Because Evelyn Waugh uses lines 27-30 of The Waste Land as epigraph to A Handful of Dust, readers have generally assumed that the "fear in a handful of dust" is analogous to Eliot's vision of the dry, sterile, and, at least in Waugh's implication, unredeemable land. The range of reference in Eliot's line is considerably expanded, however, if one accepts the editor's note in the Norton anthology, The American Tradition in Literature (3rd ed., vol. II, p. 1288n) which summarizes the Cumean Sybil's fate when she forgot to specify eternal youth in asking Apollo for as many years of life as the grains of dust she could hold in her hand. The note implies that The Aeneid is the source of the legend; in fact, it comes from Ovid's Metamorphoses, Book XIII, 11. 155-182 in Arthur Golding's translation of 1567 (ed. John Frederick Nims, New York: Macmillan, 1965, pp. 354-5). The most significant lines are:
I taking full my hand of dust, and shewing it him there,
Desyred like a foole to live as many yeeres as were
Small graynes of cinder in that heape. I quight forgot to crave
Immediately, the race of all those yeeres in youth to have.[After the passage of ten centuries]
The day will come that length of tyme shall make my body small,
And little of my withered limbes shall leave or naught at all.
And none shall think that ever God was tane in love with me.
Even out of Phebus knowledge then perchaunce I growen shall be,
Or at least that ever he mee lovde he shall denye,
So sore I shall be altered. And then shall no mannes eye
Discerne me. Only by my voyce I shall be knowen. For why
The fates shall leave mee still my voyce for folke to know mee by.(11. 161-64, 174-181)
Even casual readers of Waugh's novel can see the relationship between the Sibyl become only a voice and Tony become lector to Mr. Todd. The parallel situations of Sibyl and Tony's refusing God's love and choosing what are ultimately the horrors of time may be less obvious, but hardly obscure. Tony Last rejects religious belief, seeks an earthly city, and is made Todd's victim. Though "time is different in Brazil," it does not have products which eternity can love.
This argument assumes, of course, that Waugh had read Ovid before writing A Handful of Dust. If he had, he did not keep a copy, for there is no Metamorphoses in his library, now at the University of Texas, Austin. Those familiar with English public schools may be able to speculate fruitfully on the odds for and against an English schoolboy's escaping Ovid. Furthermore, the legend is in Bulfinch's Mythology. (See also Helen H. Bacon, "The Sibyl in the Bottle," Virginia Quarterly Review, 101: 262-276.)
If my assumption is correct, the reference lends further support to Richard Wasson's view that the novel criticizes secularized Victorian values (Modern Fiction Studies, 7: 327-37) and helps to explain Waugh remark in "Fan-Fare" (Life, April 8. 1946, p. 60) that the novel was "humanist and contained all I had to say about humanism." Humanism, decent though its adherents may be, is nevertheless a secular, time-bound philosophy.
Subsequent to the publication by G. K. Hall of the catalog of the New York Public Library's Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature, the Collection acquired a nearly complete set, in generally mint condition, of first and limited editions of books by or with contributions from Evelyn Waugh. Most notable among them are two rarities, his early P. R. B.: An Essay on the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood ([London?] A. Graham, 1926) and Francis Crease's Thirty-four Decorative Designs, With a Preface by Evelyn St. J. Waugh (London: A. R. Mowbray, 1927), no. 8 of 60 copies, signed by the artist.
The limited editions include: Basil Seal Rides Again, Black Mischief, Brideshead Revisited, The Holy Places (three copies, including one of the 50 "specially bound and signed by the author and artist"), Labels, Love Among the Ruins, The Loved One, and Wine in Peace and War.
Also worthy of mention are uncorrected proof copies of the English editions of:
| Basil Seal Rides Again | Men at Arms |
| Brideshead Revisited | A Tourist in Africa |
| Helena | Unconditional Surrender |
| A Little Learning | Work Suspended |
And among related printed material is a duplicated typescript of a screen adaptation by Ivan Foxwell of Decline and Fall (1967?).
