MANUSCRIPT BY NANCY CUNARD 'LONDON SUMMER '48'
[TRANSLATION FROM THE FRENCH ORIGINAL]

This summer in London the accent seems to fall partic-
ularly on what is French, but to be honest, there is
nothing new about this - Hasn't London always welcomed
"the beautiful French spirit" with open arms? One
has the impression, probably, that I'm very much glad
to be back in Europe after being away for nine months.

Let me first point out the success won by this admir-
able painter who has captured the essence of one whole
side of our epoch; Christian Berard. It is at Covent
Garden, which at least is home to the Opera and the
other great spectacles of the first order, that Haydn's
"The Clock Symphony" with decors by Berard and chor-
eography by Massine was performed. Let me also point
out that Sartre's "Crime Passionelle" was performed
in London, that Rodiguet's film "La Diable Au Corps"
is being shown and soon to be followed by "Vengence de
Femme" [with Charles Boyer] taken from Aldous Hux-
ley's play "The Smile Of The Mona Lisa" - the English
are wild with excitement about it. I missed Rainin in
"Le Chapeau Rond", but I saw an "Old"French film [can
a film be old after ten years?] "Sans Lendermain" by
Max Ophuls with Edwige Feuilliere and George Regand -
so touching, so romantic, so meticulous in all its detail,
and a fashion that, well, only the French ..

A critic obviously knows how to state why he apprecia-
tes something. To the public, to the man on the street,
shallow appreciation suffices. He cannot put the little
nuances on paper [but why?] the little tear

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that come from inside [that's the case with "Sans Lendermain" so finely performed] is enough for him, that's the time to-life human values that French cinema so admirably portrays. There will always be an avid English public for French films, there will always be a packed house. One speaks kindly of a great Italian film "Quatre Pos dons les Nuages". Walt Disney and Stokowski have been united in "Fantasia." Dickens' "Oliver Twist" will be received at least as well as the admirably filmed "Great Expectations" of the same.
Tolstoy has also been put on film. "La Sonate a Kreuzer" was done by the Argentines with a certain style [and very lavishly] and it is somewhat unkind of me to say that a French director, in my opinion, would have adapted it better. But as for "Hamlet" on film - what a horror! A critic friend of mine said of it: Heavily and intellectually pretentious. Ophelia is a young delinquent, Hamlet a dirty old man. The whole thing is full of wrinkles. The most beautiful passages are called out from the corridors."

I'm thinking if there really is a 'summer season' in London? Tediously cold and gray the months of May and June, nature seems to degrade herself with an austerity that lasts and lasts and is always far from being over. Yet, business goes on, and even though schools lack some 15 million textbooks, and a good number of students, it seems, are doing their homework on toilet paper, that still does not prevent the appearance of a good number of excellent books. The publishing houses continue to lack paper and the

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non-compromising editors, even when they could make
accomodations always postpone the publication of a
new book .. that's the author's point of view - a
deadline is agreed upon, and voila - no paper, so
contracts are broken ... the poor authors! And, thus,
that's how two volumes of particular Franco-British
interest have been greatly delayed: "A Mirror to
French Poetry" by Cicily Mackworth, and "Apollinaire
to Aragon" by Walter Strachen - [a well known Franc-
ophile and Director of Modern Languages at the college
of Bishop's Stratford.] Admirable are these collec-
tions which are from translations in English of French
poems. The first was edited by this young enthusiast
of Mallarme, Cicily Mackworth who lives in Paris and
contributes to a number of magazines[literary artic-
les and, more recently, several of great interest on
Palestine.] "A Mirror ..." contains some translations
by several English poets of Baudelaire, Mallarme and
other poets of this year up to certain ones of our time
the age of Eluard and Aragon. As for Strachen's book,
"Apollinaire to Aragon", which begins with an excellent
preface, it is truly a tour de force, having put into
English thirty poets beginning with Apollinaire and
finishing with nine of the most beautiful poems of
the 'Creve-Coeur'. A tour de force that Strachen acc-
omplished rather brilliantly, and, what's more, with a
veritable love, something perhaps rather rare in a trans-
lation.

