Letter from Edward Thomas to the poet Gordon Bottomley. Sent from Elses Farm, The Weald, Kent. Archival ref: 424/1/1/1/10/44
The Weals
24.ix.05

My dear Gordon
Helen goes away tomorrow
for at least a fortnight. So if I can
get away to you, I shall not be free until
about October 10. I hope to come,
tho I expect I must bring books with me,
if I may.
What an excellent plan I have
got of catching letters from you & by sending
my MSS. And many thanks for what you
say. I think you are right when you
say that 'masses of such visions should be
piled & reared together'" yet I am too
feeble & stupid to think hard about the
remedy. My excuse - that I am
too much disturbed by reviewing & have hold
troubles - might fairly be condemned
as a pretext; & yet if you knew my
almost daily agonies of fury, despair,
violent resolve & dull resignation,
perhaps you would not blame me much for
sticking to purely minor prose . I try
to force myself not to spend more than a few
hours at a time because I invariably
subside these into the cushions of easy
intercourse with people as idle, as
silly but not as miserable or (may I say)
ambitious as myself. Then I think that this
would be impudent [illegible]. So I do nothing.
Just now I am so sick of books & literary
people that I do not think of writing
even my ejaculations.
I was at an 'Academy' dinner
on Thursday at a gilded restaurant that
made me feel like an unfortunate woman.
Sturge Moore sat opposite; I was not
introduced: but I saw next to the Editor
of 'The King' who told me that George
Newnes' new buildings were the finest
business buildings in London 'tho he knew
nothing about architecture'. N. B. Unless
you get into the roof of Covent Garden
market you cannot see these buildings at all,
they being to a most narrow street as a
precipice. - I didn't get on: the
rest being reviewers (who went about
asking whether 'Academy' dinners were to
become as famous as 'Punch' dinner) and
creatures who were females if one may
judge from their stupidity & the purple
colour which ½ a glass of champagne
gave to their cheeks.
Next time I am at the 'Academy'
I will give you name & address to
Harold Child who is assistant &
practically omnipotent editor. He is a
Winchester. Brasenose man; a friend of
Lionel Johnson's; once an actor:
a kind, clever, uninspired, somewhat
academic man, apparently. I see that it
might be a good thing in the end if you
got a little work from him, & I will
do what I can. By the way, all reviews are anonymous.
I grow very very dull. I am always
talking about personality working out for it
in others & envying it in its most varying
kinds, & am so conscious of
my own lack of it & so disgusted that
daily (I think) I give myself less & less
chance of ever putting for a little yet.
-
Ransome told me he had decided to
give up his romantic way of life as he
considered it, & ceasing to stew his
plums, & live near Balmer. I hear
he has been instructing Balmer in my
true character.
I wish I had that table piano but
it is impossible.
--
I am now about to write the
3rd article of 2000 words on Charles
Lamb which I have had to do in 3 months.

Lamb was glorious but he can't be written
about & it annoys me to have to do so,
especially as he doesn't deeply touch me -
so how can I write any more to you? tho
thereby how I could write what I have
written is made clear. Forgive the
reviewers, Yours ever
Edward Thomas