Acquisitions (112): John Betjeman

John Betjeman: The Illustrated Summoned by Bells (1989)

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Sir John Betjeman (1906-1984)

John Betjeman: The Illustrated Summoned by Bells (1989)
[Bought in Colonial Collectables, Browns Bay, Auckland - 15/5/24]:

John Betjeman. The Illustrated Summoned by Bells. 1960. Paintings and Sketches by Hugh Casson. 1989. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd. / The Herbert Press, 1995.

John Guest, ed.: The Best of Betjeman (1978))

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The Best of Betjeman

"John Betjeman was a mediocre poet – but he wrote one brilliant poem," according to a British newspaper pundit by the name of Simon Heffer. Of Betjeman's verse autobiography, Summoned by Bells, Heffer opines: "It isn’t doggerel, but it hardly qualifies as poetry. Less thought seems to have gone into his rhymes than into [his] television scripts." [NB: Summoned by Bells is written in non-rhyming blank verse].

I then revisited the Collected Poems, and found one undemanding bit of verse after another, reaffirming my belief that this was poetry for people who don’t like their verse too profound, or too strenuously poetic.

Well, f-- you very much for that little contribution, Simon. You can leave now.

His article as a whole does rather put one in mind of a celebrated passage from Summoned by Bells itself:

After Miss Usher had gone home to Frant,
Miss Tunstall took me quietly to the hedge:
"Now shall I tell you what Miss Usher said
About you, John?" "Oh please, Miss Tunstall, do!"
"She said you were a common little boy."

[chap. 4 - "Cornwall in Childhood": p.49]

Sir James Gunn: Conversation piece (G. K. Chesterton; Maurice Baring; Hilaire Belloc) (1932)

It's not that Heffer doesn't have a point. His summary of Betjeman as a "comic poet in the mould of Belloc or Chesterton" has a certain justice to it. But I doubt that he knows as much as he thinks about poets and poetry if he believes that those two "had poetry as a sideline, but, unlike Betjeman, had no pretensions about it."

We may prefer the Father Brown stories and Belloc's Cautionary Tales to their more formal verses, but like virtually all writers in this medium, they took what they did desperately seriously. Does Heffer imagine that it's accidental that all three of these poets remain so readable when their more ambitious contemporaries have faded into the dust of second-hand bookshops?

The Times: The Death of King George V (20 January, 1936)

And what is that "one brilliant poem" which, in Heffer's estimation, redeems poor old John? Well, not to keep you in suspense, it's "Betjeman’s poem of 1936 on the death of King George V."

Not only is it to my mind his greatest poem, but one of the great English poems of the last century. Unlike so much of his work, it does not instantly invite parody; its greatness lies in its acute and concise portrayal of the king, and the sense that his death moved Britain from one way of life to another.

So let's hear it, then:

Spirit of well-shot woodcock, partridge, snipe
Flutter and bear him up the Norfolk sky:
In that red house in a red mahogany book-case
The stamp collection waits with mounts long dry.

The big blue eyes are shut which saw wrong clothing
And favourite fields and coverts from a horse;
Old men in country houses hear clocks ticking
Over thick carpets with a deadened force;

Old men who never cheated, never doubted,
Communicated monthly, sit and stare
At the new suburb stretched beyond the runway
Where a young man lands hatless from the air.

John Betjeman: Continual Dew: A Little Book of Bourgeois Verse (1937)

I agree that it's a bloody good poem - very much in Betjeman's earlier mode: "Death in Leamington" or "The Arrest of Oscar Wilde at the Cadogan Hotel." But is it really so much better than the rest of the work in Mount Zion or Continual Dew? Heffer thinks so:

A world of standards and tradition is being blown away by the sub-art deco sprawl of Metroland, by a king (Edward VIII) who is consorting with another man’s wife, and who doesn’t even bother to wear a hat. It takes a considerable poet to force all that meaning into 12 lines. On that basis, and however ordinary so much of his output, Betjeman the poet merits admiration after all.

Praise from Sir Hubert is praise indeed ... Actually, in his graceless, grudging, bovine way, Simon Heffer has stumbled on an important truth about Betjeman. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day! The fact is, all of his readers - even his greatest admirers - find his fluent facetiousness wearying at times. But all of them make an exception for one great poem.

The funny thing, which old Dumbo above was on the verge of discovering, is that it's always a different poem. For me "Death in Leamington" has a sinister edge below the pastiche Victorianism which transforms it from verse to poetry. I can read it again and again and it keeps on changing.

I also like the way Betjeman is so adept at delivering painful stingers in the midst of otherwise fairly ordinary narrative verse. I've already given one example above, but here's another, from "False Security" (1954):

Can I forget my delight at the conjuring show?
And wasn't I proud that I was the last to go?
Too overexcited and pleased with myself to know
That the words I heard my hostess's mother employ
To a guest departing, would ever diminish my joy,
I WONDER WHERE JULIA FOUND THAT STRANGE, RATHER COMMON LITTLE BOY?

Then there's the culmination of "Cricket Master: An Incident" (1960):

"D'you know what Winters told me, Betjeman?
He didn't think you'd ever held a bat."

John Betjeman: Summoned by Bells (1960)

The other day I was looking around an antique shop in Browns Bay when I came across a copy of the illustrated version of Summoned by Bells. I already had the edition above, but it seemed worthwhile to invest a few dollars in the rather charming drawings and watercolours with which Betjeman's old friend Hugh Casson adorned the book.

Uffington Museum: Archie and the Poet (2023)

Rereading it, I was struck again by the intense class anxiety which seems to lie at the root of his work - as with so many other English writers. Betjeman's teddy bear Archie (full name Archibald Ormsby-Gore) is alleged to have been the original for Sebastian Flyte's Aloysius, so perhaps Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited remains the best starting point for anyone seeking to fathom these complexities.

