I got off the leading rein on my horse [Ariel] just before I left and have had some heavenly rides under the moors. I hope Frieda and Nick learn to ride very young. I seem to get on with the horse, I must say, and my riding mistress is very pleased. You can imagine what a relief riding has been through all this trouble, having to take on all a man’s responsibilities as well as a woman’s. Well, after I get this lovely flat all fixed up—and your “investment,” bless it, is making that possible right now—I shall know what I’m doing for the next five years and can maybe take a little rest! Right now I hardly have time for a cup of tea, I have so many irons in the fire!
I got your dear letter today and went out and bought steak and lamb chops. Now I’ve finally got here, after half a year of being stuck and not knowing if I ever could manage it, I am so happy I am ravenous and eat like a horse. I hope to get off sleeping pills as soon as I get through the first week or so fixing this place up. I must say they have kept me going; otherwise I’d have been awake all night, and one is just no good without sleep. I wish you’d talk mother out of worrying. Hard work never killed anybody, and I think hardship can be a good thing. It has certainly taught me to be self-reliant, and I’m a lot happier because of it! … I am fine and happy and so are the babies…. Now I am settling in, I shall write once a week. I am with the babies all the time and they are angels….
I hope by the New Year to have this place pretty well furnished and cosy and get a mother’s help to live in by then. And then I should be able to really get on with my career. It is lucky I can write at home, because then I don’t miss any of the babies’ antics. I just adore them.
I must say there is nothing like American clothes. Everybody here envies my American babies’ clothes. You have no notion how much your cheery letters mean! My nurse has taken some color shots of me and the babes that I hope will come out. I’ll send them on as soon as they do.
Love to all,
Sivvy
DECEMBER 14, 1962
Dear Mother,
Well, here I am! Safely in Yeats’ house! I can just about allow myself time for a cup of tea and a bit of letter writing after the immensity of the move—closing up [the Devon house] and opening this place. And I can truly say I have never been so happy in my life. I just sit thinking, Whew! I have done it! And beaming. Shall I write a poem, shall I paint a floor, shall I hug a baby? Everything is such fun, such an adventure, and if I feel this way now, with everything bare and to be painted and curtains to be made, etc., what will I feel when I get the flat as I dream it to be. Blessed Susan stayed with me through the move up and a day after, so I could make innumerable dashes into town ordering and buying the most necessary things …
We had a lovely drive up—a clear, crisp blue day…. I arrived here to find no gas stove in and no electricity connected! As I dashed out, Susan nobly holding the babies in the car, to drive to the gas board, I left my keys in the open flat and the door blew shut! Well, it was a comedy of errors. The obliging gas boys climbed on the roof and jimmied a window and installed the stove—the Devon mover did it all by candlelight (which I had the foresight to bring)—and by getting laryngitis, I persuaded the electricity people to connect us up—the agents hadn’t sent them the right keys. The minute this was over, everything went swimmingly. I was dumbfounded at the people who remembered me—you, too. The laundromat couple rushed up; they had been in Boston since we last met; they wanted to be remembered to you. The people at the little dairy-grocery shook hands and remembered me by name, and the nappy-service man I called up remembered me and welcomed me back! Well, it was like coming home to a small, loving village. I haven’t had a second to see Katherine Frankfort or Lorna Seeker-Walker yet, both of whom have had new babies, I’ve been so busy on my own with Frieda and Nick. I can only work evenings at the house and writing when I have no help.
Sylvia and Nick in Devon, December 1962
So the next five years of my life look heavenly—school terms in London, summer in Devon. I only pray I earn enough by then to offer the widow who owns this place so much she’ll sell it to me. I feel Yeats’ spirit blessing me. Imagine, a Roman Catholic priest at Oxford, also a poet, is writing me and blessing me, too! He is an American teacher-priest who likes my poems and sent me his for criticism. I thought this would please Dot.