Invitation [from Mrs. Waugh], printed, to Carl Van Vechten, with holograph map [by Evelyn Waugh] of the Islington area. 2 pieces.
[Labels; a Mediterranean Journal] Holograph (incomplete), unsigned and undated. 1 p. Paginated 4. Inserted in his: Labels. [London] Duckworth, 1930. No. 46 of 110 copies.
Man the exile. Holograph, signed, dated "21st April 1960." 2 p. With A. N. S. at top forwarding these "notes of our conversation of yesterday" to John Kobler.
Remote People. Holograph, unsigned [1931] 139 p.
Postcard, signed with initials, to [John Kobler] Combe Florey House, nr. Taunton [Eng.] [n.d.] Sends copy of second edition of When the Going Was Good; cannot supply any more synopses; hopes to meet Kobler and his wife.
A. L. S. to Beverley Nichols. Piers Court, Stinchcombe, nr. Dursley, Glos. [Eng.] June 29 [n.y.] Delighted to have copy of Moonflower; comments on Nichols's health and on Jamaica.
2 A. L. S., 1 postcard to Christopher Sandford. Piers Court. Stinchcombe. Glos. [Eng.] April 18, May 7 and Nov. 14, 1946. 2 p.; 2 p.; card. Waugh proposes that Golden Cockerell Press issue limited edition of his new book on the Empress Helena.
A. N., in the third person, to George Williams. Combe Florey House, Combe Florey, nr. Taunton [Eng.] April 16, 1964. 1 p. Declines to autograph book.
Waugh and the English poet and essayist John Betjeman were close friends for a number of years. Materials in the Betjeman Archive recently acquired by the University of Victoria, British Columbia testify to the warmth of their relationship.
In the archive are fifty-eight letters or postcards from Waugh to Betjeman written over a period of twenty-two years. All the letters are holograph and most are addressed from Waugh's Piers Court or subsequent Combe Florey House addresses. (A few are from various London clubs, army barracks during Waugh's World War II military service, or from holiday resorts abroad).
The range of the correspondence is of considerable interest. There are frequent comments on aspects of art and architecture, common interests of both writers. And in addition to a certain amount of literary gossip and comment on Betjeman's own work, a number of the letters discuss Waugh's own literary activity. He comments on several of Betjeman's reviews of his books (including Brideshead Revisited and his biography of Knox), and a letter of 1947 notes the beginning of a novel on 'morticians' - presumably The Loved One.
Of greatest biographical significance however is a series of letters c. 1946/7 in which Waugh argues the case for Catholicism against that of the Church of England. These letters are notable for Waugh's acerbic refusal to sympathise with any arguments that Betjeman advances for his remaining an Anglican. Waugh continually and unequivocally holds out the prospect of eternal damnation to Betjeman, chiding him for both the lack of any substance in his arguments and for what he, Waugh, considers to be Betjeman's totally erroneous view of the purpose of religion. Two striking features of these letters are Waugh's conviction of the absolute truth of Catholicism and the vigour of his exhortations to Betjeman to think out his own position. The frankness and eloquence of these letters gives them an important place in Waugh scholarship.
A selected edition of these letters is in progress.
