_To William James._
The incident referred to in the following letter was the unexpected
miscarriage of one of H. J.'s theatrical schemes. Meanwhile _Guy
Domville_ had been accepted for future production at the St.
James's Theatre.
34 De Vere Gardens, W.
Dec. 29th, 1893.
...I rejoice greatly in Alice's announcement (which you, William, coyly
don't mention) of the presidency of the [Society for Psychical
Research]. I hope it's all honour and kudos and pleasantness, without a
tax of botherations. I wish I could give you some correspondingly good
tidings of my own ascensory movement; but I had a fall--or rather took a
jump--the other day (a month ago) of which the direction was not
vulgarly--I mean theatrically and financially--upward. You are so
sympathetic about the whole sordid development that I make a point of
mentioning the incident.... It was none the less for a while a lively
disgust and disappointment--a waste of patient and ingenious labour and
a sacrifice of coin much counted on. But a la guerre comme a la guerre.
I mean to wage this war ferociously for one year more--1894--and then
(unless the victory and the spoils have by that become more
proportionate than hitherto to the humiliations and vulgarities and
disgusts, all the dishonour and chronic insult incurred) to "chuck" the
whole intolerable experiment and return to more elevated and more
independent courses. The whole odiousness of the thing lies in the
connection between the drama and the theatre. The one is admirable in
its interest and difficulty, the other loathsome in its conditions. If
the drama could only be theoretically or hypothetically acted, the
fascination resident in its all but unconquerable (_circumspice!_) form
would be unimpaired, and one would be able to have the exquisite
exercise without the horrid sacrifice. However, Alexander's preparations
of my play are going on sedulously, as to which situation and
circumstances are all essentially different. He will produce me at no
distant date, infallibly.... But meanwhile I am working heroically,
though it every month becomes more difficult to give time to things of
which the pecuniary fruit is remote. Excuse these vulgar confidences. I
_have_ come to _hate_ the whole theatrical subject.... Don't write to
condole with me about the business. I don't in the least "require" it.
May the new year not have too many twists and turns for you, but lie
straight and smooth before you.
Evermore your
HENRY.
_To Julian R. Sturgis._
34 De Vere Gardens, W.
Sunday [1893].
My dear Julian,
I wish I had your gift of facile and fascinating rhyme: I would turn it
to account to thank you for your note and your sympathy. Yes, Ibsen is
ugly, common, hard, prosaic, bottomlessly bourgeois--and with his
distinction so far _in_, as it were, so behind doors and beyond
vestibules, that one is excusable for not pushing one's way to it. And
yet of his art he's a master--and I feel in him, to the pitch of almost
intolerable boredom, the presence and the insistence of life. On the
other hand his mastery, so bare and lean as it is, wouldn't count nearly
as much in any medium in which the genus was otherwise represented. In
_our_ sandy desert even this translated octopus (excuse my confusion of
habitats!!) sits alone, and isn't kept in his place by relativity.
"Thanks awfully" for having retained an impression from the few Tales.
My intentions are mostly good. I hope to knock at your door this p.m.
Yours always,
HENRY JAMES.
_To George du Maurier._
An article by H. J. on George du Maurier had appeared in _Harper's
Weekly_, April 14, 1894.
Casa Biondetti, San Vio 715,
Venice.
Thursday [May 1894].
Only see, my dear Kikaccio, to what my thick-and-thin espousal of your
genius exposes me at the hands of an unknown American female.
Guileless, stupid, muddled, distracted, well-meaning, but slightly
hypocritical American female!--Don't return, of course, the letter. I
haven't seen the little _cochonnerie_ I wrote about you, bothered,
preoccupied with other work, more and more incapable of writing _that_
sort of thing gracefully and properly--in the muddle and confusion of my
coming abroad; and I hope _you_ haven't, by the trop bons soins of
McIlvaine, seen it either. But I bless it in that through arousing the
American female my clumsy 'critique' has given me the occasion to
salutarvi tutti. Are you on the hill or in the vale? I give it up, only
pressing you all to my bosom wherever you are. Trilby goes on with a
life and charm and loveability that gild the whole day one reads her.
It's most delightfully and vividly talked! And then drawn!--no, it isn't
fair. Well, I'm in Venice and you're not--so you've not got quite
everything. It has been cold and wet; but Italy is always Italy--and the
only thing really to be depended on quand meme. I hope you have not
returned to Hampstead, if you _have_ returned, without tying your legs
somewhere or other to Bayswater. I hope that everything has been well
with you all--you yourself most well. It makes me homesick to write to
you--but it is the only thing that does. I trust fame and flattery and
flowers flow in upon you with the revolving Harpers.... Write me a
word--tell me you don't hate me. I seem to remember rather disagreeably
what I wrote about you.
Yours, caro mio, always,
HENRY JAMES.
_To William James._
H. J. had just received from his brother the diary which their
sister had kept during her last years in England.
Grand Hotel, Rome.
May 28th, 1894.