The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers, Volume II: 1937 to 1943: From Novelist to Playwright
472
The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers, Volume II: 1937 to 1943: From Novelist to Playwright
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Overview
This second volume of Dorothy L. Sayers covers the seven years in which the greatest detective novelist of the golden age--and the creator of Lord Peter Wimsey--turns away from mystery writing to become a playwright and, in turn, a controversial figure.
Accused on the one hand of blasphemy, acclaimed on the other as one of the most influential lay theologians of her time, she found herself drawn into a vast network of correspondence, dealing with a wide range of social concerns.
These, after all, are the years of World War II, of air-raids, threats of invasion, rationing, lack of domestic help, congested travel, and blackouts. But there was no blackout in the creativity of Dorothy L. Sayers; in fact, this is the peak period f her creative endeavors: seventeen plays, several books, innumerable articles and talks--and hundreds of letters.
The letters reveal the context of her published words and send the reader back to them with new understanding. But the issues they raise are not merely those of her time; many are startlingly topical, even today.
The letters take us behind the scenes of her thinking, activity, and personal life. Here is an unknown Dorothy L. Sayers, whose influence on her contemporaries and beyond has yet to be measured. But at the same time, here is the Sayers whom we have always known and loved: witty, engaging, creative, passionate, committed.
Barbara Reynolds, Dorothy L. Sayers's acclaimed biographer, has selected and annotated these letters from the hundreds that Sayers wrote during one of the most fascinating times of her life.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781466886353 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | St. Martin's Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 03/26/2024 |
| Series: | The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 472 |
| Sales rank: | 721,936 |
| File size: | 4 MB |
About the Author
Dorothy L. Sayers (1893–1957) was a British playwright, scholar, and acclaimed author of mysteries, best known for her books starring the gentleman sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey. While working as an advertising copywriter, Sayers began writing Whose Body? (1923), the first Wimsey mystery, followed by ten sequels and several short stories. Sayers set the Wimsey novels between the two World Wars, giving them a realistic tone by incorporating details from contemporary issues such as advertising, women’s education, and veterans’ health. Sayers also wrote theological essays and criticism during and after World War II, and in 1949 published the first volume of a translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy. Although she considered this translation to be her best work, it is for her elegantly constructed detective fiction that Sayers remains best remembered.
Date of Birth:
June 13, 1893Date of Death:
December 17, 1957Place of Birth:
Oxford, EnglandEducation:
B.A., Oxford University, 1915; M.A., B.C.L., 1920Read an Excerpt
The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers Vol. II
1937â"1943 From Novelist to Playwright
By Barbara Reynolds
St. Martin's Press
Copyright © 1997 Barbara ReynoldsAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4668-8635-3
CHAPTER 1
1937
Behind the scenes
At the beginning of 1937, Dorothy L. Sayers was still involved with the reception of her play, Busman's Honeymoon, and with the timing of the publication of the novel she had made of it. Gradually her commitment to the play for Canterbury Cathedral was to demand more and more of her attention.
24 Newland Street Witham Essex
TO MURIEL ST CLARE BYRNE 4 January 1937
Dear Muriel,
To set against the pronouncements of some of our London critics, who complain that they do not know whether we meant to write farce, melodrama, or sentimental comedy, here is the considered judgement of my gardener. I may say that this came out of him entirely unsolicited and unprompted, and that I have reproduced his words as exactly as I can remember them:
"What I thought was, it was meted out just right. There was a bit of everything – a bit of a thrill and then a bit of a laugh and then a bit of what I call the sob-stuff. That's what I like – not the same thing all the time, but go on just so long and then you're off on to something else. It's natural, ain't it? because life's always a mix-up. You may say, 'I've had seven years' good luck, or seven years' bad luck' – but when you come to look at it in detail, like, even those years have been a mix-up. Something sad, and then something funny comes along of it – that's how life is."
I really do not think, if we had tried with both hands for a fortnight, we could have stated our own theory – or Will Shakespeare's practice – very much more forcibly or concisely.
I hope you're having a good rest. Mine was a dose of flu, all right. It didn't hurt much at the time, but it's left me curiously shaky, and not altogether eager to tackle 120 Somervillians at the end of the week. However, London will probably cheer up the old system, and so long as the cast escape the Scourge I don't much mind what happens. In the meantime I have asked various people to various meals – nobody replies to my letters or tells me anything!!
