Something wrong with the world

Saturday, March 31st., Comarques, Thorpe-le-Soken.

I came home yesterday morning. Beautiful day. Snowfall and a lot of rain in the morning. As soon as the rain ceased at noon, the whole landscape began to steam, even before the sun had got fairly out. I find myself admiring the natural world, and then it comes back to me that only just across the sea, men are crouching in trenches, exposed to the elements I am admiring, and being shot at. There is something wrong with the world! I have read accounts of people with mental disorder who have a sort of 'split' in their personality, and that is how the world is at present, from my point of view anyway.

For example we were at the theatre in London the other night laughing and enjoying ourselves. It was the best evening I have had at the theatre for I don't know how long. Then you come out with nothing on your mind except the play you have seen, and maybe there is an air raid; immediately you must switch to a different state of mind. All this must be having a tremendous impact on the nerves of the public. 

The play was Pierre Veber's "Gonzague", a common farce of intrigue, but ingeniously constructed. There is nobody in England (whether or not as bereft of genius as Veber is) who could construct a little farce so well. Nothing to it but very agreeable to witness. Excellently produced and excellently played.

As regards the war, Donald said that the Russians would make no offensive this year, and that had it not been for the Revolution they would have made peace. He also said that he was getting some men to write messages to Russia for cabling, but that he had to obtain Lloyd George's approval first. During the afternoon he sent me up a note to say that he had obtained the approval and would I send in 500 word message quickly.

New ideas

Thursday, March 29th., Cadogan Square, London.

Dorothy is now more or less recovered from her operation and life is returning to normal. I have been doing a good deal of walking about, and bus riding, to get ideas. And I have got some! Weather is still rather cool and rain intermittently, but spring flowers in the parks and I feel my spirits rising. Only a couple of weeks until I start my Mediterranean cruise with Otto Kahn et al.

Vere Gordon Childe

Tea with the Webbs a couple of days ago. I sat next to an interesting man by the name of Gordon Childe. Australian. An archaeologist. Bit of an odd looking chap. Linked to the Webbs by a devotion to socialism and tells me he had to leave Australia because his political views prevented him getting a decent academic post. Currently Librarian at the Royal Anthropological Institute and has published a book about how civilisation arose from the Middle East. Fascinating talker once you get used to the accent. 

His idea is that farming started in the Middle East, the Fertile Crescent, and then spread westwards, eventually arriving in Britain. Until then people had been wanderers, hunting and gathering food where they could, no settled base. So it was becoming settled in stable communities that led to structured societies, religion, and eventually 'civilisation'. Not something I had thought about before. Must get a copy of his book and go into it more. I should think somebody with the right sort of imagination could set a novel with the transition to farming as the background. Must have been the women behind it! You can imagine the scene: Man - "We must go hunting as our fathers have done from time immemorial." Woman - "Well you can go without me and the children. I have heard about farming. This is a good place and I'm going to plant some crops and make a hut which will be our home. See you when you get back." 

Nothing much has changed since!

 

Room of one's own

Wednesday, March 28th., Rue de Calais, Paris.

I only keep this journal sufficiently to prove that I am still not keeping it. Sometimes it just seems to be too much of an effort. I ask myself who I am writing it for? But at others the words flow and I find that writing down what I have done, and especially how I feel about people and places, helps me get my mind in order. I will persevere.

I finished the seventeenth instalment of "The Sinews of War" today. Three more to do. This evening on my return to Paris from Moret I received in a letter from Phillpotts an adumbration of the plot for our next serial in collaboration. I am not at all sure that I can face another one. Not that it is hard, but I don't feel it is the sort of work I should be associated with. I am concerned that if I get a reputation as an author of 'potboilers' then my serious novels will not be taken seriously.

Lately, besides having the influenza, I have been occupied in putting my Moret flat into an artistically habitable condition. It is an activity I truly enjoy. How wonderful to have rooms of one's own! Growing up as I did in a large family, privacy was more or less unknown which is why, I think, that I value it so much now. Even when I marry I will insist on an inviolate study where I can arrange my books and furniture just as I like.

Yesterday morning in a second-hand shop in Moret I found a Louis XV commode in carved oak in excellent condition, and bought it for 45 fr. without bargaining. I also bought a rather worn Empire bookcase for 20 fr. Impossible to keep my journal while I am so preoccupied with the serial and with questions of cretonnes, carpets, and the arrangement of old furniture and purchasing of fresh.

War gloom.

Wednesday, March 27th., Yacht Club, London.

Sydney and Beatrice Webb

Lunch at Webb's. Webb said his wife couldn't sleep on account of the war news, and he had to exaggerate his usual tranquil optimism in order to keep the household together. It was one of the rare human touches I have noticed in the said household. It is hard to imagine any tenderness between the two, let alone passion! Yet Beatrice is an attractive woman. Surely there must be times when the intellect gives way to normal animal instincts? Anyway, they were soon off into the misdeeds of the Reconstruction Committee. I was told that certain of the staff of the Department of Information (Webb termed it 'Propaganda') had resigned when Beaverbrook was appointed Minister over them, refusing to serve under 'that ignorant man'. They won and were transferred to the Foreign Office. One more instance of the hand-to-mouthism of Lloyd George according to Webb. I thought they would be pleased to hear of the abdictaion of the Czar, and the progress of the revolution in Russia. But no sign.