Brideshead Revisited: Sebastian, Aloysius, & Charles (1981)

As a mere colonial, I fear that I'm outside all that (or beneath it, as my old friend Martin Frost was wont to remark). Leaving that to one side, though, rereading Summoned by Bells also reminded me of the bibliographical complexities that surround Betjeman's (so-called) Collected Poems, in its various incarnations.

John Betjeman's Collected Poems (1958)

Why, for instance, in the latest (2006) edition of this much revised and expanded book, does the poem "Cricket Master" appear twice, at the end of High and Low (1966) and then again as an addendum to Summoned by Bells?

John Betjeman: Collected Poems (2006)

In his Guardian review of the above volume, poet and editor Anthony Thwaite complained:

In his introduction, [Andrew] Motion ... says that "there is still a lack of academic interest in his work ... and no properly edited edition of his poems". You can say that again. For many years, including in his lifetime, Betjeman, in spite of the superficial elegance of production of his books, was textually mangled - in minor ways, true; but in a poem every detail matters. In a review of the 1958 Collected Poems (the book that famously sold in its hundreds of thousands), Philip Larkin commented: "I hereby offer to correct the proofs of Betjeman's next book of poems for nothing, if that is the only way to protect them from such blemishes". (He cited the perpetuation of "Chirst" for "Christ" and "that I wanted" instead of "what I wanted".)
I don't know whose fault such things were or are: I have the feeling that Betjeman was a careless proof-reader. For many years, the final stanza of his marvellously chilling poem of childhood dread, "NW5 and N6", was marred by a full stop missing at the end of the penultimate line: it has at least been put right in this edition. But there are several niggling errors in the book too: a stray lower-case for upper-case in the last line of "Thoughts in a Train", a comma instead of a full stop in "Before the Lecture". Something has gone wrong with the punctuation in the middle of "An Ecumenical Invitation", and again in the second stanza of "To Stuart Piggott".
... As for the gaps, they lie at both ends, poems missing from Betjeman's first two books (Mount Zion, 1931, and Continual Dew, 1937), and retrievals from his laureate years. It's surely a pity, in Collected Poems, to omit such early sportive pieces as "School Song", "The Garden City" or "Tea with the Poets" ("Tucking in at whipped cream walnuts, / Blue shorts bursting under green, / C Day Lewis brings his wolf cubs / Safe into the full canteen").
For completeness, too, there should be room for Betjeman's honest and dutiful efforts on official occasions, such as his poem for Prince Charles's wedding to Lady Diana in 1981, however sadly it reads now: it's certainly no worse than some of Ted Hughes's laureate verses.
Betjeman, altogether, is so good, and so important (a judgment at which he would no doubt have guffawed), that John Murray, the firm that has for so many years published his work and benefited from its large sales, should put in hand a properly edited full-scale edition of his poems, in a handsome uniform typeface (the variations in the present book are ugly) and on good paper, not nasty, already yellowing stuff.

John Betjeman: Harvest Bells: New and Uncollected Poems (2019)

This situation doesn't seem to have been redressed as yet, but we live in hope. Perhaps Kevin J. Gardner's book of "New and Uncollected Poems", Harvest Bells, will fill the more obvious gaps. It'd be better to have something reasonably definitive to rely on, though.

John Betjeman: Mount Zion; or, In Touch with the Infinite (1931)

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Martin Jennings: John Betjeman at St Pancras Station (2012)

John Betjeman
(1906-1984)

Poetry:


1. Mount Zion (1931)
   • Mount Zion; or, In Touch with the Infinite. Illustrated by de Cronin Hastings et al. 1931. Poetry Reprint Series, 4. London: St. James Press / New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1975.
2. Continual Dew, a Little Book of Bourgeois Verse (1937)
3. [as 'Epsilon'] Sir John Piers (1938)
4. Old Lights for New Chancels, Verses Topographical and Amatory (1940)
5. New Bats in Old Belfries (1945)
6. Slick but not Streamlined. Introduction by W. H. Auden (1947)
7. Selected Poems. Preface by John Sparrow (1948)
8. St. Katherine's Church, Chiselhampton, Oxfordshire: Verses Turned in Aid of a Public Subscription towards the Restoration of the Church (1950)
9. A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
10. Poems in the Porch (1954)
    • Poems in the Porch. Illustrated by John Piper. S. P. C. K. Saffron Waldon, Essex: The Talbot Press, 1954.
11. Collected Poems. Ed. the Earl of Birkenhead (1958)
    • John Betjeman’s Collected Poems: Enlarged Edition. Ed. The Earl of Birkenhead. 1958, 1962. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd., 1970.
    • Collected Poems. Ed. The Earl of Birkenhead. 1958, 1962, 1970, 1979. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd., 1989.
    • Collected Poems. 1958. Introduction by Andrew Motion. John Murray (Publishers). London: Hodder Headline, 2006.
12. John Betjeman [selected poems] (1958)
13. Lament for Moira McCavendish [limited edition of 20 copies] (c. 1958–59)
14. Summoned by Bells (1960)
    • Summoned by Bells. 1960. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd. / Readers Union Ltd., 1962.
    • The Illustrated Summoned by Bells. 1960. Paintings and Sketches by Hugh Casson. 1989. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd. / The Herbert Press, 1995.
15. A Ring of Bells (1962)
16. High and Low (1966)
17. Six Betjeman Songs (1967)
18. A Wembley Lad and The Crem (1971)
19. A Nip in the Air (1974)
    • A Nip in the Air. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd., 1974.
20. Betjeman in Miniature: Selected Poems of Sir John Betjeman (1976)
21. The Best of Betjeman. Ed. John Guest (1978)
    • The Best of Betjeman. Ed. John Guest. London: John Murray / Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1978.
22. Five Betjeman Songs (1980)
23. Ode on the Marriage of HRH Prince Charles to Lady Diana Spencer [limited edition of 125 copies] (1980)
24. Church Poems (1981)
25. Uncollected Poems (1982)
26. Betjeman's Cornwall (1984)
27. Ah Middlesex [limited edition of 250 copies] (1984)
28. Harvest Bells: New and Uncollected Poems. Ed. Kevin J. Gardner (2019)

