Vol. 30, No. 4 Winter 2002-03 Editor: Norman T. Gates
520 Woodland Avenue
Haddonfield, NJ 08033-2626, U.S.A.
e-mail: ntgates@worldnet.att.netAssociate Editor: David Wilkinson
The Old Post Office Garage, Chapel Street, St. Ives
Cornwall TR 26 2RL, U.K.
e-mail: books@book-gallery.co.uk
Correspondents:
Catherine Aldington, Michael J. Copp, C.J. Fox, F.-J. Temple, Caroline Zilboorg.
Correspondent and Bibliographer, Shelley Cox.
Biographer, Charles Doyle
* * * * * * * * *
NCLS member Stephen
Steele, researching in the Dos Passos collection at the University of Virginia,
found the typescript of a very favorable critique of RA’s poetry, which is
grouped with numerous other writings in the category of “publication
undetermined or unknown”. It is
evidently early writing, because Images
Old and New (1916) is mentioned as RA’s “only volume.” Steele also found in John Dos Passos by Townsend Ludington (E.P. Dutton, 1980) further
reference to Dos Passos’s interest in RA (p. 57) and a probable reference to
the above typescript (p. 79). Ludington
also notes that an article on Spain by Dos Passos appeared in Seven Arts with a contribution by RA (p.
121). In an earlier book by Ludington, The Fourteenth Chronicle (Gambit, 1973),
Dos Passos writes in a letter dated April 23 [1916] : “Then I am sending you
later a little green volume of the poems of one Dick Aldington, an
Englishman—and it seems to me the best of the Imagists. Do tell me what you think of him—sérieux,
because I am planning a ‘monumental’ essay on the subject & a fresh point
of view."
Bibliographer
Shelly Cox reports that the article on “Classics of World War One Literature”
by Peter Coveney (mentioned in NCLSN , 30.3.4) contains an error on p.35:
“Richard Aldington’s Death of a Hero
… was so controversial … that the first edition was published with the
offending passages replaced by asterisks.
These passages were not restored until the book was reissued by the
Hogarth Press in 1984.” Actually, an
unexpurgated edition of the novel was available shortly after the first
edition, published by Henry Babou and Jack Kahane in Paris in 1930. Inexpensive copies of the full text without
asterisks were available from
World distributors in 1965, and Cederic Chivers and Sphere books in 1968, all
British publishers.
Member
Cox also reports on two new books received by SIU that, as one would expect,
have things to say about RA. The first
is Michael Squires and Lynn J. Talbot’s Living
at the Edge: A Biography of D. H. Lawrence and Frieda von Richthofen (University of Wisconsin Press, 2002),
and the second is Deirdre Anne (McVicker) Pettipiece’s Sex Theories and the Shaping of Two Moderns: Hemingway and H.D. (Routledge,
2002).
Caroline
Zilboorg has written an essay, “‘What Part Have I Now That You Have Come
Together?’ Richard Aldington on War,
Gender and Textual Representation,” that will be included in a collections of
essays to be edited by Angela Kay Smith and published next year by Manchester
U. Press.
Correspondent
Cy Fox found RA is mentioned in The
Hudson Review, Summer 2002, in a review by William H. Prichard of a recent
book on the history of the Times Literary
Supplement.
The
International Richard Aldington Society held their second conference in Les
Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, July 9-11.
Papers were presented by Corinne Alexandre-Garner, Norman T. Gates,
Valerie Hemingway, H.R. Stoneback, and F-J. Temple among others. The Society plans to collect and print the
papers from the first two conferences.
Member Steele also reports that the
letters of Louis Aragon to Ezra Pound, held in the Beinecke Library, contain a
few references to RA. In one, Nancy
Cunard promotes “Richard’s Extra-Fine Xmas Carol…,” which her Hours Press
printed. Since this letter is dated
early 1929, she probably refers to RA’s Hark
the Herald (1928). These letters
will be published by the Aragon scholar, Lionel Follet.
The NCLSN, in its 30th year, is taking a giant step into the
new millennium. For the first time,
Associate Editor David Wilkinson, instead of receiving hard copy by mail,
received the Autumn number by e-mail, and distributed it by e-mail to all of
the members on his list for whom he had addresses. This Winter edition will be sent by e-mail to all members whose
e-mail addresses we have. Doing this
will effect a considerable saving in time and expense, but we want to
distribute the Newsletter by e-mail
only to members who are willing to receive it in that form; therefore, 1) if
you receive your copy by e-mail and prefer hard copy, please e-mail us, or 2)
if you receive your copy by regular mail as usual but would be willing to
receive it by e-mail, please send us your e-mail address. There has never been a cost for subscribing to
“The Richard Aldington Newsletter,” and this innovation will help us to
maintain that policy.
