders about some specific imagery in Brideshead: "It's in Chapter 7, where Waugh says, "It is time to speak of Julia... and through those halcyon weeks Julia darted and shone, part of the sunshine between the trees, part of the candlelight in the mirror's spectrum, so that elderly men and women, sitting aside with their memories, saw her as herself the blue-bird.' (and) '... she brought to all whose eyes were open to it a moment of joy, such as strikes deep to the heart on the river's bank when the kingfisher suddenly flames across dappled water.' Now, I don't know how many readers associate the kingfisher with halcyon. Between the reference to 'halcyon weeks' and 'kingfisher' he calls Julia a 'blue-bird', which seems to be a confusing reference. At any rate, the image is sharp, and real, and clear to anyone who has been startled by a kingfisher. Notice the parallel between 'Julia darted and shone...' and 'the kingfisher suddenly flames across...' Surely it's an exponent of something?"

The Evelyn Waugh Newsletter, designed to stimulate research and continue interest in the life and writings of Evelyn Waugh, is published three times a year in April, October, and December (Spring, Autumn, and Winter numbers). Subscription rate for libraries and interested individuals: $1.00 a year (10 shillings in England). Back issues 50 cents each. Checks or money orders should be made payable to the Evelyn Waugh Newsletter. Notes, brief essays, and news items about Waugh and his work may be submitted, but manuscripts cannot be returned unless accompanied by a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Address all correspondence to Dr. P.A. Doyle, c/o English Department, Nassau Community College, State University of New York, Garden City, New York 11530.