Non-fiction:


29. Ghastly Good Taste (1933)
30. Devon. Shell Guides series (1936)
31. An Oxford University Chest. Photographs by László Moholy-Nagy. Illustrations by Osbert Lancaster & Edward Bradley (1938)
    • An Oxford University Chest. Illustrated by L. Moholy-Nagy, Osbert Lancaster, the Rev. Edward Bradley et al. 1938. Oxford Paperbacks. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979.
32. [with Hugh Casson] A Handbook on Paint (1939)
33. Antiquarian Prejudice (1939)
34. Vintage London (1942)
35. English Cities and Small Towns (1943)
36. John Piper (1944)
37. [with C. S. Lewis et al.] Five Sermons by Laymen (1946)
38. [with John Piper] Murray's Buckinghamshire Architectural Guide (1948)
39. [with John Piper] Murray's Berkshire Architectural Guide (1949)
40. [with L. V. Grinsell, H. B. Wells & H. S. Tallamy] Studies in the History of Swindon (1950)
41. Shropshire – with maps and illustrations. Shell Guides series (1951)
42. The English Scene (1951)
43. First and Last Loves (1952)
    • First and Last Loves. Drawings by John Piper. 1952. A Grey Arrow. London: Arrow Books Ltd., 1960.
44. Gala Day London (1953)
45. The English Town in the Last Hundred Years [The Rede Lecture] (1956)
46. Some Immortal Hours (1957)
47. Collins Guide to English Parish Churches, including the Isle of Man (1958)
48. [as "Richard M Farren"] Ground Plan to City Skyline (1960)
49. Clifton College Buildings (1962)
50. [with Basil Clarke] English Churches (1964)
51. The City of London Churches. Pitkin Pride of Britain series (1965)
52. Collins Pocket Guide to English Parish Churches. 2 vols (1968)
53. Victorian and Edwardian London From Old Photographs (1969)
54. Ten Wren Churches [limited edition of 100 copies] (1970)
55. [with J. S. Gray] Victorian and Edwardian Brighton From Old Photographs (1971)
56. A Pictorial History of English Architecture (1972)
57. London's Historic Railway Stations (1972)
58. [with David Vaisey] Victorian and Edwardian Oxford From Old Photographs (1972)
59. West Country Churches (1973)
60. A Plea for Holy Trinity Church, Sloane Street (1974)
61. [with A. L. Rowse] Victorian and Edwardian Cornwall From Old Photographs (1974)
62. Archie and the Strict Baptists (1977)
63. Metro-land (1977)
64. John Betjeman: Coming Home (1997)
    • Coming Home: An Anthology of His Prose 1920-1977. Ed. Candida Lycett Green. Methuen. London: Random House, 1997.
65. Trains and Buttered Toast: Betjeman's best BBC radio talks. Ed. Stephen Games (2006)
66. Tennis Whites and Teacakes: An anthology of Betjeman's prose, verse and occasional writing. Ed. Stephen Games (2007)
67. Sweet Songs of Zion: Betjeman's radio programmes about English hymn-writing. Ed. Stephen Games (2007)
68. Betjeman's England: Betjeman's best topographical television programmes. Ed. Stephen Games (2009)

Edited:


69. Cornwall Illustrated. Shell Guides series (1934)
70. [with Geoffrey Taylor] English Scottish and Welsh Landscape 1700–1860 (1944)
    • English Scottish & Welsh Landscape: 1700-c.1860. Ed. John Betjeman & Geoffrey Taylor. With Original Lithographs by John Piper. New Excursions into English Poetry. Ed. W. J. Turner & Sheila Shannon. London: Frederick Muller Ltd., 1944.
71. Watergate Children's Classics (1947)
72. [with Geoffrey Taylor] English Love Poems (1957)
73. An American's Guide to English Parish Churches, Including the Isle of Man (1958)
74. Altar and Pew: Church of England Verses (1959)
75. Charles Tennyson Turner: A Hundred Sonnets (1960)
76. [with Winnifred Hindley] A Wealth of Poetry (1963)
77. John Masefield: Selected Poems (1978)
    • John Masefield: Selected Poems. Preface by John Betjeman. London: Book Club Associates, 1978.

Letters:


78. John Betjeman's Letters: Volume One. Ed. Candida Lycett Green (1994)
79. John Betjeman's Letters: Volume Two. Ed. Candida Lycett Green (1995)


Secondary:


80. Hillier, Bevis, ed. John Betjeman: A Life in Pictures. London: John Murray (Publishers ) Ltd. / The Herbert Press Ltd., 1984.
81. Hillier, Bevis. Young Betjeman. 1988. London: Cardinal Books, 1989.
82. Hillier, Bevis. John Betjeman: New Fame, New Love. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd., 2002.
83. Hillier, Bevis. Betjeman: The Bonus of Laughter. 2004. Hodder Headline. London: John Murray (Publishers) Ltd., 2005.

Humphrey Carpenter: The Brideshead Generation: Evelyn Waugh and His Friends (1990)

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• category - English Poetry (post-1900): Alphabetical

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Acquisitions (96): Vita Sackville-West

Vita Sackville-West: The Land & The Garden (1989)

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Vita Sackville-West: Vita Sackville-West (1915)



Vita Sackville-West: The Land & The Garden (1989)
[Finally Books - Hospice Bookshop, Birkenhead - 18/7/2023]:

Vita Sackville-West. The Land & The Garden: A New Edition. 1927 & 1946. Illustrated by Peter Firmin. Introduction by Nigel Nicolson. Exeter, Devon: Webb & Bower (Publishers) Limited, 1989.

Vita Sackville-West: The Land (1926)

The Land

As we were watching Christopher Nolan's brilliant new movie Oppenheimer the other day, I noticed a copy of T. S. Eliot's Waste Land among the books piled on the angst-ridden young physicist's bedside table.

T. S. Eliot: The Waste Land (1922)

April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain ...

They're probably the best-known lines in twentieth-century poetry.