The first letter through my door was from my publishers. I spent last night writing a long broadcast of all my new poems to submit to an interested man at the BBC and have a commission to do a program on the influence of my childhood landscape—the sea. Oslo, Norway, radio wants to translate and do my “Three Women” program set in the maternity ward and A. Alvarez, the best poetry critic here, thinks my second book, which I’ve just finished, should win the Pulitzer Prize. Of course, it won’t, but it’s encouraging to have somebody so brilliant think so. As soon as I get my mother’s help (I hope early in January), I’ll finish my second novel. I am writing these “potboilers” under a pseudonym [Victoria Lucas]!
… I took Frieda and Nick to the Zoo and had a heavenly time. Nick slept, but Frieda was thrilled … They are so happy and laughing, we have such fun. F. does her puzzle in 5 seconds, reads books with me and loves coloring. I’m going to make their bedroom—the biggest—a playroom, too. I brought the Geegee horse and the favorite toys. My bedroom will be my study; it faces the rising sun, as does the kitchen.
Viewed the full moon from my little “balcony” in sheer joy. It is so light here. The only real job is painting the floors. I’ve ordered rugs and mats. I adore planning the furnishing. You were very wise about ordering a double bed [in view of future subletting]—I’ll get one. I have a single on loan from a Portuguese friend. The cats are being fed by friends in Devon.
… A big bouquet of my own beautiful green and white holly with red berries is in my newly polished pewter set. I am so happy, I just skip round. Please tell darling Dotty her blessed “investment” is enabling me to furnish the flat straight out instead of poem by poem, as I’d thought … I had the darlingest young solicitor at my firm do the lease business for me—we were exchanging advice about kinds of paint at the end. Everybody—Frank, Dot, Mrs. Prouty—says you worry if I don’t write. For goodness sake, remember no news is good news and my work is so constant I barely have a second to fry a steak …
Lots and lots of love to all,
Your happy Sivvy
P.S. Have told Mrs. P. I would like to dedicate my second novel to her. She wanted to be sure I was dedicating something to you, so I said I was dedicating my third book of poems to you—I’m dedicating the second one I’ve just finished to Frieda and Nick, as many poems in it are to them, and I’m sure you approve! Don’t want Mrs. Prouty to feel I’m “expecting” anything, though!
DECEMBER 21, 1962
Dear Mother,
I do hope these pictures convince you of the health and happiness of us three! Susan took them and for Christmas blew up four big ones for me. Here, Frieda and I are having a December picnic in St. Ives, Cornwall.
I have never been so happy in my life. By some miracle everybody has delivered and done everything for me before Christmas, their usual “after Christmas” excuses melting miraculously away. I have fresh white walls in the lounge, pine bookcases, rush matting which looks very fine with my straw Hong Kong chairs and the little glass-topped table, also straw and black iron in which I can put flowerpots and currently have a lilac hyacinth. I have found the most fantastic store—Dickens and Jones—which knocks Harrod’s out the window. I spent the rest of Mrs. Prouty’s clothes money and feel and look like a million. Got a Florence-Italy blue and white velvet overblouse, a deep brown velvet Italian shirt, black fake-fur toreador pants, a straight black velvet skirt and metallic blue-and-black French top. One or two other outfits made me drool, notably some Irish-weave shirts—I love everything Irish, as you may imagine. But I stopped at a Viennese black leather jerkin. I haven’t had a new wardrobe for over seven years, and it’s done wonders for my morale. You should see me n
ipping round London in the car! I’m a real Londoner at heart; I love Fitzroy Road and this house above all.
… Got in my old Doris, who loves the children, so I could see a marvelous new Ingmar Bergman movie … Will have Christmas dinner with this lovely Portuguese couple who’ve been putting me up on my London visits … Just had two long bee poems accepted by the Atlantic and have been asked to judge the Cheltenham poetry contest again this year. I am in heaven…. Everybody tells me his life story and warms up to me and the babies right away. Life is such fun.