It may be due to the particular nature of satire or merely my own deficient vocabulary, but I find it easiest to express the relationship between the satirist and his subject matter by using figurative language. The writer as a head and his subject matter as a wall have always seemed particularly appropriate representations. Thus, when someone says Decline and Fall I immediately think of Evelyn Waugh's head busily assaulting a stone-reinforced English hedge. David Worcester, in The Art of Satire (New York, 1960), though hardly deficient in vocabulary, also resorts to metaphor when he describes the relationship between the reader of satire and the work. The subject matter is a weapon for Worcester, one that the reader must first discover "then load, aim, and fire it all by himself."(1)
Each figurative expression assumes, of course, the existence of subject matter. Let the subject matter be unfamiliar, esoteric or inaccessible in some other way, and our literal ears will hear neither the figurative pounding nor the metaphoric shot. Unfortunately, this happens quite often with satiric works. The social occasion upon which the satire depends passes, the knowledge that makes it function is forgotten and the effectiveness of the satire is lost as well. Dryden's "Absalom and Achitophel" is inaccessible today without the Bible, Pope's "The Dunciad" without notes. Our brave new world has forgotten that this was once considered the best of all possible worlds and thus is impervious to the prick of the most pointed satire in Voltaire's Candide. More recently, the Kennedys and Johnsons have had their day and thus, "MacBird," the "Macbeth" parody which utilized the relationship between the two families, would not survive a revival.
At the same time, some satiric works seem to transcend the apparent impermanency of their genre. Swift's Gulliver's Travels and "A Modest Proposal," Pope's "Rape of the Lock," Molière's "The Misanthrope," and Aristophanes's "The Clouds," seem, among others, to contain some mysterious ingredient that has preserved the acidity of their satire to this day. It may seem reasonable to begin the search for the ingredient by turning to the author, but some critics have suggested that the reader may be an equally reliable source.
Mr. Worcester, for example, makes clear his belief that the reader is at least equally, if not more, responsible for the success of satire than the author. He feels that the reader "shares the work of authorship … his labor is necessary to complete the meaning … his creative participation is essential to the author's design."(2) Wayne C. Booth, in The Rhetoric of Fiction, quotes Mark Harris to the effect that "The novelist depends upon … that audience which brings to reading a frame of reference, a sophistication, a level of understanding not lower than the novelist's own."(3) Mr. Harris is speaking of a reader's responsibilities when reading novels in general, but he would, I am sure, reiterate this demand for the reader of satire as well.
No one, of course, relieves the author from responsibility. Mr. Booth offers the personal opinion that "The very concept of writing a story seems to have implicit within it the notion … that the author will make the work accessible to the highest possible degree."(4) Mr. Worcester too, while emphasizing the responsibility of the reader, also reminds the author that "The writer of effective satiric invective keeps the abuse that he is attacking always before the reader's eyes."(5)
It seems difficult then to resolve whether it is Voltaire who may demand that the reader familiarize himself with Leibnitz's Theodicy or whether the reader may demand that Voltaire supply the essentials of Leibnitz's philosophy in the text of Candide itself, whether Ibsen may require familiarity with contemporary Norwegian society for the appreciation of satire in "Peer Gynt" or whether the reader may require that Ibsen make more easily available to the reader the abuses he is attacking in the play. We are not sure at which point we brand the reader an ignoramus for his lack of familiarity with the subject matter and at what point we assail the author for having made his references too obscure and hence not sufficiently accessible.
It seems to me that this division of responsibility could best be determined in terms of what I call novelistic and historic elements in a satire. The definition of these two terms is highly personal and demands a reorientation of previous associations with the words.
I consider "novelistic" the elements of language and human nature. The basic components of any satire should be these two items. I consider "historic" all other elements in a work - historic time and place, of course, but also such elements as technical details, obscure philosophical ideas, esoteric terms, in short, any proper or common noun that demands specialized knowledge. It seems to me that the reader's level of sophistication and understanding should enable him to deal with the language of the work and recognize the human type of its characters. It is the author's responsibility, however, to make accessible historical context and technical detail when these are essential to the understanding of the satire. In a sense, this essay illustrates part of this thesis. When a work is cited in the essay, as a convention, the author's name is included. This convention is maintained in spite of the sophistication of the audience that will read this paper. There is no doubt in my mind that no-one who reads the essay needs the information that Voltaire was the author of Candide. Since, however, it is part of the author's responsibility to provide that information, it is given. The classification has, however, been given for a satiric work (which this essay has not attempted to be) and Evelyn Waugh's satire Decline and Fall can more effectively illustrate the division of responsibilities in terms of "history" and "novel." A consideration of Decline and Fall will also return us to the simile of the head and the wall which seemed to have pleased me at the beginning of this essay.