Mind you, these cinematic pans over the shelves to establish the credentials of a protagonist as an all-round brainbox are a fairly familiar device: the one in Apocalypse Now, where Colonel Kurtz's books are shown to include well-thumbed copies of Frazer's Golden Bough and Jessie Weston's From Ritual to Romance, is justly famous.

Christopher Nolan, dir.: Oppenheimer (2023)

Christopher Nolan is (imho) right not to despise these humble tools of the historical filmmaker. It makes sense in context, and fits in with the emphasis on Sanskrit - also extensively referenced in Eliot's poem - later on the film.

What struck me about it most, though, was the date. Eliot's poem first appeared in 1922, when it caused an immediate sensation. Vita Sackville-West, whose long pastoral poem The Land I bought a copy of the other day in a Hospice Shop, wrote most of it in exile in Persia, where her husband Harold Nicolson's diplomatic posting had taken the young couple.

I'm not, it would appear, the first to spot the resemblance between the two books:

Some critics have read Sackville-West’s poem as a response to the bleaker outlook and modernist style of T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, which was published four years prior. Where Eliot’s work is famously difficult, pushing the boundaries of form, Sackville-West’s turn to tradition can be seen as an act of literary conservatism.

- Wikipedia

Hers begins (not quite so catchily):

I sing the cycle of my country's year,
I sing the tillage, and the reaping sing,
Classic monotony, that modes and wars
Leave undisturbed, unbettered, for their best
Was born immediate, of expediency ...

Virginia Woolf: Orlando: A Biography (1928)

Despite the defiant conservatism - and rather forced classicism - of her poetry (she admitted later to not having read Virgil's Georgics - the obvious prototype for The Land - until she was halfway through her own epic), within a couple of years of its publication Vita Sackville-West would inspire what her son Nigel Nicolson called "the longest and most charming love letter in literature": her friend (and lover) Virginia Woolf's strange, history-bending, gender-fluid novel Orlando - perhaps more familiar to many of us from Sally Potter's 1992 film adaptation:

Sally Potter, dir.: Orlando (1992)

So there you have it - on the one hand, a fussily dressed, bowler-hatted banker, soon to turn gentleman-publisher, whose private life was a long struggle against the anarchic disorder represented by his first wife Vivienne:

‘My nerves are bad tonight. Yes, bad. Stay with me.
Speak to me. Why do you never speak. Speak.
What are you thinking of? What thinking? What?
I never know what you are thinking. Think.’

I think we are in rats’ alley
Where the dead men lost their bones.

On the other hand, we have an androgynous, bisexual rebel, married to a closeted homosexual diplomat and politician. Who's the maverick now?

Brian Gilbert, dir.: Tom & Viv (1994)

Putting it another way, any attempts which have so far been made to dramatise T. S. Eliot's private life have foundered on the fact that most people would rather read him than read about him. He's just not that interesting once you get him off the page. It's the discordant, jazz age cacophany of Eliot's nightmarish vision of London in the First World War that counts - not the sad details of his admittedly tempestuous marriage.

Stephen Whittaker, dir.: Portrait of a Marriage (1990)

Vita, by contrast, is rather dull on the page - despite her immense industry as a novelist, biographer, and writer about gardens (her true passion, we're told) - but riveting to read about. The epigraph to the miniseries above - based on Nigel Nicolson's bestselling book about his parents - says it all: "They both took lovers - of either sex ..." Who wouldn't want to hear about all that?

Sarah Raven: Vita Sackville-West's Sissinghurst: The Creation of a Garden (2014)

And then, of course, there's Sissinghurst, the magnificent garden these two ill-assorted people created together. That, rather than The Land, is probably their true legacy - and the best tribute they could pay to the eternal verities of the English countryside. It's now run for the National Trust by Adam Nicolson, Vita and Harold's grandson, in partnership with his wife Sarah Raven, author of the book above.

Adam Nicolson: Sissinghurst: An Unfinished Story (2009)

Clearly authorship runs in the blood, as Adam too has written a book on the subject.

Harold Nicolson: Diaries and Letters (3 vols: 1966-68)

Once you get started on collecting books about the Sackville-West / Nicolson axis, though, it soon becomes apparent that there's no real end to it. Another recent find in a local secondhand shop was the three volumes of Harold Nicolson's diary, edited - like Portrait of a Marriage - by his long-suffering son Nigel. I haven't yet read it, but it's said to be one of the great twentieth-century diaries, if only for its insider's view of British politics before, during and after the Second World War.

In the meantime, the Virginia Woolf connection alone continues to spawn theses and books by the cartload, as the cartoon below attests:

Summer Pierre: The Love Letters of Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West (2021)

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William Strang: Lady with a Red Hat (1918)

Victoria Mary Sackville-West, The Hon Lady Nicolson
[Vita Sackville-West]
(1892-1962)

Books I own are marked in bold:

Peter Firmin: Illustration for The Land & The Garden (1989)

Poetry:


1. Timgad (1900)
2. Constantinople: Eight Poems (1915)
3. Poems of West & East (1917)
4. The Land (1926)
   • The Land. 1926. Windmill Library. London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1933.
   • Included in: The Land & The Garden: A New Edition. 1927 & 1946. Illustrated by Peter Firmin. Introduction by Nigel Nicolson. Exeter, Devon: Webb & Bower (Publishers) Limited, 1989.
5. King's Daughter (1929)
6. Invitation to Cast Out Care (1931)
7. Sissinghurst (1931
8. Collected Poems (1933)
9. Solitude: A Poem (1938)
10. The Garden (1946)
    • Included in: The Land & The Garden: A New Edition. 1927 & 1946. Illustrated by Peter Firmin. Introduction by Nigel Nicolson. Exeter, Devon: Webb & Bower (Publishers) Limited, 1989.
11. Lost poem (or A Madder Caress) (2013)

Fiction:


12. Heritage (1919)
13. The Dragon in Shallow Waters (1920)
14. Challenge (1920)
15. Orchard and Vineyard: Stories (1921)
16. The Heir: A Love Story (1922)
    • Included in: Seducers in Ecuador & The Heir. 1924, 1922. Introduction by Lisa St Aubin de Terán. Virago Modern Classics. London: Virago Press Limited, 1997.
17. Grey Wethers: A Romantic Novel (1923)
18. Seducers in Ecuador (1924)
    • Included in: Seducers in Ecuador & The Heir. 1924, 1922. Introduction by Lisa St Aubin de Terán. Virago Modern Classics. London: Virago Press Limited, 1997.
19. The Edwardians (1930)
20. All Passion Spent (1931)
21. Family History (1932)
22. The Death of Noble Godavary (1932)
23. Thirty Clocks Strike the Hour, and Other Stories (1932)
24. The Dark Island (1934)
25. Grand Canyon: A Novel (1942)
26. Devil at Westease: The Story as Related by Roger Liddiard (1947)
27. Nursery Rhymes (1947)
28. The Easter Party (1953)
29. No Signposts in the Sea (1961)

Children's Books:


30. A Note of Explanation [written for Queen Mary's Dolls' House in 1924] (2017)

Plays:


31. Chatterton: A Drama in Three Acts (1909)

Biographies:


32. Aphra Behn, the incomparable Astrea (1927)
33. Andrew Marvell (1929)
34. Saint Joan of Arc (1936)
35. Pepita (1937)
36. The Eagle and the Dove, a Study in Contrasts: St. Teresa of Avila and St. Thérèse of Lisieux (1943)
37. Walter de la Mare and The Traveller (1953)
38. Daughter of France: the life of Anne Marie Louise d'Orléans, Duchesse de Montpensier, 1627-1693, La Grande Mademoiselle (1959)

Guides & Travel-Books:


39. Knole and the Sackvilles (1922)
40. Passenger to Teheran (1926)
41. Twelve Days: An Account of a Journey across the Bakhtiari Mountains of South-western Persia [aka Twelve Days in Persia] (1927)
42. [with Beverley Nichols, Compton Mackenzie, & Marion Dudley Cran] How Does Your Garden Grow? (1935)
43. Some Flowers (1937)
44. Country Notes (1939)
45. Country Notes in Wartime (1940)
46. English Country Houses (1941)
47. The Women's Land Army (1944)
48. Exhibition Catalogue: Elizabethan Portraits (1947)
49. Knole, Kent (1948)
50. In Your Garden (1951)
51. In Your Garden Again (1953)
52. More for Your Garden (1955)
53. Even More for Your Garden (1958)
54. Joy of Gardening: A Selection for Americans (1958)
55. Berkeley Castle (1960)
56. Faces: Profiles of Dogs. Photographs by Laelia Goehr (1961)
57. Garden Book (1975)
58. Hidcote Manor Garden, Gloucestershire (1976)
59. Une Anglaise en Orient (1993)

Translations:


60. Rainer Maria Rilke. Duineser Elegien: Elegies from the Castle of Duino. Trans. V. & Edward Sackville-West (1931)

Edited:


61. Another World Than This ..: An Anthology (1945)



Nigel Nicolson: Portrait of a Marriage (1990)


Letters:


62. Dearest Andrew: letters from V. Sackville-West to Andrew Reiber, 1951-1962 (1979)
63. The Letters of Vita Sackville-West to Virginia Woolf. Ed. Louise A. DeSalvo & Mitchell A. Leaska (1984)
    • The Letters of Vita Sackville-West to Virginia Woolf. Ed. Louise DeSalvo & Mitchell A. Leaska. 1984. London: Virago Press Limited, 1992.
64. Vita and Harold: The Letters of Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicolson (1992)
    • Vita & Harold: The Letters of Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicolson, 1910-1962. Ed. Nigel Nicolson. 1992. A Phoenix Paperback. London: Orion Books Ltd., 1993.
65. Violet to Vita: The Letters of Violet Trefusis to Vita Sackville-West, 1910–1921. Ed. Mitchell A. Leaska & John Phillips (1991)
66. Portrait of a Marriage: Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicolson. Ed. Nigel Nicolson (1973)
    • Nicolson, Nigel. Portrait of a Marriage. 1973. London: George Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd., 1990.
    • Nicolson, Nigel. Portrait of a Marriage. 1973. Illustrated Edition. London: George Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd., 1990.
67. [with Virginia Woolf] Love Letters: Vita and Virginia. Introduction by Alison Bechdel (2021)

Secondary:


68. Bell, Quentin. Virginia Woolf: A Biography. 2 vols. 1972. A Paladin Book. Frogmore, St. Albans, Herts.: Triad Paperbacks Ltd., 1976.
69. Glendinning, Victoria. Vita: The Life of V. Sackville-West. 1983. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1984.
70. Nicolson, Harold. Diaries and Letters 1930–1939. Ed. Nigel Nicolson. 1966. London: William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd., 1967.
71. Nicolson, Harold. Diaries and Letters 1939–1945. Ed. Nigel Nicolson. London: William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd., 1967.
72. Nicolson, Harold. Diaries and Letters 1945–1962. Ed. Nigel Nicolson. London: William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd., 1968.
73. Woolf, Virginia. Orlando: A Biography. 1928. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1945.
74. The Diary of Virginia Woolf. Ed. Anne Olivier Bell, with Andrew McNeillie. Introduction by Quentin Bell. 5 vols. 1977-84. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979-85.
75. The Letters of Virginia Woolf. Ed. Nigel Nicolson, with Joanne Trautmann. 6 vols. London: The Hogarth Press, 1975-1980.
    1. The Flight of the Mind: 1888-1912 (Virginia Stephen) (1975)
    2. The Question of Things Happening: 1912-1922 (1976)
    3. A Change of Perspective: 1923-1928 (1977)
    4. A Reflection of the Other Person: 1929-1931 (1978)
    5. The Sickle Side of the Moon: 1932-1935 (1979)
    6. Leave the Letters Till We're Dead: 1936-1941. 1980 (1983)

Virginia Woolf & Vita Sackville-West: Love Letters (2021)

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• category - English Poetry (post-1900): Alphabetical

•

Acquisitions (7): Raymond Chandler

Raymond Chandler: The Complete Novels
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Raymond Chandler (1888-1959)

Chandler's Complete Novels (1989)

[Acquired: Thursday, November 1, 2012]:

Chandler, Raymond. The Big Sleep. 1939. Introduction by Frank MacShane. The Complete Novels, 1. London: The Folio Society, 1989.