Katherine is finding out about a little nursery school round the corner where I might send Frieda mornings. The weather has been blue and springlike, and I go out every day with the babies. Still have the babies’ floors to paint, the “au pair’s” floors, the hall floors and three unpainted wood bureaus. Blue is my new color, royal, midnight (not aqua!). Ted never liked blue, and I am a really blue-period person now. With lilac and apple green accents.
If you ever want to make another hit, send some more kitty balloons! I read a picture book with Frieda every night. My bedroom has yellow and white wallpaper, straw mat, black floor borders and gold lampshade—bee colors—and the sun rises over an 18th century engraving … I’d like to live in this flat forever … Lots of love to you, Warren, and Maggie. Tell everyone of my move; hence no cards this year. I’ve not had a second …
Sivvy
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 26, 1962
Dear Mother,
… It is amazing how much my new hairdo and new clothes have done for my rather shattered morale. I had a lovely tea with the Frankforts, with the two beautiful blond Seeker-Walker children and their parents (they live two houses down from our Chalcot Square place) … and some others … I plan to throw myself into painting the rest of the upstairs floors this week so I can give myself the treat of applying for an au pair first thing in the new year. I have been resting a bit the last few days. We went for Christmas dinner with a very nice Portuguese couple in Hampstead. They cooked a goose which they lit with cognac and gave Frieda a tiny toy piano that plays simple songs and Nick a rubber rabbit. I thought the outfits for Nick and Frieda which Warren and Maggie sent just lovely; do thank them for me. I have been so preoccupied I have barely had time to cook. The little nursery school just round the corner takes children from 9:30 to 12:30, and I shall try Frieda at it next week. She seems to blossom on outside experiences with other children, and I think she needs this….
I am hoping the BBC accepts my 20-minute program of new poetry —the producer thinks they are wonderful, but the Board still has to approve. Then I have the commission for a program on my childhood landscape, or in my case, seascape. Did I tell you Mrs. Prouty sent $100? And bless you for your $50. I have double expenses just now—the closing expenses [in Devon] and the rather large opening ones here, but once I am settled here, it will be five years’ blessed security and peace and no more floor painting! All of which is much to look forward to and in which time I should have produed a lot of work.
How lucky I am to have two beautiful babies and work! Both of them have colds, which makes them fussy, but I keep them warmly dressed and they take long naps. Did Maggie knit that gorgeous blue sweater for Frieda? Their color pictures are lovely—Frieda has claimed them. She says of every sweater, “Grammy made that.” Frieda loves the little mouse that came in Warren’s parcel. She came in holding a rusk in her hands just as the mouse is holding the corn and said, “Like mouse.” She is unique in seeing resemblances to things. Just now I held her up to see a fine snow falling and she said, “Like Tomten book,” which is about a little Scandinavian dwarf on a farm in the snow. I took the very favorite picture books to London, and we “read” one each day. I am enjoying just sitting about with the children and making tea and breathing a little. I don’t feel to have had a holiday for years!
Nick is wonderfully happy and strong….
Well, I hope to drop over to the Frankforts a bit later this evening for a “Boxing Day” supper with them … I naturally do get a bit homesick for relatives and was grateful to have Christmas dinner out with friends. Frieda did very much enjoy opening presents, but is much too young to grasp more than that “Santa brought it for Frieda.” She is very encouraging about my painting floors, getting up and praising me in her little treble each day, “Good mummy, paint floors all clean for Frieda.” She is such a joy …
It is now snowing very prettily, crisp and dry, like an engraving out of Dickens.
Lots of love to all,
Sylvia
JANUARY 2, 1963
Dear Mother,
… Probably you have heard we’ve had fantastic snow here—my first in all my years in England. I heard Devon was completely cut off by 20-foot drifts, and they were dropping bread and milk by helicopter! Well, I just got out in time. The English, of course, have no snow plows, because this only happens once every five years, or ten. So the streets are great mills of sludge which freezes and melts and freezes. One could cheerfully use a dog sled, and I wish I had a sled for Frieda, for they are sledding on Primrose Hill; it looks so pretty! I am trying her at the little nursery school around the corner where Katherine Frankfort sends her boys, three hours a morning, five days a week for just over $4. They drink cocoa and play. Some mornings she is more tearful than others, but she does need to be free of mummy for some time, and I need desperately to have time to work. I put Nick down for a nap, which he’s ready for by then, having been up and playing and shaking his cot since six.