Through much of Decline and Fall there is a great deal of noise. The head bangs loudly against various walls as Waugh flails away at men and institutions. There are, however, periods of silence as well in the work, when the attacked wall is absent or the striking head is off target. Both sound and silence may perhaps be explained in terms of novelistic and historic elements in the satire.
Waugh's satire appears most effective when he is examining human types. His portrait of Paul Pennyfeather is superb. The young man is that same innocent, constantly bewildered youth who has been victimized forever by both novelists and other members of society. We recognize in him not only the literary type satirists love to hold in front of us, such as Rasselas and Candide, but more important, we recognize in Paul a human type, perhaps ourselves, still filled with a childish naivete. The figure of the opportunistic school director, Dr. Fagin, with his false Ph.D. and M.D., is another recognizable human type that is effectively satirized in Decline and Fall. And any reader who is acquainted with human nature will be familiar with the types of Captain Grimes, the lovable bounder who is always "in the soup" but always escapes, unscathed in spirit even if crippled in body. Finally, there are those personifications of peasant ignorance and cupidity - the Welsh musicians who play at The Games - whose satirical portrait typifies all that is repugnant in greed and stupidity:
They were low of brow, crafty of eye and crooked of limb. They advanced huddled together with the loping tread of wolves, peering about them furtively as they came, as though in constant terror of ambush; they slavered at their mouths, which hung loosely over their receding chins, while each clutched under his apelike arm a burden of curious and unaccountable shape.
The reader's familiarity with human nature will, of course, enable him to comprehend and appreciate this satire. It is the reader's responsibility to possess this knowledge of human nature. The satirist has done his part in holding it up to the reader's eyes who must now recognize the portraits of human failings. The reader must also provide a sophisticated understanding of the language of the satirist, for which he is amply rewarded in Decline and Fall. He can then understand and applaud the satiric thrust of Dr. Fagin's words when he advises Pennyfeather, "We school-masters must temper discretion with deceit." The discerning reader will also realize how effectively Waugh uses adjectives to advance his satire. The various members of Bollinger Club, the club with "tradition" behind it, are "epileptic royalty," "uncouth peers" and "illiterate lairds." Further manipulation of the language produces additional telling satire, again made available to the reader by his knowledge of language, the "novelistic" element of satire. Waugh exploits a colloquialism to inflate the importance of the assembled guests. The haughtiness of "All that was most sonorous of name and title was there," is punctured with "for the beano." Finally the satire in the recital of Lord Tangent's wounding, deterioration and eventual death is easily within the grasp of the reader who is aware of understatement, as is the account of Prendergast's death, masterfully interpolated with lines of a sacred hymn. The satire in all these cases is fired when the reader loads the gun and pulls the trigger with his own knowledge of language.
There are, however, silences as well in Decline and Fall, when the head does not hang, when the weapon fails to fire. The words of the author lack satire when there is nothing to satirize. The absence of walls is not necessarily the author's fault, of course. When we read satire forty or more years after it was written we may find that institutions toward which the satirist exhibited irreverence have long ago lost the ability to inspire reverence. What was once treated seriously by many people and was thus a fitting subject for satire - in Waugh's case, the jet set or abstractionism - is no longer taken seriously. The sacred cows Waugh was once attacking are ordinary animals today who hardly merit his barbs. To exchange this for our previous metaphor - the walls have been removed and the satire was eliminated with them. Waugh can hardly be held responsible for the ravages of time. He can, however, be held responsible for allowing his satire to depend on "historical" elements that remain mysterious to the reader.
