28 January 1953

Dear Favlik and Charles,

I did so appreciate this card for Christmas just to know that you're settled for the winter in the Hills. The weather cannot be as good as it is here now, but then again this is farther from Rome and funnily enough, much more world-weary a place to be. I hope it was a nice Christmas and that there's a prospect of a productive and satisfying new year with good health and a few good dinners. How I ache to be there too.

Bernadine and I, with Adrian and Janet, Dick Hammond and his silent friend, made a gala evening of going altogether to the premiere of George Antheil's new opera 'Volpone'. It lasted an embarrassing four and a half hours and was hopelessly panned by the critics, who days later casually remarked that it was an effort in the right direction. George cut it down but the libretto was done senza gusto, nary a bit of Ben Johnson in it. The plot was there, more or less, but adapted, and you can guess what that means. The surprise was the gay little wlatz music that started picking up thru it, like Der Rosenkavelier. I sat blissfully thru the whole thing and just loved it, completely oblivious that it was nearly one-thirty when it finished. Bernardine and I felt like we were clapping for a lost cause. The audience was dead, but dead. C'est triste.

I don't need to warn you who else is in Rome, do I?

B. and I went to see Raymond Duncan give his play-lecture Monday night. We laughed all the way thru, but I came away feeling rather chagrined remembering him saying, it isn't what you think or say, but what you do that matters. So, I'm no longer a painter, for I haven't done anything for two months now except a few Sunday watercolors. I feel like you the lack of any values here, and even worse, any sympathy except from a few people like Alice and Mary. It just doesn't matter somehow. It seems so awful to say so after all the fine words I mouthed coming back from Europe. I wonder what good is in me if I don't paint.

Apart from the Studio where my work is improving greatly, I've been doing some sketches for sets and decoration of one of the little theatres here. It seems to satisfy my gregariousness and there does seem to be a point to it all. And I've been putting on weight and feeling better and finally freeing myself of the terrible melancholie from Paris. At least that was important. Now with the money saved this year and next I'll spend a few months in Europe next summer. Will you be there?