I have a BBC assignment to do “live” next Thursday night, reviewing a book of American poems on a weekly “New Comment” program, so my being back is already getting round.
It takes months to get a phone here, but once I get all these things done, I’ll be set for five years and one can do a lot in that time … The car is really snowed up. I don’t want to use it until some of this Arctic is thawed.
The wonderful package from Dot and you came the day after Boxing Day, which is the holiday the day after Christmas. Much better then! I was astounded at all the toys and beautiful clothes! Nick loves the baby doll, which he seems to think is another of his own sort, and he chews the little mouse Warren sent as a cat would … I am so glad Grampy could spend Christmas Day [he came from a nursing home] with you. Do give my love to Uncle Frank and Louise—I believe I wrote them thanking them for their $25 cheque, but thank them again for me, anyway.
It is such a relief to be back with my wonderful and understanding Doctor Horder. He has given me a very good tonic to help me eat more, is checking my weight—I lost about 20 pounds this summer—and has sent me to have a chest x-ray after hearing of my 103° fevers, so I am in the best of hands …
… Love to Warren, Maggie and Dot and Joe.
x x x Sivvy
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16, 1963
Dear Mother,
Thanks very much for your letter and the cheque. I am slowly pulling out of the flu, but the weakness and tiredness following it makes me cross. I had a day nurse for a week when I was worst and the children had high fevers (little Frieda got a ghastly rash, which turned out to be an allergy to penicillin, which she can’t have), but then the nurse got a cold and went home, just as well, for she used up that $50 cheque; they are very expensive. The children are themselves again, thank goodness….
The weather has been filthy, with all the heaped snow freezing so the roads are narrow ruts, and I have been very gloomy with the long wait for a phone, which I hope to get by the end of the month after two months’ wait, which makes me feel cut off, along with the lack of an “au pair.” I did interview a very nice German girl of eighteen from Berlin whom I wanted and engaged, but her employer is making difficulties for her leaving … I hope to goodness I hear this week that she is coming. Then I should feel cheered to cook a bit more; I’ve been so weak I’ve just wanted boiled eggs and chicken broth.
I did get out for a small BBC job the other night, very pleasant, reviewing a book of American poetry, and was entertained
with drinks and sandwiches; and I have a commission for a funny article which I just haven’t had time or energy to think of.
I still need to sew the bedroom curtains, have some made for the big front room windows and get a stair carpet and oddments. It is so hard to get out to shop with the babies, but I’ve decided to use the agency babyminders, who are very good, though expensive, for a few nights out this week. A very sweet couple have invited me to dinner tomorrow and me and the babies to dinner Sunday, and I think I may go to a play with this Portuguese girl.
I just haven’t felt to have any identity under the steamroller of decisions and responsibilities of this last half year, with the babies a constant demand. Once I have an “au pair,” the flat finished—after all, it is furnishing for at least five years and should always be my “London furniture,” so it is an investment—and a phone and routine, I should be better, I think.
… But I get strength from hearing about other people having similar problems and hope I can earn enough by writing to pay about half the expenses. It is the starting from scratch that is so hard—this first year. And then if, I keep thinking, if only I could have some windfall, like doing a really successful novel, and buy this house, this ghastly vision of rent bleeding away year after year would vanish, and I could almost be self-supporting with rent from the other two flats—that is my dream. How I would like to be self-supporting on my writing! But I need time.
I guess I just need somebody to cheer me up by saying I’ve done all right so far.
Ironically there have been electric strikes and every so often all the lights and heaters go out for hours; children freeze; dinners are stopped; there are mad rushes for candles.