Bless you, dear, and all the best, Dorothy
[24 Newland Street Witham Essex]
TO VICTOR GOLLANCZ 17 January 1937
Dear Mr Gollancz,
We were all very sorry that you were unable, after all, to join us on Monday night. As I said to you on the telephone, I can see no objection to the distribution of advance copies of Busman's Honeymoon to the booksellers; the only danger I foresee, would arise if mere were too much advance publicity to the public so as to disappoint them when they could not get the book. Thank you for sending Mr Cadness Page's letter; he wrote me one himself in somewhat similar terms. I am very much pleased to have approval of this novel from him and from one or two other men, since while the woman's side of a honeymoon novel would be easy for me to write, the man's side of it is bound to be more conjectural. I am so sorry that we are having to hold you up like this on the novel, but as I think Miss Pearn explained to you, I feel deeply responsible to the management and to the cast, and have pledged myself to do nothing that might hamper the run of the play. I do feel that at this moment publication would be a mistake; for one thing there would be people like my Aunt, who, having read the novel beforehand, felt a little bewildered by the play, feeling that a great deal had been left out of it. For another thing, one has to reckon with the critics, who may very well say that here is the novelist doing her own proper business, which is novels, and that therefore the novel is better than the play. If the play succeeds in establishing itself, then I think its objections will disappear. In any case we will keep our fingers firmly on the pulse of the thing and give you good warning when the time comes for publishing.
What has particularly interested me in the writing of the novel has been the problem of rethinking the story in terms of narrative, and of writing a book which should not be the ordinary novel of the play, but a distinct novel of the same [name]. I know that it would probably not fit in with your publicity scheme to tackle the thing along those lines, but I suggest that if the play should run, it might become desirable to look at the thing from this point of view in order to protect ourselves against the general feeling that there doubtless is about "the novel of the play". Of course we do not yet know how long the present business is going to keep up, but we are at present playing to extraordinarily steady sheets, especially taking into consideration the influenza epidemic.
Yours very sincerely, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
[24 Newland Street Witham Essex]
TO ELIZABETH HAFFENDEN 17 January 1937
Dear Miss Haffenden,
I was at Canterbury last week talking over with Miss Babington and Mr Laurence Irving the matter of the Canterbury Play, and they felt that the time had come when I ought to get into touch with you about the designs for the costumes. I have so far only sketched out the first section of the play, and the pageant which ends it, but as this pageant contains most of the really difficult problems of stage management and design, the bits I have done will perhaps afford us sufficient basis for discussion. Mr Irving was very keen that we should have a final tableau full of colour and splendour bringing in all the various craftsmen and so on who contribute to the building and furnishing of the church, and I feel that we ought to be able to have some fun over planning the costumes for this. There is also a matter of certain gigantic angelic figures forming a kind of chorus to the play about which we shall have to talk. I understand from Mr Irving that there are some costumes in existence which could be adapted for these angels. What I particularly want is to find out from you how far one may go in the matter of fantastic design, and how far angels could be expected to move about when encumbered by, what I understand will be, large quantities of gold american cloth!
I have to be in Town next Wednesday the 20th, and it would be very convenient if we could manage to meet on that date, or if it does not suit you I could manage to stay over until Thursday. Perhaps you could come along to my flat either morning or afternoon as suits you best, when I could show you the bits of the play I have done and go into all these questions. As I shall be away from home on Tuesday, would you very kindly either write to me at 24, Great James Street, Bloomsbury, W.C.I. or ring me up there on Wednesday morning – HOLborn 9156.
Yours very truly, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
[24 Newland Street Witham Essex]
TO MARGARET BABINGTON 18 January 1937
Dear Miss Babington,
Thank you so much for your letter. I am so glad you like the title "The Zeal of Thy House": it was Mr Irving's inspiration, and though I sat grinding my teeth with jealousy for two hours, I could not think of anything half as good! I am delighted to confirm it, since it has your approval; as you say, it is the imaginative touch about it which is so delightful. By all means get the postcards out at once.