Michael
Copp’s book, An Imagist at War: The
Complete War Poems of Richard Aldington was introduced at a Book Launch by
Associated University Presses 18 October in the OCR of St. Catharine’s College,
Cambridge. The title of Correspondent
Copp’s Master’s dissertation, “Richard Aldington and the English Dimension to
Early Modernism: Perspectives and Constructions of Imagism,” provided an excellent
starting point for An Imagist at War.
NCLS
member Adrian Barlow spoke 20 September to a conference for students at the
Imperial War Museum, Duxford, about poetry in the Great War. He is the author of The Great War in British Literature.
Member
Hugh Cecil mentioned RA in a review in the Spectator
(August 2002) of Professor Brian Bond’s The
Unquiet Western Front: Britain’s Role in Literature and History (Cambridge
University Press 2002): “…even writers
as embittered as Sassoon and Aldington were not consistently
anti-military…Aldington was exhilarated in 1918 by the power of the British
Expeditionary Force… .”
Lisa
Gilbey of Rosica Colin, agents for RA’s publications, advises that they have
granted Andrew McCann a non-exclusive license to use an extract from the poem
“Sunsets” (The Complete Poems, p.
68), and to use the first line of the poem as the title of his novel, The White Body of Evening
(HarperCollins, Australia).
Michael
Copp, author of An Imagist at War (see above), will tutor a course, “Poets of the
First World War,” at Missenden Abbey – Chilterns, 24 – 26 January 2003. Session 5 is titled “‘An Imagist at War:’
Richard Aldington.” The course is for
anyone “with an interest in the poetry of the Great War; and anyone with an
interest in twentieth century English Poetry.”
Dear Editor: A History of Poetry in Letters
(Norton) by Joseph Parisi and Stephen Young includes a number of letters from
RA to Harriet Monroe. Catha Aldington
recently received copies of this book and the Andrew McCann novel mentioned
above from Rosica Colin.
NCLS
member Ann Hassan (see NCLSN, 30.2.2)
has just received word that her proposal for a doctoral dissertation on RA has
been approved. She may ask us for
advice and assistance in her work
RA
Website editor Paul Hernandez was notified that Chadwyck-Healey’s “Literature
Online” and “ProQuest Learning Literature” websites will be linking to the
Aldington biography page.
“New
Book News from Associated University Presses” includes in its listing Michael
Copp’s An Imagist at War: The Complete
War Poems of Richard Aldington.
Hardcover, 6 X 9 inches, bibliography, index, 176 pages ISBN
0-8386-3952-6, Price $38.50 (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press).
Stephen
Steele has copies of 14 letters written to Douglas Goldring between 1932 and
1946. The letters carry references to
Pound, Ford, Lawrence, “T.S.” and discussions of Aldington’s own writings
(reception), his past, Goldring’s work and travel advice for Goldring on his
way to Portugal. Since Professor Steele
hopes to publish these letters, we will not give them in Checklist format, but will give publication information when it is
available.
Gemma
Bristow is another member of the NCLS who is beginning a doctoral study in an
area involving RA. Her project will be
an examination of the Imagist group from an historical perspective. Ms. Bristow attended the RA dinner in
London: "It was a wonderful opportunity to be among kindred spirits for
some uninterrupted Richard-talk, and to put faces to names known only from
emails and the Newsletter."
Michel
Pharand is editing a book, Bernard Shaw
and His Publishers, which will be included in the Selected Correspondence of Bernard Shaw series published by the
University of Toronto Press.
Manchester
University Press has set the publication of Caroline Zilboorg's one-volume
edition of the letters of RA and H.D. for April of 2003.
NCLS
member Anne Powell reports on the RA dinner: "Fourteen of us from the
United States, France, England and Wales, gathered at Le Colombier, in London,
on 14 October 2002 for the Richard Aldington Celebration Dinner. We had a wonderful evening. The Aldington magic, enthusiasm and
exuberance, cast their spell and conversation sparkled from start to
finish. Old friends came together
again, new friendships were established, and the one link with the past was
through Nesta McDonald, who knew Netta after she and Richard Aldington
parted. Hugh Cecil's choice of
restaurant and his overall organisation of the evening were superb—a lovely
private room, flowers, aperitifs, delicious food, excellent and ever-flowing
wine, and table placements with a 'reshuffle' at pudding time. It seemed we only stopped eating, drinking
and talking to remember friends who could not be with us and to enjoy five
interludes of readings. Caroline
Zilboorg from letters between RA and HD; Tony Ferney and Gary Sheffield
extracts from 'Death of a Hero'; Hugh verses from 'A Wreath for San Gemignano';
and Michael Copp read the poem 'Sunsets.'
