1929-05-16 English Autobiography; Biography; Journals; Correspondence nonfiction prose masculine 21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCText-proofing of a sample of the text21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCConversion to TEI.2-conformat markup21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCAdding scripted markup21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCAddition of encodingDesc21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCAddition of bibls21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCAssembled all images21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCCreation of derivative images21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCValidation of TEI21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCValidation of names21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCConversion to Unicode (utf-8)21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCPromotion to production21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCAddition of text to access control21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCHarvest into Topic Map21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCChecking of text using browser21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCAddition of text to corpus21:18:08, Tuesday 7 August 2007editorialNZETCAddition of text to Library Catalogue14:47:45, Tuesday 23 September 2008editorialNZETCMake text available on NZETC website 16 May 1929 21 Brunswick Square London W.C.1 My dear Mummy,

Three letters this time in my N.Z. mail, thank you for all your congratulations, I feel quite overwhelmed. You seem to have jiled up quite a lot of excitement out of the great event, so much so that I'm quite surprised Auntie didn't turn on a fruit- salad for you all. Well, will you please thank her & Auntie Win very much for their letters, pending a more direct & more courteous acknowledgement, & Auntie for her enclosure, which of course I am having the usual difficulty in spending. Shall I buy the new Sin Miss Beaune in 6 vols with it? Or the Shakespeare Head Press Plutarch? Or merely a new pair of pyjamas? A great question. — Thank-you very much for your & Daddy's gift too, although it didn't come. I have only to retort on you your remark on double birthday presents — you shouldn't do it. But as you are sending it I shall endeavour to put it to a worthy use. Perhaps to pick up anything that's left over after the Auntie splurge. I have been thinking of some of the new gents Celanese underwear for some time, & if I come back to N.Z. I must certainly startle the natives in some way. I take it by the way that Daddy merely omitted to enclose the postal orders or notes, as they were not contained in the envelope, never was there any sign of their having been pinched. I am certainly much attracted by the Plutarch. And yet the Sin The Bourne is very nice. And a guinea cheque. I haven't bought myself anything to celebrate yet so perhaps we might all club together & do something splendiferous. At the same times there's a very nice thin paper 3 vol Pepys complete which is very attractive. Let alone that beautiful Celanese underwear. — I duly note the Songs of Childhood t64. Immoral I call it. The bloke had no right to take the money. It must have been an exceptionally good copy, though of course the loom is still on the upgrade. It looks to me as if there is going to be a nasty crash sometime not too far off. As to the question of my title, which seems to be worrying you both: I believe I may now be addressed as Dr by anyone who wants so do to, & perhaps if it would bring me in a job any faster it would be an advantage. Otherwise I don't care much. I'll never be insulted if anyone calls me Mister. Did you ever hear the yarn about Ern's cobber Sutherland & Daddy's fellow member of the A.A.P.P.? He was heard at the phone at College shortly after he had got his Ph.D. telling Whitecombe's where to send some books. "Dr Sutherland! Dr Sutherland! No, not Mister, Doctor!" I wont throw it up at him though, he may have changed by now. No, I didn't shout anybody anything on that occasion. I was shouted, as I recounted to you in the relevant place. No alas, I am not the first to get the degree — de K. & Helen A. got there theirs 18 months & 11 months ago. I forget now whether of the 4 Osterley coves it was I who bet Hemming or Hemming who bet me by a week or two. I think I had my exam first, but his was formally granted first. Mine of course has not been formally granted yet — such is the almost excessive speed of the University of London. I think the Senate meets in three or fours days. — You seem to have had a pretty good Easter with all your grandchildren round your knees — or perhaps it would be more accurate to say round Auntie's knees. Though now I remember it, Auntie didn't mention Betty, perhaps Betty isn't up to hoos yet. The next thing I suppose will be Uncle John returning from his wonderings with his pockets full of toys for the children. Ahem! Thank God for Woolworths! Then I suppose I shall have to take them to pantomimes, or perhaps to Alan Wilkie, as no doubt they are exceptionally high-brow kids. Or b may be they are still higher-brow, & are keen students of the flicks. Anyhow I can see a job will be urgently necessary if I am to do the right things as an uncle. Keith's remarks on Mary's looks I can only regard as highly invidious & uncalled for: still no doubt Mary has her private sentiments as to his looks, so I dare say they are about even. I am glad to hear that your visitors didn't stir you up too much. I am also glad to hear that Keith and Frannie are so well- satisfied with their house — of course if I came back I shall need to put in a good deal of time while waiting for a job to turn up, & as I shall have no money I shall certainly have to sponge alternatively on all married brothers etc. In this way I shall no doubt see a good deal of N.Z. Perhaps you had better start writ- ing & prepare Frannie. I don't mind playing with the kids & lending a hand with the washing up.