I have already written to Miss Haffenden suggesting an appointment in Town for next Wednesday or Thursday; I hope we shall be able to make good progress and get your embroiderers on to the job without delay.
I had, in a half jesting manner – and explaining of course that casting did not come within my province – mentioned the subject of archangels to Mr Alan Napier. I have now heard from him and he says that he would seriously be delighted to be Michael if called upon. This is, of course, just a suggestion, but if you did think of strengthening the cast with one or two professionals, I do think we could not possibly find a more suitable leading archangel. He is, as I told you, six foot four, and magnificently built; good-looking in rather a severe way with a very fine voice, and excellent training in the speaking of verse. He is a young man, and has a considerable reputation as a rising actor. I do not think, however, that he would be out of the way as regards fees. A further recommendation, perhaps, is that having been brought up more or less in the bosom of the church and a highly intelligent man, he would act his part with understanding and in the right spirit. I am not, of course, trying in any way to force him on you; but if he should be free in June I think it would be worth while considering him. I see that he is opening early next month in London in a new play Because We Must, with Howard Wyndham and Bronson Albery; it is, however, possible that the play may not run for five months.
I am trying to get on now with the middle part of the play, though I have been unexpectedly interrupted this week by the B.B.C. who have suddenly arranged a broadcast of Busman's Honeymoon for tomorrow, so that I shall have to go up and see to it.
I hope, however, to be able to report progress before very long.
Yours sincerely, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
[24 Newland Street Witham Essex]
TO JAMES PASSANT 19 January 1937
Dear Mr Passant,
Thank you for your letter. I am so much looking forward to our team's visit to Cambridge.
I am glad you enjoyed the play, in spite of an unsatisfactory Harriet; the part, though small, is a very difficult one. I think you would like the way Veronica Turleigh plays it in Town, she is so distinguished and so sympathetic. I am sorry that the love scene made your bowels heave; I can imagine that in the wrong hands it probably would! I expect the wretched people started to act. Dennis Arundell and Veronica Turleigh put over the serious part with the very minimum of acting and the quietest possible intonation, and it never fails to hold the house. It was so good of you to write and let me know your reactions to the performance, which unfortunately, neither my collaborator nor I was able to attend owing to pressure of business and flu in our respective circles.
Yours sincerely, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
[24 Newland Street Witham Essex]
TO MRS K. L. R. MOLYNEUX 19 January 1937
Dear Bella Donna,
Thank you so much for your two letters. I had put aside the first one meaning to answer it, but day after day went by, and I seemed to be in such a rush that I really have done no private correspondence at all for the last twelve months. I had sent a card to Japan, but I expect you had returned before it got there. So you are back in Oxford again! I rush down there from time to time to attend meetings of the Somerville College Council; we must certainly contrive to meet one day this term or next. At the moment I am spending most of my time tearing up and down to Town over theatrical business. Having just, more or less coped with the agitations of Busman's Honeymoon (have you seen it yet? It is really doing extraordinarily good business), I find myself plunged into work for this year's Canterbury play which I have rashly undertaken to write. We are going to have great fun with a lot of musical and scenic effects.
It was nice of you to be so forgiving and write again after my long silence.
Looking forward to seeing you, Yours affectionately, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
[24 Newland Street Witham Essex]
TO MARGARET BABINGTON 23 January 1937
Dear Miss Babington,
Many thanks for your letter; I am so glad you feel that it would be a good thing to approach Mr Alan Napier about being the archangel Michael; I really think he would be an excellent choice, and in the hope of getting him, I am allowing myself to give some importance to the part.
Miss Haffenden and I had a long and most fruitful interview; she seems to be immensely keen on the idea of the thing, and I feel sure we shall see eye to eye about the costumes. I have given her a copy of the last section of the play so that she may get started at once on the pageant material which will, of course, mean the heaviest work.
In accordance with Mr Irving's suggestions, I have now added two extra pageants, that of the Sailors and that of the Royal Gifts, and I am enclosing a copy of this section with these additions. It is now getting pretty long, and I don't think we ought to put in anything more until the composer and producer have seen what they can do with it. Have we had any reply yet from Mr Harcourt Williams? It would be a good thing if I could get into touch early with the producer and if Mr Williams has accepted, it might be possible for me to see him when I am in Town at the beginning of the week after next.