As the novel opens, there is a series of one line "putdowns" that fails miserably. Sanders, a poor fellow whose Matisse is put in his water jug by the marauding Bollingers, merits his fate because (Waugh explains) he once "went to dinner with Ramsay MacDonald." Paul Pennyfeather earns their wrath as well. His crime consists of wearing what appears to be a Boller tie, apparently the equivalent of a red flag to a bull for a Bollinger. Contrast the satiric effectiveness of these obscure characterizations with "epileptic royalty" and "illiterate lairds."
When Waugh has Beste-Chetwynde scorn Capt. Grimes for "wearing combinations," he is again indulging in the use of specialized knowledge, which, if beyond the ken of the reader, renders the satire ineffective. It is Waugh, however, who is responsible for its failure this time, as he is by another of Beste-Chetwynde's statements: "That's Briggs," the student identifies another boy, "only everyone calls him Brolly, because of the shop you know." Neither knowledge of language nor understanding of human nature will enable the reader to comprehend the satire in that statement. It is Waugh who should have supplied the weapon, who should have located the wall.
There are also literally historical elements in Decline and Fall which would defy satire if Waugh would not explain them. The mere statement that the "blessed equity in the English social system … insures the public-school man against starvation," is not by itself satirical. The satire becomes effective, delightful in fact. as Waugh, through Captain Grimes, elaborates on the faithfulness of the system which has extricated Grimes from the worst of his indiscretions. It is essential to the effectiveness of the satire that Waugh educate the reader to the fullest extent of the public-school comradeship.
When history remains history, however, satire fails. A long passage keyed to the phrase "enlightened self interest" conceals its satire behind two centuries of political history. Waugh fails to make the connection between the action of the Lancashire mill owner and the philosophy of European despots of the eighteenth century. Nor does he make available to his reader the satire in his description of Professor Silenus's life, prior to his discovery by Margot Beste-Chetwynde. He is described as "starving resignedly in a bed-sitting room in Bloomsbury," a contrast no doubt or perhaps a comment on those other artists in the area, the Bloomsbury Group. The reference is explored further in a remark by Pennyfeather's jailer who offers him a new Virginia Woolf that has "only been out two days." That the daughter of Pennyfeather's guardian "became engaged to a well conducted young man in the Office of Works and that Prendergast is declared winner of the argument about rood screens are other "historic" elements that remain unexplained and hence without satiric effectiveness in Decline and Fall.
What seems to emerge from this consideration of Decline and Fall is that satire is most effective when it observes human nature which is eternal rather than humanity at a particular moment which may be transient. The success of satire when it deals with human types should actually hardly be surprising. It seems to have been the reason for the immortality of those other satires mentioned earlier. Certainly Pope was satirizing Sir George Browne and Arabella Fermor, actual historical personages, but he was at the same time satirizing human types and it is the vanity of the girl Belinda and the pompousness and stupidity of Sir Plume that are recognizable today and successfully satirized. Similarly, when Swift satirizes low heels and high heels, Big Endians and Little Endians, he is satirizing contemporary British society. Though historical familiarity with the doings of the Whigs and Tories seems necessary for the comprehension of the satire, it becomes apparent that the satire is effective without that historical knowledge. Swift is, after all, not only satirizing political corruption during one period in England's history but corruption in general. Thus, it is the nature of Man that is under scrutiny, not merely the nature of a particular Englishman at a unique moment in history. Knowledge of human nature and language will enable any reader, centuries later, to understand the satire in those works.
