21 Brunswick Square London W.C.1 9/9/27 My dear Mummy,

Not much to make a letter of out of this trip, so be prepared for a short one. Anyhow I am thinking of chucking up the writing of letters altogether, after seeing that ghastly thing in the Spike. I thought I was sup- posedsupposed to write good letters, but this is the sort of thing that takes the skite out of a man. In future I can see my- selfmyself sitting down & putting in a week polishing up a couple of pages. The Spike on the whole seems pretty poor to me, the printing absolutely rotten for a start, & the proof- reading if possible worse. And too much Fain; why didn’t they put in one, or two good solid things about him instead of maundering for pages in that hopeless 10thtenth rate sunday school way. He may be a silly goat, but there’s no reason why the Spike should fall to the level of the Council, or even the Professional Board. The foregoing sentences I would not mind being printed. One or two fair bits of verse I noticed, including one of Sammy Palmer’s that I printed three or four years ago. I gather from indications generally that V.U.C. is getting to be a pretty poor place. I suppose Ern is doing his best to hold it together. It’s a pity the Spike has to go off in the general rot, though. The printing & get-up is really about the worst I have ever seen I will now proceed to a more pleasant subject & answer your letter. A. Wilkie seems to be going pretty strong, from what you say. They are altering the Old Vic. at present but are starting off their season at the Lyric Hammersmith next week, with the Taming of the Shrew & Sybil Thorndike. I must buzz out there. There is a Strindberg thing running here at present which I must go to also — The Father; said to be exceedingly gloomy but exceedingly good. Like other fathers. They run some tripe of Barrie’s as a curtain raiser. I wish they would turn on a season of good Barrie. Also some more Shaw. I like the way Daddy spells Chloral Society — he’s not far wrong either. As for their doing Aida — fair dinkum, they beat me - which lower depth of half-wittedness can they possibly touch? They’ll be going on to Tristan next. Why don’t you write to the paper & suggest it? That eliminates the chorus altogether except for one brief spasm in the first act. It ought to make a strong appeal to the committee. My oath! are they under the impression that after Elijah the world came to an end? Wonderful, wonderful Chloral Union! And what are they going to do now that old Temple White washes his hands of them? Get old Porter back again, I suppose, & do Elijah once more. I have now worked myself up to a point where no language I can use to my Mother is adequate. — The reason that I am the greatest living authority &cet cetera, &cet cetera, &cet cetera is that though I may know damn little about the subject, nobody else knows anything at all. The is how PhD’s are manufactured. It is called widening the bounds of knowledge & I am a widener. It doesn’t much matter whether it is worth while or not. You just go on widening, & the university collects your money. If Ern has any sense he will stay in N.Z.New Zealand & marry a nice girl like Frannie & teach experimental psychology in a kinder- gartenkindergarten. Much more profitable & comfortable than research; & think how much better a comfortable married life at Karori is than the unhappy celibate academic one, with no one to darn your socks or make tea for you! I didn’t mend my blazer myself because I wanted it done carefully & proper- lyproperly & permanently, & though I do not doubt my capacity to sew up holes I thought I would treat at least my blazer with reverence. Of course the whole thing was a washout; the fabric seems to be quite rotten; added to which I lent it to de Kde Keivriel while we were away, with the result that it got a terrific vent on each side. He is a bigger cove than I am. Yes I do darn my socks, though there is more darn than sock to some of them by now. I’ll have to be biffing a few of them away soon. Wotcher getting at? — not passing on any of my remarks on to Frannie in case she gets her back up? I never heard of such a thing. You’ll be telling me next she hasn’t got a sense of humour. To think of the pearls of wisdom I have strung for that girl, & you don’t even pass them on. Its not every bloke who would go to all that trouble to look after the welfare of his sister-in- law. I think I’d better turn my attention to Theo, a fine pleasant girl with no nonsense about her. I am really pretty disappointed in Frannie — I had a letter from Mrs Johnson some time ago in which she said inter alia, “I suppose you hear pretty often from the newly married couple”. Now I ask you how many times Frannie has written to me since she left London. Has she written to me at all? I doubt it. As a matter of fact she doesn’t seem to give two pins for my existence, & here am I always thinking about her, always writing about her, always striving in some small way to make her life brighter & better & more improving. And you don’t even pass my messages on. If you only realised how deadly boring married life can get you would not abstain so carefully from introducing a little bit of variety into the girls existence. It must be pretty ghastly to have to come up to scratch day after day with a bloke like Keithles. By the way I recommend Mencken’s In Defence of Women to Frannie; it (a/ elevates women at the expense of men & (b/ qu says a very excellent thing about profes- sorsprofessors of history. Or have I recommended it to her before. I would send my copy out to you, only it still has to go the rounds a good bit here; b by the time it is finished with it will be pretty well worn away, I’m afraid, as it is only a Tauchritz edition. He has a style that goes round the corners on two wheels. I quote my young friend W.M.A. — The household & large & variegated fringe of friends are stirred to amounted excitement as Campbell’s boat approaches. We don’t know what the boat is, so we can only wait in breathless excitement & hope the Parcel hasn’t gone west on the voyage. It was indeed a noble thought on your part & noble work on Auntie’s, dangerous as it may be to make such a statement previous to consumption. I hope she put plenty of dope into it to keep it good & moist over the intervening six weeks. — I regret to hear that you have taken to your bed again. I was going to say you had better stay there for the whole winter; but of course by the time you get this you will be emerging from that state & we shall be getting right into it. The trees are starting to turn brown & the leaves to fall, & in a few more weeks we shall be sticking on our overcoats for the six months spell. I have not been to see JMR. yet, but I dare say I shall be doing so soon. There is so much to do ,you understand. I shall not go to see Miss Richmond, nor would I go near the Unitarian hqsheadquarters at any price. Once is quite enough. Except of course for a Fabian lecture. There is another course coming off soon. — I has a letter from Auntie Sis reporting all well & blooming, including you, so I gather you can’t be too bad. Please thank Auntie Sis when convenient. I daresay she & all my other confounded aunts will hear from me again at Christmas. That is, if Berrie does any more Xmas cards. If not they will just have to assume that I am thinking of them. Well I think that that has answered all your numerous queries about socks & so forth.