Whoever it might be - Tzara or Peguy, Pierre Emmanuel
or Jacques Prevert, the problem of translation

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seems to remain absolutely insoluble. There is always
this insurmountable problem of confronting and struggling
with the archangel, when it is a question of
translating water, air and fire, that is to say - a
good poem. These books should have a value that is permanent.
A tour de force of a translation even in prose.
One thinks of Rabelais, translated into English very admirably in the 17th century by Urquhart and finished by
Motteux. And speaking of Rabelais a great tome on this
marvelous ancestor [Rabelais] has just appeared in London - a work by John Cowper Powys.

Oscar Wilde, I think, belongs to both our countries -
but isn't that what he wanted? To the great collection
of Wildiana can now be added 'The Trial of Oscar
Wilde' by Montgomery Hyde [from the series "Celebrated
British Trials"). This tome contains numerous transcriptions
of the trial itself and voluminous correspondence
of the times. Aesthete - who more than Oscar
Wilde - "There will never be anyone like him again they
say" .. [There was no one like him before!]. But a few
very rare personalities and belles - letteristes exist
where it is not exaggerating to say that they are somewhat
of the same lineage. Harold Acton, poet, critic,
biographer, sinologist - and now a delightful chronicler
of his time - is one. "The Autobiography of an Aesthete"
has just appeared. Acton knows everyone. He is witty,
mocking, mischievous, and interesting. He gossips and

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he plunders, and certain critics [it's a book very much quoted and already very celebrated] prefer his writings on China, which he knows extremely well, to those where his arrows and darts whirl around his dear colleagues at Oxford and the times so cavalierly christened "L'Entre Deux Guerres". Acton, lecturer and reader of English in Chinese Universities, has discovered and proved himself in China.

During my absence in the British Antilles I noted the fear which exists in these little islands stuffed with the white bourgeoisie [always more royal than the King]. This exaggerated fear came from a solid foundation of ignorance, a fear of what the USSR and, naturally, the USA were going to do. War, war, war, was on everyone's breath. Was I going to find upon my return to Europe that the English authorities had forbidden the publication of all writings which were trying to study the question in a calm and objective way? There was nothing to it, of course. One is not so stupid. Gordon Schaffer has just published "Russian Zone", the first account to appear in book form on the Soviet Zone in Germany. Schaffer, one of the pricnciple editors of the weekly "Reynolds" [an honest, independent, socialist Sunday newspaper] has been given a higher position for seeing and transcribing so much. Edgell Rickwold held a little symposium "Soviet Writers Reply", on the question of freedom of expression of writers in the USSR - lively and interesting.

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Also noteworthy is a volume of poems by Rickwold, a deep-
ly introspective and intellectual poet, who has spec-
ialized in the study of Rimbaud, and who also belongs,
although at the other end of the scale from Acton, to
"L'Entre Deux Guerres" [The times between two wars].

Let me also mention "Great Morning", a spiritual auto-
biography of Osbert Sitwell [recently named "Literary
Advisor" to the Queen] and "Collected Poems" by Lillian
Bowes Lyon.

The ballet craze continues in London and certain plays
are beseiged days in advance. That's the case with Al-
dous Huxley's "The Smile of The Mona Lisa". What can
I say? It is well conceived, well fashioned, well
performed. That is certain! A great work? - No, but
certainly worth seeing. But some are perplexed over the
subject of the title. Why attach, the name of a mas-
terpiece to this story of a woman's vengeance? The play
has been taken from Huxley's story: a young woman poi-
sons the wife of the man she secretly loves and whom
she hopes to obtain. But once freed from his wife,
the man marries someone else, and vengeance takes off
at full speed. He soon finds himself accused of mur-
der; the beautiful murderess [powerfully portrayed by
Pamela Browne] remains calm and collected until the
very end. By a trick of the clock she is made to be-
lieve that the innocent "Murderer" has been hanged. She
collapses and her confessions save the life of the man
who would have become her second victim. Huxley is not
afraid of philosophical reasons, nor

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is the public, and both are right under the circum-
stances - but ... her is another little accent on
France: the friend who took me to see "The Smile of
The Mona Lisa" said 'The dialogue would have been so
much better, more moving, had it been done in French'.

A little chronicle of what's going on: The Shakes-
pear Festival at Stratford-on-Avon - Duke Ellington
& Katherine Dunham, a celebrated artist of color from
the United States, and a dancer [she also has a doc-
torate in philosophy].