The few hours spent in happy fellowship reflected Richard Aldington's
lovely phrase 'the life of the here and now.'
I think he would have enjoyed the laughter and the wide range of topics
shared and discussed; and I hope he would have been touched by the admiration
and affection it was evident we all felt for him."
Alister
Kershaw always felt that RA had been "subjected to a peculiarly abject
campaign of denigration which persists to this day." Although one of his poems,
"Battlefield," was included in The
Oxford Book of War Poetry, chosen and edited by Jon Stallworthy in 1984, he
was not in The Faber Book of 20th Century
War Poetry edited by Kenneth Baker twelve years later, nor was he one of
the Twelve Poets in the Imperial War Museum's new Exhibition, "Anthem for
Doomed Youth." Both Anne Powell
and Michael Copp wrote to Jon Stallworthy, the organizer of the exhibition,
asking if this omission could be rectified.
Certainly we may hope that Michael Copp's just published An Imagist at War: The Complete War Poems of
Richard Aldington (see above p. 2) will restore RA to his rightful place
among the poets of the Great War.
NCLS
member John Mayes writes from France that he received a letter last March from
the "Mayor Adjoint" in Montpellier confirming that a new plaque had
been placed on RA's former residence there (see NCLSN, 29.4.2 and 30.2.1).
From a picture sent to him by Mayes, David Wilkinson notes that the
plaque is now positioned on the front wall of the garden, immediately to the
right of the entrance steps rather than in its original position around the
corner. The NCLS is indebted Mayes and
other members who sent letters to the Montpellier Mayor's office through
Jacques Temple (see NCLSN, 29.2.3-4).
In addition to the letters
to Goldring, member Steele also obtained a copy of the following letter
which
is listed below in Checklist form:
O'Donnell, Mr.; 1 letter
1
– 3 September 1933 – London [Chatto & Windus address], WU.
Professor
Steele also obtained a copy of the letter to Jack Bray which is listed in the Checklist but for which the date should
be 11 October 1923.
NCLS Member J. Howard Woolmer lists three of
RA's books in a recent catalogue: The
Colonel's Daughter (1931), one of 200 signed copies; A Tourist's Rome (1961); D.H.
Lawrence (1935).
New
NCLS member Daniel Kempton, who is a member of the Department of English, SUNY
New Paltz and secretary of the RAIS, visited RA's library last year and writes
for us of "Richard Aldington's Library in Mason Sallé":
Some 300 of Richard Aldington's
books remain in Maison Sallé, meticulously catalogued by Jelka Kershaw, current
owner of the house in which Aldington last lived. In May of 2001, Mme. Kershaw graciously allowed me to examine the
collection, which is a valuable resource for scholars that the newly formed
International Richard Aldington Society is dedicated to maintaining.
An afternoon's research uncovered
the following (undated) inscriptions by Lawrence Durrell:
In Bitter Lemons:
Richard Aldington from Larry Durrell
Bon voyage!
Sommiers
In Esprit de Corps:
My dear RA—for the odd chuckle
In season I hope
In White Eagles over Serbia:
Dear Richard—
Aimed at your age-group but at
[illegible] of 15!
What fun to see you however briefly—
So try and come down more often.
The afternoon also yielded the
following notes, in Aldington's distinctively acerbic voice, written at
the end of selected
volumes of Harpers English Men of Letters series (John Morley, ed.):
Francis Bacon by R.W. Church, 1884.
"A just, sensible and
intelligent estimate of a great man who is greatly misesteemed. The good Dean writes better than many of his
English colleagues, & his brave tolerance is a lesson to us all."
Alexander Pope by Leslie Stephen, 1880.
"In this book Stephen shows
himself as a prude, a bit of a pedant and something of a prig. His parade of moral superiority to Pope is
offensive. So is his affectation of
superiority in philosophy to Voltaire and Pope. This is the more ridiculous as he is not widely acquainted with
poetry. For example, he does not appear
to know that Gay's poem (quoted p. 81) is a paraphrase of a canto in Ariosto's
Orlando Furioso. He does not even mention
the edition of selections from Italian neo-Latin poets (published with Pope's
name on the title page) which certainly mis[illegible] several passages,
especially in the Rape of the Lock. The
remarks on pastoral poetry show great insensitiveness. Worst of all in a biography, Stephen is
quite incapable of bringing alive any character, even that of his
hero." [To be concluded in the
next issue of the NCLSN.]