Went from there to the Reform to see the papers. Massingham was so gloomy he could hardly speak. The brothers McKenna came in intensely pessimistic. I was rather ashamed of them. Spender's two articles in the Westminster were A1 for fortitude and wisdom. I think more and more highly of this man. Then to flat to dine. Electricity not working there. Gloom of candles. Marguerite very gloomy about the war. This sort of thing always makes me cheerful. There is a perverse side to my nature which has often been pointed out to me which makes me take a tack opposite to the general mood.

Sybil Colefax gave a very good description of the All Clear Signal in a few words at dinner. She said she was walking with her husband in the streets towards the end of a raid. Everything was quite silent. Then the search Lights began winking the All Clear all about the sky. Then the sound of the All Clear bugles was heard. Then the footsteps of a man. Then the footsteps of ten people, of twenty, of a hundred. The town was alive again!

Bits of news

Sunday, March 27th., Berkeley Street, London.

The 285th and last performance of "The Title" occured on Saturday at the Royalty. A good house. The provincial tour which began some weeks ago was a failure for the first fortnight. I am not optimistic that things will improve.

Sir Henry Norman

While I was being shaved at the Reform on Tuesday Henry Norman came in and waited. He read me a letter from his wife who is inspecting the Fronts to make a record for the Imperial War Museum. He told me other things not in the letter. As that English women are still looking after French 'permissionaires' at the railway stations and that French women do nothing in this line and even try to prevent these women from getting lodgings in the towns. I regard the Englishwomen as silly for doing it, and can understand the French resentment. It seems to me that they are ineffectual 'do-gooders' motivated by some perverted sense of caring; in fact it is all self-interest. I continue to maintain that there is no true altruism in the world.

Lillah McCarthy

It seems that the French soldier is very rough when drunk or half drunk. That does not come as a surprise to me. I would have thought it was characteristic of soldiers everywhere! One woman apparently had coffee thrown in her face three times. Another was stabbed and killed. The English psychology is very queer in these things.

Rehearsals of "Judith" going along fairly well. Lillah McCarthy and Frederick Keeble are to be married. This news was something of a surprise to me. Keeble must be 50. Fortunately Lillah is a consummate professional so the play will not be affected. In spite of distractions I have written one complete 'woman' article at home each weekend for 3 weeks.

Writing to death

Good Friday, March 25th., Hotel Belvedere, Switzerland.

Six days of perfect weather, with a N. and N.W. wind and nothing visible all day in the strong sunshine. I was able to begin the final chapters of the second part of "Clayhanger" without much difficulty on Tuesday, and I have averaged over 2,000 words a day of it. I finish tomorrow. The second part will be 50,000 instead of the estimated 40,000 words.

It is surprising that, a fortnight ago at Brighton,I could have thought it possible to finish the second part there. I had only allowed 2,000 words for the most important series of scenes - love scenes - in that part. On the whole I think it is fair. Anyhow it is honest and conscientious. I wrote 3,200 words yesterday, and pretty near killed myself, and was accordingly very depressed at night. This morning I went for a long walk and wrote 1,000 words in an hour this afternoon.

What I am led to wonder is, whether the context in which something is written has much impact on the finished product. So, would the version of this part of "Clayhanger" I have written here be the same if I had in fact written it at Brighton? I think not. Obviously the general development of the novel would have stayed the same but surely the 'tone' would be different. Here I am writing surrounded by mountains with sunshine and clean, fresh air, rather than by the sea in gloom and rain. Interesting to think about.

Reviews of "Helen with the High Hand" strangely kind. William Morton Payne in the Dial of Chicago describes it as: ".... capital fooling, humorously charming from start to finish,and we are glad to have it as a pendant to Mr. Bennett's gloomy large-scale depiction of the Five Towns." I could ask for no more.

Class distinctions

Friday, March 24th., Comarques, Thorpe-le-Soken.

London yesterday. Pamela McKenna handed over a book which Birrell had given me in exchange for "The Golden Remains of the Ever Memorable John Hales", which he bought from me about 24 years ago when I was doing a few experiments in book selling - and never paid for.

On Wednesday night a Welsh vet. officer came here to sleep. 60. Very provincial and polite and talkative. All about Lloyd George and North Wales and Stanley Weyman. Just like middle-class provincials in the Potteries, except for the accent. Speaking of billeting in Manningtree, he said that billetees had to cook for soldiers, while not finding the food. "Now, many of them didn't like it," he said with sympathy and conviction, as middle-class speaking of and understanding middle-class. It was absolute Five Towns. No member of upper middle-class would have said it like that. A member of upper middle-class might have laughed, or said it indulgently, or said it comprehendingly, but not with the same unconscious sympathy.

Made me think about what effect this war will have on the class system. As far as I can tell it is still pretty well maintained in the trenches, but surely close proximity and shared hardships and danger must have some effect? And then at home when it is all over. Will the returning 'common' soldiers be content to revert to the situation as before? I doubt it, and in fact hope not. I think we have seen the end of an era.