"The Linden Tree" by Priestly.

"The Relapse" by Vanbrugh.

The Spanish Gypsy Ballet of Carmen Amoya - alas, for this
group. It's a mixture of flashiness, hideous colors,
and badly played music. All of it violently mixed up,
nauseating and insipid - where we always find the very
great artist Luisillio [A Mexican gypsy] forever turning
and spinning and seeming to be almost drowned in the
horrid frou-frou of skirts that dare to pretend they
come from the barrio chino in Barcelona. Carmen Amoya,
herself a very great artist of technical talent, almost
disappears in this mess that has nothing whatsoever to do
with Spain .. How can it be that this wretched troupe
has been so badly led by someone of artistic respon-
sibility? It's a mystery how London can adore this bad
ballet.

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The special painting exhibitions have been the main attractions of the season. Especially the French. Those of Renoir, those of Degas, Cezanne, Rouault, and those of Vuillard. And the exhibition of all the Impressionists at the Tate Gallery, which belong to the very important and celebrated private collection of Courtauld, to which has been added some works of living painters. Especially Renoir [At Lefebre Galleries]; some canvases come from numerous private collections in England, representing solely his first and his very last of the era. At the new gallery, Hanover, there was an exhibit of Graham Sutherland [an admirable painter and historiographer of London] which included several canvases with French subjects.

A new painter to note is Lanks Adler. The excellent and vivacious John Banting [Very innovative and who is reviving games and styles like the sea changes moods] has been admired at the London Group Gallery in Mesens; Augustus John at Leicester Galleries. Topolski, Louis de Brocquy, and Lucien Jacques - the two former ones obsessed by the age - [Topolski - Congress of Europe, silhouettes of war and the aftermath, India, the Orient]. Le Brocquy, a young Irishman but somewhat French with a lot of talent

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and very serious - is looking for and will, indeed, find
his career as an artist very agreeable.

And then, I must mention a new personality in which one
is tempted to say 'At last'. Ben Enwonwu is a young,
pure-blooded African sculptor who comes from Benin, Ni-
geria - this great city ravaged by the fire of British
Colonialism in the last century. Benin City - father-
land of the greatest of all the numerous civilizations
of the Black Continent. Benin City, where anonymous
black artisans of the 16th and 17th centuries trans-
posed in majestic plaques of bronze the customs and
accoutrements of the Portugese sailors, the first nav-
igators. Benin City with its royal palaces filled
with noble ivories incredibly crafted, and jewels of
the most beautiful coral imaginable. These are the
ancestors of Erwonwu. I allow myself to be enthusias-
tic over his young works - they are proudly male and
delicately chiselled. A painter also, very descriptive
of native dances and ceremonies, he knows how to handle
the wood with his tools in a unique way. The woods are
taken from Africa - heavy, dense, blond, streaked.

And, thus, with these materials he begins to work. Some
characteristic traits: serenity, and simple, pure con-
tours [as in supplication] an invocative gesture cap-
tured in a meter and a half of a line somewhat Byzan-
tine, and direct allusion to the bronze heads of
Benin, like his sculpture of the head of

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an Oba [chief]. He has, indeed, seen and loved, and perhaps studied the works of sculptor Henry Moore - Is he familiar with Brancusi? "Danseuse au Repos" - another reminder of the primitive block style, the breasts being so placed as to suggest certain Housa sculptures.
"Tete d'Ancetre" is classical Benin, whereas "Pere et Fils" and "Age de la Renaissance Africaine" have nothing of traditional black art. Modern, abstract, and very conscious of the Benin, Enwonwu, at the same time, can be seen departing in many directions. He is certainly not the only black sculptor to come out of Africa.
Another Nigerian has worked in London for about the same time. But that Benin, the splendid and tragic Benin, sends to us today these hands and this mind which knows so well how to transform precious unused wood, is at least a happy thing through its symbolism. And the fact that Enwonwu truely has talent and an individual vision has more than symbolic value.

BACK OVERLEAF: [In English]

July 29,

Dear Walter, I thought you might like to have original of "London Letter" for "Europe", now painfully copied out on a borrowed typewriter.

Do please help Moline with your consels for his son's visit to England if he writes to you.

All best,

NANCY