When Decline and Fall is involved in a similar satire of human types - the innocent Pennyfeather, the doubting Prendergast, the corrupt Fagin, the irresponsible Grimes, the impostor Philbrick, the reformer Lucas-Dockery - it is effective and devastating satire. The reader is able to fire the weapon, he is capable of hearing the head against the wall. Knowledge of these types and of the language that transmits them are his responsibilities. When the satire depends, however, too greatly on "history" for its effectiveness, it fails. As Elizabeth Bowen puts it in The House In Paris, describing a boy who does not think an English magazine is funny, "His lack of humor was native and untutored - no one had taught him that curates, duchesses and spinsters are enough in England to make anyone smile. "(6) The reader untutored in the peculiarities of the English would thus comprehend only a fraction of the satire in Waugh's name games and sport games. He may appreciate some of the hyphenated, double, last names as being indicative of human vanity but will, after a while, ignore Waugh's attack on this English idiosyncrasy. Similarly, the satire on sports can be only partially effective to the uninitiated reader. Appreciation will vary directly with the reader's preoccupation with sports. To the English, for whom the worship of athletics and the worship of good form is often the equivalent of the worship of God, the satire on sports in Decline and Fall is appropriate and potent. To other readers, unless Waugh educates their "untutored" humor, it is merely overdone.
Let me close with two observations. If this reasoning, which deems "historical" elements beyond the responsibility of the reader, is carried beyond the satire, it must arrive to the conclusion that some kind of initial understanding, communion perhaps, must be achieved between the novelist and the audience without the aid of intervening agents such as an explicator or notes. Additional information, information external to what is in the book, should lead to better, not initial understanding of a work. If a circle may be accepted as a symbol of perfect understanding between novelist and reader, the introduction of new material should lead to the formation of a circle with a larger circumference than which existed before the introduction of this external information. Some perfection, however, a circle, must exist before the map of Dublin illuminates Ulysses or Henry James's Notes explain The Ambassadors. In other words, I am greatly in support of "Afterwords" to novels, rather than "Introductions."
Finally, the reader must wonder why I have chosen the analogy of the head and the wall to represent the satirist and his subject matter. After all, rather than loud and obvious, (as heads and walls suggest) the art of the satirist is generally subtle, more like "a rapier that separates head from body without the body being aware of the separation." Why then the banging head? The blame belongs to the Hungarians who have a proverb that describes the equivalent of a speaker whose voice is not heard. "Peas thrown against the wall," the Hungarians say. With slight modification, this is the source of the head-wall simile. Too often, satire consists of peas thrown against the wall - it alters nothing but the pea.
FOOTNOTES
1 p. 168.
2 p. 31.
3 (Chicago, 1961), p.
90:
4 p. 105.
5 p. 31.
6 (New York, 1963), p. 27. The quotation in
the text is not accurate. It was done from memory which has obviously failed
me. Here is the exact quotation. "His passionate lack of humor was native and
untutored; no one had taught him that curates, chars, duchesses, spinsters are
enough, in England, to make anyone smile."
I. Articles, Letters, and Reviews
"In Defence of Cubism," Drawing and Design, Nov 1917, 9.
"Yes, Give Us a Censor," Daily Express, 20 Oct 1928.
"Old-Fashioned Drinks," Daily Express, 21 Dec 1928.
"Take Your Home Into Your Own Hands! ", Daily Express, 16 Jan 1929.
"Beau Brummells on £60 A Year," Daily Express, 18 Feb 1929.
"I prefer London's Night Life," Daily Mail, 5 Apr 1930.
"Advice to the Rich," Daily Express, 10 Apr 1930.
"What I Think of My Elders," Daily Herald, 19 May 1930.
"My Favourite Film Star," Daily Mail, 24 May 1930 (she is Anna May Wong).
"People Who Want to Sue Me," Daily Mail, 31 May 1930.
"In Defense of Pleasure Cruising, Harpers Bazaar, May 1930, 36-37, 99, 100.
"Happy Days in the O.T.C. ," Daily Mail, 7 June 1930.
"Was Oxford Worth While?" Daily Mail, 21 June 1930.
"One Way to Immortality," Daily Mail, 30 June 1930.
"This Sun-Bathing Business," Daily Mail, 5 July 1930.
"Address Snobbery," Daily Mail, 1 July 1930.