Chandler, Raymond. Farewell My Lovely. 1939. The Complete Novels, 2. London: The Folio Society, 1989.

Chandler, Raymond. The High Window. 1943. The Complete Novels, 3. London: The Folio Society, 1989.

Chandler, Raymond. The Lady in the Lake. 1944. The Complete Novels, 4. London: The Folio Society, 1989.

Chandler, Raymond. The Little Sister. 1949. The Complete Novels, 5. London: The Folio Society, 1989.

Chandler, Raymond. The Long Goodbye. 1953. The Complete Novels, 6. London: The Folio Society, 1989.

Chandler, Raymond. Playback. 1958. The Complete Novels, 6. London: The Folio Society, 1989.

The Unicorn Bookshop in Warkworth has a long shelf of Folio Society editions of various classic books, and this one caught my eye when I was in there with David Howard a few weeks ago. This time I couldn't resist it. I love Chandler's stylised and mannered prose, and admire - above all - his ability to constantly reinvent himself.

There's no mention of an illustrator for the various prints and embellishments in this set, which seems a bit careless. It's certainly very styly, though. I see that there's an accompanying volume of short stories, but I already have those in other forms.

And here's a link to a fascinating list of all the Folio Society series (i.e.: sets of five books or more) to date.

Raymond Chandler: The Complete Novels and Stories (1989, 2006-7)

•


Raymond Chandler

Raymond Thornton Chandler
(1888-1959)

Novels:


1. The Big Sleep [Based on "Killer in the Rain" (1935) & "The Curtain" (1936)] (1939)
   • The Big Sleep. 1939. Introduction by Frank MacShane. The Complete Novels, 1. London: The Folio Society, 1989.
2. Farewell, My Lovely [Based on "The Man Who Liked Dogs" (1936), "Try The Girl" (1937) & "Mandarin's Jade" (1937)] (1940)
   • Farewell My Lovely. 1939. The Complete Novels, 2. London: The Folio Society, 1989.
3. The High Window (1942)
   • The High Window. 1943. The Complete Novels, 3. London: The Folio Society, 1989.
4. The Lady in the Lake [Based on "Bay City Blues" (1938), "The Lady In The Lake" (1939), "No Crime In The Mountains" (1941)] (1943)
   • The Lady in the Lake. 1944. The Complete Novels, 4. London: The Folio Society, 1989.
5. The Little Sister [Scenes based on "Bay City Blues" (1938)] (1949)
   • The Little Sister. 1949. The Complete Novels, 5. London: The Folio Society, 1989.
6. The Long Good-bye [Scenes based on "The Curtain" (1936)] (1953)
   • The Long Goodbye. 1953. The Complete Novels, 6. London: The Folio Society, 1989.
7. Playback [Based on an unproduced screenplay] (1958)
   • Playback. 1958. The Complete Novels, 7. London: The Folio Society, 1989.
8. [with Robert B. Parker] Poodle Springs (1959 & 1989)
   • [with Robert B. Parker] Poodle Springs. 1959 & 1989. A Macdonald Book. London: Macdonald & Co. (Publishers) Ltd., 1990.

Short Story Collections:


9. Five Murderers (1944)
   1. Goldfish
   2. Spanish Blood
   3. Blackmailers Don't Shoot
   4. Guns at Cyrano's
   5. Nevada Gas
10. Five Sinister Characters (1945)
    1. Trouble is My Business
    2. Pearls Are a Nuisance
    3. I'll Be Waiting
    4. The King in Yellow
    5. Red Wind
11. Red Wind (1946)
    1. Red Wind
    2. Blackmailers Don't Shoot
    3. I'll Be Waiting
    4. Goldfish
    5. Guns at Cyrano's
12. Spanish Blood (1946)
    1. Spanish Blood
    2. The King in Yellow
    3. Pearls Are a Nuisance
    4. Nevada Gas
    5. Trouble is My Business
13. Finger Man, and Other Stories (1947)
    1. Finger Man
    2. The Bronze Door
    3. Smart-Aleck Kill
    4. The Simple Art of Murder
14. The Simple Art of Murder (1950) [SAM]
    1. Finger Man
    2. Smart-Aleck Kill
    3. Guns at Cyrano's
    4. Pick-up on Noon Street
    5. Goldfish
    6. The King in Yellow
    7. Pearls Are a Nuisance
    8. I'll Be Waiting
    9. Red Wind
    10. Nevada Gas
    11. Spanish Blood
    12. Trouble is My Business
    13. The Simple Art of Murder: An Essay
    • The Simple Art of Murder. 1950. Vintage Books. New York: Random House, 1988.
15. Trouble Is My Business (1950) [TB]
    1. Trouble Is My Business
    2. Red Wind
    3. I'll Be Waiting
    4. Goldfish
    5. Guns at Cyrano's
    • Trouble is My Business and Other Stories. 1950. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976.
16. Pick-up on Noon Street (1952)
    1. Pick-up on Noon Street
    2. Smart-Aleck Kill
    3. Guns at Cyrano's
    4. Nevada Gas
17. Smart-Aleck Kill (1953) [SAK]
    1. Smart-Aleck Kill
    2. Pick-up on Noon Street
    3. Nevada Gas
    4. Spanish Blood
    • Included in: The Chandler Collection, Volume 3: Pearls are a Nuisance / Smart-Aleck Kill / Killer in the Rain. 1958, 1953, 1964. Picador. London: Pan Books Ltd., 1984.
18. Pearls Are a Nuisance (1958) [PN]
    Introduction
    1. Pearls Are a Nuisance
    2. Finger Man
    3. The King in Yellow
    4. The Simple Art of Murder: An Essay
    • Included in: The Chandler Collection, Volume 3: Pearls are a Nuisance / Smart-Aleck Kill / Killer in the Rain. 1958, 1953, 1964. Picador. London: Pan Books Ltd., 1984.
19. Killer in the Rain (1964) [KR]
    1. Killer in the Rain
    2. The Man Who Liked Dogs
    3. The Curtain
    4. Try the Girl
    5. Mandarin's Jade
    6. Bay City Blues
    7. The Lady in the Lake
    8. No Crime in the Mountains
    • Included in: The Chandler Collection, Volume 3: Pearls are a Nuisance / Smart-Aleck Kill / Killer in the Rain. 1958, 1953, 1964. Picador. London: Pan Books Ltd., 1984.
20. The Smell of Fear (1965) [SoF]
    Introduction
    1. Blackmailers Don't Shoot
    2. Pearls Are a Nuisance
    3. Finger Man
    4. The King in Yellow
    5. Smart-Aleck Kill
    6. Pick-up on Noon Street
    7. Nevada Gas
    8. Spanish Blood
    9. Trouble is My Business
    10. Red Wind
    11. I'll Be Waiting
    12. Goldfish
    13. Guns at Cyrano's
    14. The Pencil
    • The Smell of Fear. 1965. London: Book Club Associates / Hamish Hamilton Ltd., 1983.
21. Raymond Chandler: Stories and Early Novels. Ed. Frank MacShane. Library of America, 79 (1995) [LoA1]
    Pulp Stories:
    1. Blackmailers Don’t Shoot
    2. Smart-Aleck Kill
    3. Finger Man
    4. Nevada Gas
    5. Spanish Blood
    6. Guns at Cyrano’s
    7. Pick-Up on Noon Street
    8. Goldfish
    9. Red Wind
    10. The King in Yellow
    11. Pearls Are a Nuisance
    12. Trouble Is My Business
    13. I’ll Be Waiting
22. Collected Stories (2002) [CS]
    1. Blackmailers Don't Shoot
    2. Smart-Aleck Kill
    3. Finger Man
    4. Killer in the Rain
    5. Nevada Gas
    6. Spanish Blood
    7. Guns at Cyrano's
    8. The Man Who Liked Dogs
    9. Pickup on Noon Street
    10. Goldfish
    11. The Curtain
    12. Try the Girl
    13. Mandarin's Jade
    14. Red Wind
    15. The King in Yellow
    16. Bay City Blues
    17. The Lady in the Lake
    18. Pearls are a Nuisance
    19. Trouble is My Business
    20. I'll Be Waiting
    21. The Bronze Door
    22. No Crime in the Mountains
    23. Professor Bingo's Snuff
    24. The Pencil
    25. English Summer
    • Collected Stories. Introduction by John Bayley. Everyman's Library, 257. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002.

Stories:


1. Blackmailers Don't Shoot (December 1933) [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
2. Smart-Aleck Kill (July 1934) [SAM] [SAK] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
3. Finger Man (October 1934) [SAM] [PN] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
4. Killer in the Rain (January 1935) [KR] [CS]
5. Nevada Gas (June 1935) [SAM] [SAK] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
6. Spanish Blood (November 1935) [SAM] [SAK] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
7. Guns at Cyrano's (July 1936) [SAM] [TB] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
8. The Man Who Liked Dogs (March 1936) [KR] [CS]
9. Pickup on Noon Street [aka "Noon Street Nemesis"] (May 30, 1936) [SAM] [SAK] [SoF][LoA1] [CS]
10. Goldfish (June 1936) [SAM] [TB] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
11. The Curtain (September 1936) [KR] [CS]
12. Try the Girl (January 1937) [KR] [CS]
13. Mandarin's Jade (November 1937) [KR] [CS]
14. Red Wind (January 1938) [SAM] [TB] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
15. The King in Yellow (March 1938) [SAM] [PN] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
16. Bay City Blues (June 1938) [KR] [CS]
17. The Lady in the Lake (January 1939) [KR] [CS]
18. Pearls are a Nuisance (April 1939) [SAM] [PN] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
19. Trouble is My Business (August 1939) [SAM] [TB] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
20. I'll Be Waiting (October 14, 1939) [SAM] [TB] [SoF] [LoA1] [CS]
21. The Bronze Door (November 1939) [CS]
22. No Crime in the Mountains (September 1941) [KR] [CS]
23. The Little Sister [Prepublication abridgement] (April 1949)
24. Professor Bingo's Snuff (June-July, 1951) [CS]
25. Playback [Serialisation] (October-November 1958)
26. The Pencil [aka "Marlowe Takes on the Syndicate", "Wrong Pigeon" & "Philip Marlowe's Last Case"] (April, 1959) [SoF] [CS]
27. English Summer (August 1976) [ES] [CS]

Miscellaneous:


23. Raymond Chandler on Writing [Pamphlet with material from Raymond Chandler Speaking] (1962)
24. Raymond Chandler Speaking. Ed. Dorothy Gardiner and Kathrine Sorley Walker (1962)
    • Raymond Chandler Speaking. Ed. Dorothy Gardiner & Kathrine Sorley Walker. 1962. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1977.
25. Chandler before Marlowe: Raymond Chandler's Early Prose and Poetry, 1908–1912. Ed. Matthew J. Bruccoli (1973)
26. The Notebooks of Raymond Chandler, and "English Summer: A Gothic Romance". Ed. Frank MacShane (1976) [ES]
    • The Notebooks of Raymond Chandler & English Summer: A Gothic Romance. Ed. Frank MacShane. Illustrated by Edward Gorey. 1976. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1977.
27. Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe: A Centennial Celebration [23 stories by various writers; also Chandler's "The Pencil"] (1990)
28. Raymond Chandler: Later Novels and Other Writings. Ed. Frank MacShane. Library of America, 80 (1995) [LoA2]
    Selected Essays:
    1. The Simple Art of Murder
    2. Writers in Hollywood
    3. Twelve Notes on the Mystery Story
    4. Notes on English and American Style
    5. Introduction to The Simple Art of Murder
29. The Raymond Chandler Papers: Selected Letters and Non-Fiction, 1909–1959. Ed. Tom Hiney and Frank MacShane (2000) [RCP]
    • The Raymond Chandler Papers: Selected Letters and Non-Fiction, 1909-1959. Ed. Tom Hiney & Frank MacShane. 2000. London: Penguin, 2001.
30. [with music by Julian Pascal] The Princess and the Pedlar [comic operetta libretto] 1917 (2014)