And now to give an account of myself. During the last fortnight I have been (a/ working (b/ sleeping (c/ other- wiseotherwise enjoying myself. As you are not interested in Canadian constitutional history, or lord Earl Grey’s defence of the colonial policy of Lord John Russell’s administra- tionadministration, however initially important a landmark such may be in the history of life & thought, I pass over (a). Likewise I pass over (b) except to remark that like others of this world’s good, I never seem to get enough of it. As for (c) I now proceed to elaborate. The Proms have been going steadily along with great success & biting criticism from Earnest Newman, & I have been there off & on. — Not much these weeks, owing to letters & other nuisances to be settled. They played three of the Planets the other night — Mercury, Saturn, & Jupiter; my word, they are good stuff. Our records are pretty good so far as I remember. I have also heard Brahms, Beethoven, Bach, Wagner, Mozart, Haydn, Handel, & all the other duds. Symphonies, suites, concertos, & noisy excerpts. The place is so crowded on some nights, particularly Mondays when they do Wagner, that there is a continuous stream of fainting people moving or being moved out of the prom part of the hall. It is wretchedly ventilated. How the poor cows upon the platform, who have to wear evening dress, get on I can’t imagine. Let alone Sir Henry, who has to put in more work than any of them. The Proms are the only The concerts that have been going so far, though the other orchestras are beginning to wake up & issue their programmes for the season; & soon we shall be in the midst of wild excitement again. Thank heaven it won’t be as wearing as last year was, though, the theatres are looking up totoo, though most of the stuff they are putting on at present is tripe.