"For Adult Audiences," Daily Mail, 25 July 1930.
"Parties One Likes," Daily Mail, 15 Aug 1930.
"Let Us Return to the Nineties," Harpers Bazaar, Nov. 1930, 50-51, 98.
"Venetian Adventure," Harpers Bazaar, Oct 1932, 54, 86.
"Travel - and Escape From Your Friends," Daily Mail, 16 Jan 1933.
"My Escape From Mayfair," Daily Mail, 29 March 1933.
"Was He Right to Free the Slaves," Daily Express, 15 July 1933 (about William Wilberforce).
"Cocktail Hour," Harpers Bazaar, Nov 1933, 26,87.
"Farewell 1933," Harpers Bazaar, Jan 1934, 52, 94.
"We Can Applaud Italy," Evening Standard, 13 Feb 1935.
"In Quest of the pre-war Georgian," Harpers Bazaar, May 1935, 50-51, 130, 132.
"Home Life is So Dull," Sunday Express, 1 Dec 1935 (about the divorce laws).
"The First Time I Went North" The First Time …, 147-162, ed. Theodora Benson, London, 1935 (about his trip to the Arctic).
"Christmas at Bethlehem," Tablet, 9 Jan 1937, 62 (letter).
"Equitation," Harpers Bazaar, Oct 1937, 59, 106, 108.
"Laying Down a Wine Cellar," Harpers Bazaar, Dec 1937, 53, 120, 122.
"The Philistine Age of English Decoration," Harpers Bazaar, March 1938, 79, 96, 98.
"Wedding Present," Harpers Bazaar, Apr 1938, 70, 112, 116.
"From London to Budapest," Catholic Herald, 27 May 1938, 1.
"Impressions of Splendour and Grace," Catholic Herald, 3 June 1938, 1, 9.
"Is Oxford Worth the Money?" Sunday Dispatch, 10 July 1938.
"Mr. Evelyn Waugh's Review," Tablet, 10 Dec 1938, 805 (letter).
"Mr. Evelyn Waugh and the Daily Mail," Tablet, 19 Aug 1939, 250 (letter).
"The Grill Room Can Take It," Observer, 23 Aug 1942 (review of I've Lived Another Year by Eric Baume and War in the Strand by Hector Bolitho).
"Why Hollywood is a Term of Disparagement," Daily Telegraph and Morning Post, 30 Apr 1947.
"What Hollywood Touches It Banalises," Daily Telegraph and Morning Post, 1 May 1947.
"The Importance of Mr. Maugham," Sunday Times, 13 Jan 1952 (letter).
"Our Guest of Dishonour," Sunday Express, 30 Nov 1952 (about Tito's visit to London).
"Mr. Waugh Replies," Sunday Express, 14 Dec 1952 (letter about the Tito visit).
"Marshal Tito's Visit," Sunday Times, 1 Feb 1953 (letter).
"P. G. Wodehouse," Daily Mail, 24 Nov 1953 (letter).
"No," Sunday Times, 23 Oct 1955 (review of The Passionate Years by Caresse Crosby).
"A True Father in God," Sunday Times, 12 Oct 1958 (about Pope Pius XII).
"I See Nothing But Boredom … Everywhere," Daily Mail, 28 Dec 1959.
"Roman Scandals," Daily Mail, 11 Mar 1960 (about Fellini's La Dolce Vita).
"Opponents - They Meet As Friends," Sunday Dispatch, 6 Nov 1960 (about the proposed meeting of the Archbishop of Canterbury and Pope John XXIII).
"The Death Penalty" Spectator, 9 Dec 1960 (letter).
"Publishers," Observer, 9 July 1961 (letter).
"P. G. Wodehouse," Sunday Times, 30 July 1961 (letter).
"Confessions of a Pope," Sunday Telegraph, 7 March 1965 (review of Journal of a Soul by Pope John XXIII, A Pope Laughs by Kurt Klinger, and Wit and Wisdom of Good Pope John edited by Henri Fesquet).