Articles, Essays, Reviews:


1. Review of The Broad Highway by Jeffery Farnol (March 18, 1911)
2. The Remarkable Hero (September 9, 1911) [RCP]
3. The Literary Fop (November 4, 1911)
4. Review of The Reason Why by Elinor Glyn (December 23, 1911)
5. Realism and Fairyland (January 6, 1912) [RCP]
6. The Tropical Romance (January 20, 1912)
7. Houses to Let (February 24, 1912)
8. The Art of Loving and Dying: Review of The Drama of Love and Death by Edward Carpenter (June 22, 1912)
9. The Rural Labourer at Home: Review of Change in the Village by George Bourne (June 22, 1912)
10. The Phrasemaker (June 29, 1912)
11. Letter: About the Article on Floral Arrangement (June 15, 1937)
12. A Second Letter from R C Esq (July 1, 1937)
13. The Simple Art of Murder (December 1944) [SAM] [PN] [LoA2]
14. Writers in Hollywood (November 1945) [LoA2]
15. The Hollywood Bowl: Review of The Golden Egg by James Pollock (January 1947)
16. Letter: 'Pros' and Cons (May 1947)
17. Critical Notes (July 1947)
18. Oscar Night in Hollywood (March 1948)
19. Studies in Extinction: Review of Murders Plain and Fanciful by James Sandoe (April 1948)
20. 10 Greatest Crimes of the Century (October 1948)
21. Introduction to The Simple Art of Murder (April 15, 1950) [PN] [SoF] [LoA2]
22. Letter (May 1951)
23. Ten Per Cent of Your Life (February 1952)
24. Autobiographical note (July 1952)
25. Letter: Ruth Ellis — Should She Hang (June 30, 1955)
26. A Letter From London (September 1955)
27. Bonded Goods: Review of Diamonds Are Forever by Ian Fleming (March 25, 1956)
28. Guest Column: Crosstown with Neil Morgan (March 1, 1957)
29. Raymond Chandler Writes a Blunt Letter to the Daily Express (June 18, 1957)
30. A Star Writer's Advice to Writers (and Editors) (June 18, 1957)
31. Guest Column: Crosstown with Neil Morgan (July 12, 1957)
32. Guest Column: Crosstown with Neil Morgan (March 8, 1958)
33. The Terrible Dr No: Review of Dr. No by Ian Fleming (March 30, 1958)
34. Detective Story as an Art Form (March 1959)
35. Guest Column: Crosstown with Neil Morgan (August 25, 1959)
36. Ian Fleming; Raymond Chandler [includes letters from Chandler] (December 1959)
37. Private Eye [Prepublication excerpts from Raymond Chandler Speaking] (February 25, 1962)
38. Farewell, My Hollywood [aka "A Qualified Farewell"] (June 1976) [ES]

Screenplays:


1. [With Billy Wilder] Double Indemnity [based on the novella by James M. Cain] (1944) [LoA2]
2. [With Frank Partos] And Now Tomorrow [based on the novel by Rachel Field] (1944)
3. [With Hagar Wilde] The Unseen [based on the novel by Ethel Lina White] (1945)
4. The Innocent Mrs. Duff [unproduced; based on The Innocent Mrs. Duff (1946)
5. The Blue Dahlia (1946)
   • The Blue Dahlia, dir. George Marshall, writ. Raymond Chandler – with Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, William Bendix – (USA, 1946) [DVD]
6. Playback [unproduced] (1947–48)
7. [With Czenzi Ormonde] Strangers on a Train [based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith] (1951)

Poems:


1. The Unknown Love (December 19, 1908)
2. The Poet's Knowledge (March 3, 1909)
3. The Soul's Defiance (March 5, 1909)
4. The Wheel (March 25, 1909)
5. Art (April 16, 1909)
6. A Woman's Way (April 22, 1909) [RCP]
7. The Quest (June 2, 1909)
8. When I was King (June 9, 1909)
9. The Hour of Chaos (June 18, 1909)
10. The Bed of Roses (June 29, 1909)
11. The Reformer (July 29, 1909)
12. The Perfect Knight (September 30, 1909)
13. The Pilgrim in Mediation (November 8, 1909)
14. The Pioneer (November 17, 1909)
15. The Hermit (February 28, 1910)
16. The Dancer (May 14, 1910)
17. The Death of the King (July 16, 1910)
18. The Clay God (January 4, 1911)
19. The Unseen Planets (April 21, 1911)
20. The Tears That Sweeten Woe (May 1, 1911)
21. The Fairy King (May 3, 1911)
22. Untitled (June 16, 1911)
23. The Genteel Artist (August 19, 1911)
24. An Old House (November 15, 1911)
25. The King (March 1, 1912)
26. Time Shall Not Die (April 25, 1912)

Letters:


31. Raymond Chandler and James M. Fox: Letters (1979)
32. Selected Letters of Raymond Chandler. Ed. Frank MacShane (1981)
    • Selected Letters of Raymond Chandler. Ed. Frank MacShane. 1981. Papermac. London: Macmillan Publishers Limited, 1983.

Secondary:


33. Gross, Miriam, ed. The World of Raymond Chandler. Introduction by Patricia Highsmith. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1977.
34. MacShane, Frank. The Life of Raymond Chandler. 1976. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979.

Library of America: The Raymond Chandler Edition (1995)

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• category - North American Fiction: Fiction

•