I am sorry to hear that Auntie Sis has struck another bad patch — she has had a stiff run & no mistake. Why the devil does her son want to get married for so early? They're mad, these kids. I suppose Tony will be running a family next. Silly coots! I am sorry to hear about Auntie Sis though. I note your self congratulation on daughters-in-law. — I note also with interest that you still seem to be finding some books to read, & can only assume that Daddy hit on a hidden hand somewhere, perhaps during excavations in Lambton Quay, & got away with them before anyone could stop him. You say (referring to Parson Wood- forde "You have I." apparently Vol I. I thought it was Daddy's. If it is mine I am completely forgetting what books I have, & it might be just as well to pay a visit to Wgton before anyone gets down on them. You never know, Aunt Hannah might sneak a few under her more convenient garments, & no one the wiser; & then there would be the devil to pay when I did find out. Talking of books reminds me of Auntie Win's strange lapse of memory about the soap & water she threw around my room, & her effort to blame it on to Auntie. S This is a very low-down trick, & quite unworthy of a Christian gentlewoman, more especially of a communicating member of the Church of the Province of New Zealand. I hope she has reached a better frame of mind by now. — Well, let me thank you again for your three pages — quite a vast effort & all perused with interest, appreciation, & enjoyment.

Answers to questions by Daddy: I was told off by a London cop for riding on my bike across Trafelgar Square instead of getting into the hurly gurdy & going right round & quite a long while ago, I didn't know the rules in those days. The cow mad me go all the way back again. — Address will be Institute till further notice; they will forward when necessary, & I don't know where I shall be by the time you get this. — The 5 gus are still in suspense, but I'm afraid they have me beaten over it, someone after a lot of palava managed to produce 1/2 abuse in a long regulation, & I got another demand the other day after a couple of months rest, undisturbed by me. Money-grabbing hounds! — I am glad to see that Hicks is supplying a book or so to the household — nothing like tapping every vein, or well, or seam, whatever you tap. I believe I borrowed Neven- son's Changes & Chances, the 1st volume, from Suther- land — why don't you try him? I have got vol II More C & C. Picked up 2nd hand in Charing X Road. He is a great cove, isn't he? — Yes I had a note from G.Q.P. on his Anthology, & am sending him out some stuff by this mail. 40 poets, he told me he was having, & some of them real good. I said why not have 4 & have them all good? I thank Daddy for his quotation on Fraude — Carly le I should say, from internal evidence.

Well, things don't look too promising for a job over this side or in the States.

Dean, Deans, I went downstairs just now to see if there was any mail & there was a little letter from the Academic Registrar of the Univ. of London, addressed to John Cawte Beaglehole Esq Ph.D., to inform him that the Senate at their meeting yesterday had conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. So that's all right. I think I might send a brief but hectic life of myself to the N.Z. Associated Press now for dissemination throughout the right places.

To return to the question of jobs. I have received answers from most of the places in the States to which I wrote, they all say very politely, Nothing doing, thanks for writing, we have filed your letter. More important is the fact that I went along to the American consulate the other day to see about a place in the quota in case of need, & found that it was full up for two years in advance. So it looks as if I'm blocked in that direction. Apparently I should have rushed along & put down my name on spec as soon as I got to Eng- land! Curse their infernal restrictions. I am now enquiring about a job in Portsmouth, but as they haven't deigned to answer at all my request for further particulars, (as invited in the advertisement) that doesn't look too promising. I have also put in for a Univ. of London travelling studentship (1 year t275) thinking that I could quite well put in a year in Paris; but I have no hopes of this, & it isn't exactly what I want either. Still I have completely given up hopes of getting that. I saw Newton, & he was more stupidly fatuous than he has ever been — I wash my hands of him — anyhow there doesn't seem to be anything doing in Ch India. I may possibly — just hear from F.P. next mail — meanwhile I suppose I can still try China, Labrador or Antarctica. — The worst thing of all however just at present is that the O.U.P. has turned down my book — exceedingly courteously & even complemen- tarily, but they think its too much of a dissertation & not enough of a book (that is the worst blow!!), still they hope I will go on to write something else. I have written to ask what do they think of cutting it down t & revising, but haven't had an answer yet. Of course if I can't get a job here & have to leave for N.Z. in July, it will make publication a confound- edly awkward & long drawn-out matter. However it can't be helped. Meanwhile I am reading Camp- bell's thesis (among other things) & consoling myself thus-wise.