II. Waugh and the BBC
The following is a list of radio and television appearances which Evelyn Waugh has made on the BBC. An asterisk in front of the item indicates that the BBC has a sound recording of the appearance.
*21 June 1938 - "Up to London"
*31 July 1939 - Excerpt from Oxford Union Debate (with Ronald Knox)
*11 March 1948 - Reading "Half in love with easeful death." (Life article)
17 May 1951 - "A Progressive Game"
25 Oct 1953 - Extracts of a novel soon to be published.
*16 Nov 1956 - "Frankly Speaking"
*26 June 1960 - "Face to Face" Interview
*15 May 1961 - "P. G. Wodehouse"
15 Dec 1961 - "St. Helena Empress" (in The Holy Places)
24 Sept 1962 - "Britain on the Brink" includes a comment by Waugh about the Common Market.
*25 June 1963 - Speech at Royal Society of Literature on being made a C. H.
*16 Feb 1964 - "Monitor." Waugh being interviewed by Elizabeth Jane Howard.
*29 June 1964 - Alfred Duggan
The BBC has also written scripts from most of the above. The script for the "Monitor" interview contains more dialogue than was recorded. There is also a script for a Stephen Black interview with Waugh on "Personal Call," recorded on 28 Sept 1953. This is essentially the same interview as the one for "Frankly Speaking" (where Black was one of the three interviewers) but there are differences.
Thomas Gribble and P. H. Hardacre report reading in an English paper that Christopher Sykes has just completed his latest book and will now start work on Waugh's "authorized official biography." At the time of Evelyn's death, Sykes estimated that the biography would take three years to write. At this rate we shall, unhappily, not see the finished product at least until 1975.
In a recent English bookseller's catalogue, there is listed for sale Alec Waugh's The Prisoner of Mainz (1919). This book contains the inscription, "Muriel Silk with compliments from Alec Waugh 19.2.19." . Perhaps Evelyn took Ambrose Silk's last name from this particular family.
The current Books in Print lists, surprisingly, Basil Seal Rides Again (one thousand numbered and signed copies) as still available for $15.00. Knowing the market for Waugh's signed editions (a signed copy of Vile Bodies recently sold at auction in England for over two thousand dollars), one doubts that such a signed edition is still available from Little, Brown at the original price. Our readers are urged to check, however, since the acquisition of this item is desirable for personal libraries.
The proprietor of Ampersand Books kindly informs the editor that the English paperback edition of Flannery O'Conner's Wise Blood contains a quote by Waugh on the rear cover. This quotation is also on the dust jacket of the English edition of A Good Man is Hard to Find. The quote, so typical of Evelyn, runs, "If this is really the unaided work of a young lady, it is a remarkable product."
In talking about the evacuees from English cities during the early days of World War II, John Lehmann writes: "The episode of the Connollys in Evelyn Waugh's Put Out More Flags remains the classic, unforgettable picture of this relationship," In My Own Time (Boston: Little, Brown, 1969). Lehmann worked in the Ministry of Information during the war and one of his duties was to send information to Russia at their request. He notes that the Russians knew very little about the British literary scene. As allies, however, the Russians wished to improve their knowledge, and they cabled for information about various English writers. One of the authors they asked for information about was Evelyn Waugh.
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, September, and December (Spring, Autumn, and Winter numbers). Subscription rate for libraries and interested individuals: $2.50 a year (£1.10p in England). Single copy 80 cents. Check 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.
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| Editorial Board | |
| Editor: | P.A. Doyle |
| Associate Editors: | Alfred W. Borrello (Kingsborough Community College) |
| James F. Carens (Bucknell University) | |
| Robert M. Davis (University of Oklahoma) | |
| Heinz Kosok (University of Marburg) | |
| Charles E. Linck, Jr. (East Texas State University) |