Yours very sincerely, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
[24 Newland Street Witham Essex]
TO G. F. WOODHOUSE 25 January 1937
Dear Mr Woodhouse,
Thank you so much for your letter and for your most interesting booklet about the change-ringing machine. I remain overwhelmed with astonishment at anybody who could work out a thing like that. It is also exceedingly good of you to let me have the list of errors in The Nine Tailors, and some time, if there is a new edition, I shall hope to go through it with a view to putting these details right.
I only wish I could take up ringing, but the fact is it appears to be such an enthralling pursuit that I am sure if I once started on it I should neglect all my work! It has been a great gratification to me to know that ringers have enjoyed the book, which I so rashly wrote without knowing anything about the subject, and have been so kind to the errors I have fallen into by the way.
Wishing every success to you and your band,
Yours very truly, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
The Detection Club 31 Garrard Street W.I
TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW STATESMAN 17 February 1937
Dear Sir,
CHEKHOV AT THE WESTMINSTER
A losing bout with the flu germ put me out of action over the week-end, but I hope it is not too late to argue a little with Mr Desmond MacCarthy about Uncle Vanya.
I attended the first night at the Westminster under stimulating and, for anyone of my age, unusual circumstances. I had never previously seen the play, read the play, or heard a single word of discussion about this or any other production of it. Through this strange gap in my education I thus viewed the performance as a stage-play, and not as a venerable institution. This probably accounts for some of the differences between my impressions and those of the seasoned critic.
I find, for instance, that I ought not to have come away filled with enthusiasm for Mr Cecil Trouncer's interpretation of Astrov. But I remain impenitent about this. His leading may not be true to tradition, but if it is not true both to human nature and to what Chekhov actually wrote, I will eat my hat. I do not know what the "orthodox" reading may be, but if one goes by the text of the play it is clear that Astrov is not a man who has "lost his soul and looks like it". He is that far more disconcerting figure: the man who has lost his driving-power and does not look like it. All the exterior apparatus of strength is still there: the bodily energy (he does not merely chatter about trees, he plants them); the infectious enthusiasm; the physical attraction which "gets" not merely Sonia but the unintellectual and unmaternal Elena; what is lost is the inner cohesion and sustained courage to defy circumstance. His tragicomedy is that he still has his moments of believing in himself. At the end of the play he returns to his trees under the comforting illusion that this time, perhaps, something will really come of it. We know that nothing ever will – and in his moments of self-knowledge, so does he. Incidentally, in the scene where Astrov shows the maps to Elena, Mr Trouncer triumphantly succeeded in convincing me that here was a man genuinely in love with an idea for the first time on any stage, by any actor, in any part whatsoever.
There are other points on which the "fresh mind" would like to break a lance with Mr MacCarthy; but I believe that where he and I differ fundamentally is in our respective ideas of what the play is about. He thinks that in the final scene the reiteration of the words "they've gone" should affect us like a passing-bell, and that the laughter which greets them at the Westminster destroys the spirit of this drama of futility. That is, in spite of the end of the third act and other plain indications of the playwright's purpose, he insists on seeing the play as a tragedy. But the whole tragedy of futility is that it never succeeds in achieving tragedy. In its blackest moments it is inevitably doomed to the comic gesture. The sadder, the funnier; and conversely, in the long run, the funnier, the sadder. The English are at one with the Russians in their ability to understand and create this inextricable mingling of the tragic and the absurd, which is the base of Shakespeare's human (and box-office) appeal. Mr MacCarthy warns us against the conceit of thinking of ourselves first as "English" in relation to foreigners; but on this particular point we English are far closer in feeling to the "foreign" Russian than (let us say) the Irishman can ever be to cither of us.
I am,
Yours faithfully, [Dorothy L. Sayers]
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers Vol. II by Barbara Reynolds. Copyright © 1997 Barbara Reynolds. Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents
Contents
Preface,Introduction,
Acknowledgements,
List of illustrations,
THE LETTERS (1937–1943),
1937: Behind the scenes,
1938: Response to a new public,
1939: The crisis of war,
1940: A false start,
1941: The mind of a maker,
1942: A landmark in broadcasting,
1943: Responsibilities of fame,
Appendix: Particulars of the birth of John Anthony,
Index,