I think I told you in my last of Mrs Han- nah's visit to me. She took me out about a week after — or did I tell you about that too? Anyhow she done me proud. Lunch at a very satisfying though not flash place in Piccadilly. We then went to see the picture of Dad Dod Proctor's which the Academy turned down & incidentally saw some 1st rate land- scapes by Ethebbert White (I'd like to see Uncle George turning out stuff like that). We then went to the pictures, as there seemed to be nothing much on in the way of theatre matinees, & ss saw another Screen Classic called The Student of Prague — pretty good. I then said I'd take a hand, so I took her to Swan & Edgar's for tea & conversation, after which I escorted her to her quarters at the Overseas Club. She has now gone off to Bristol for a month. Before we parted she said she would write to you & say that I looked quite healthy, I said I'd already told you that she'd said that, but she said that you'd believe it more if she said it personally. Which may be so. It was a very inspiriting afternoon anyhow. The only other visitor I have had was also from N.Z. — one Isobel McLennon, C.Q.P.'S girl, who came with a letter of re-introduction. I entertained her & gave her good advice, & afterwards responded to an S.O.S. from Campbell to help entertain her, for he bad been written to also, & is rather at a loss with a total stranger unless said stranger can immediately em- bark on the discussion of politics which Miss McL could not do. However Ern also turned up, & we had quite a cheerful evening.

My reading has been going on fairly well. All Quiet on the Western Front is the best war-book I have read, tremendously powerful stuff. They ought to print it in the school journal; but I don't think you would like it. Sinclair Lewis' Dodsworth is good, but not his best stuff. He seems to me to have taken a considerable, perhaps unconscious pride in airing his knowledge of wines & European restaurants. Most of the action takes place in Europe. But I think the real power lies in the Mid West. Have you ever reflected how like N.Z. is fundamentally to provincial America? I don't mean so much in attitude to money-making (& yet I do a good deal too) as to ideas & general knowledge of & interest in the world at large. We're thoroughly provincial — all except Us, of course I mean — the Intelligent Minority. 7am by Wyndham Lewis is good, but about extremely peculiar people, it didn't excite me as much as it seems to have done Rebecca West. Have you read Gibbon's Autobiog- raphy — that's a pearl, if you like. I am now lapping up Graham Walles' Human Nature in Politics, an extremely good book. You ought to read it. I got my copy 2nd hand when I was in Bristol; rt & as he is looking after Ern so well you may like to hear that in the back the former owner had scribbled about some passages which he didn't like "Sarcasm — a man who writes like this cannot be o regarded as a safe guide." So perhaps I had better warn Ern. — The only show I have been to is La Via Parisienne at the Lyric Hammersmith, quite a bright turn-out. I am thinking of trotting along to the Opera some time next week though, if there are any seats for a bloke who won't go down at 8 in the morning. I have not omitted mention of five shows — I have knocked around in the National Gallery a bit, & one afternoon visited for the first time the London Museum, a very exciting places, with relics of old Newgate Prison & models of 16th & 17th century London & all. I may even — I am firmly determined to — get as far as the Tower some day before I leave. Yesterday I had a good look at Westminster Cathedral — a noble building which the Micks, as ever, are doing there their best to vulgarise. Also the new Underground Headquarters at Westminster, a very interesting h log & good piece of modern architec- ture. To-morrow, if fine, I am going to tramp in the country with a cobber. And when I have posted this I shall go to bed. — I enclose two pictures, the product of my camera, Hemming and me. Love to you both as always in full measure