Lorrie Richardson was down here last weekend & we put him up on our floor overnight, after a long & merry evening. He was going to Oxford to see Vera Birdie Teader (from whom I had a visit at the Institute by the way, during the week) about fixing up his brother & somebody else som from V.U.C. coming over to London, so he took in London on the way. I went to the Wallace Collection on Saturday afternoon with H — they have got some good stuff there, also some rotten stuff; my little lace-maker is one of the best. Here I must diverge to say that was the best thing Netscher ever did. I have seen stacks of his stuff & it is very trivial & feeble compared to that. After which she came to our place to tea, plus Harold & Lorrie & de Kde Keivriel. After which lengthy meal we adjourned to her place where I preformed on the piano with great vim. The only disadvantage there is that you have to stop at the incredibly early hour of 10 p.m. when the night is is so young as to be hardly born & people are just warming up to pulling themselves together for the serious business of the evening. The piano is quite a good Bechstein. We swopped travel yarns & sociological & political dis- cussiondiscussion & jokes & other lies. After we were thrown out we came back here for a discussion on type-writers with practical demonstrations by de Kde Keivriel who is just now typing his thesis. After which we threw him out & his type-writer after him & went to bed. L.Lorrie got a wire from V.Vera Birdie putting off the Oxford visit, so we hopped on our marples & blew down into Surrey for the day — a very pleas- antpleasant place, once you get out of London — This of course takes about 8 hours out of G. He is coming down again tomorrow to say goodbye to Harold, who is hopping it next Tuesday. You wouldn’t know the change in that cove’s mentality since he struck London & (modestly) us. He thought he would put in about a fortnight in London & give England a brief lookover & then shake it’s dust off his feet & depart for N.Z.New Zealand home & beauty. And here he is after three or four months cursing his fate & his lack of money, hurling such biting criticism at N.Z.New Zealand as I never thought could come from the lips of man, & altogether cutting up rough. A pity he can’t stay to pass the time of day with Bill Jelliffe, but like a dutiful lad, he is putting what little cash he has to spare into presents for the old folks at home. I may say that if the little cash I have to spare at he end of my time means a choice between an extra week & the gratification of said old folks, they had better not look forward with too lively an anticipation. Luckily there is Woolworth’s, an admirable place for household goods & artistic souvenirs alike. A great feller Harold. Do you remember the lack of enthusiasm he displayed at the party at our place when on the point of hopping off? He has undergone a considerable change since then. However, he’s he sort of cove who should settle down pretty

By the way, I owe the Hampstead Heath & an apology. H & de Kde Keivriel & I got fed up with work last Wednesday, the only fine day of the summer, hopped on a bus bound that way & actually finished up by going to sleep in the in the sun on some real grass. The place is bigger than I thought — last time I was there half of it or more had skipped down behind a bit of a hill & got lost. As it was a weekday there were not so many fat men snoring in deck chairs, & as the trees were still in lel leaf it did not look like one of the less attractive suburbs of hell. It must in fact have been a quite admirable place in the middle of the 18theighteenth century or even later. It’s thoroughly enclosed now of course. London will be reaching up to Manchester soon. While a I am on the subject of the English countryside I add another excursion, the Sunday before last, when Dun- canDuncan & I after a long spell away from our bikes buzzed out to St Albans to see the abbey church. An interesting place, but we nearly killed ourselves over the paltry 40 miles there & back. However I am thinking of riding up to Trimley for the last week of the month of the vacation & sponging on my relatives; or Auntie Jeanne will be getting the impression that I don’t like her. You haven’t said whether she has told you yet that I am a dear boy or not. Not that you want telling, of course, or I for that matter.

I have read Katherine Mansfield’s Journal, just published. There is some very good stuff in this. Also one or two things about the Beauchamps which made me chuckle evilly to myself. I gather that she would be not at all the sort of person for the Beauchamps to be proud of having produced. The introduction is rather interesting. The fourth sentence could have been written by no one but an Englishman. What a utterly wrong impression it gives of N.Z.New Zealand in five lines! A rotten shame she died I really would like to know what the Beauchamps thought of her. I see there are two vols.volumes of letters to come out also. I must get hold of the stories again. The only other thing I have been reading is Havelock Ellis’s Impressions & Comments, about which I am wildly enthusiastic. My word, he can turn out beautiful prose. What a wonderful even flow he has! And how he can use adjectives!

I send Daddy fle felicitations on his birthday. In the excitement of tearing round Europe I forgot your 32ndthirty-second wedding day. I suppose you feel pretty experienced married people now. Do you reckon the game is worth the candle? I have also sent Daddy a small book, hoping he has not been so tactless as to take my previous advice & get it himself.

Love to all & sundry & especially to yourself. Jack