The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers. Vol. 1 by Dorothy L. Sayers
How is everybody? Please give my love to Billy Williams3 and all the other of my friends in your company. And all the best to yourself, and don’t let a bomb get between you and the production, or I shall become finally discouraged and abandon the position.
By the way, I never did that detective thing I promised you, did I?4 I didn’t forget it, but I didn’t seem able to get hold of an idea in that line. It may come yet, if you still want that kind of thing.
Yours ever,
[D.L.S.]
1 “The Religions Behind the Nations”, a talk delivered at 7.40 p.m., 5 March. It was later included in The Church Looks Ahead: Broadcast Talks (Faber and Faber, November 1941), with a preface by E. L. Mascall. The other talks were by J. H. Oldham, Maurice B. Reckitt, Philip Mairet, M. C. D’Arcy, V. A. Demant and T. S. Eliot.
2 “Kings in Judaea”.
3 The actor Harcourt Williams.
4 See letter to Val Gielgud, 13 February 1940 and note 2.
[24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex]
TO THE BISHOP OF SHREWSBURY1
3 March 1941
My dear Lord Bishop,
Thank you very much for your letter. I don’t know whether I am at all the right sort of person to talk to a Moral Welfare Association. I am not at all good at talking to people about morals, but perhaps I could embroider the theme that morals are not entirely confined to the question of getting drunk and who goes to bed with who.2 May the 15th is I am afraid quite impossible, but there is a chance I could manage May the 1st. I cannot tell just at this moment because I shall have to see whether I could fit this in with another engagement, the details of which are not yet fixed.
So may I leave it open for the moment and write to you as soon as I hear.
Yours sincerely,
[Dorothy L. Sayers]
1 The Rt Rev. Eric Knightley Chetwode Hamilton.
2 Compare her four lines of verse: “As years come in and years go out I totter towards the tomb, Still caring less and less aboutWho goes to bed with whom.” (See Barbara Reynolds, Dorothy L. Sayers: Her Life and Soul, p. 363.)
[24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex]
TO VAL GIELGUD
3 March 1941
Dear Val,
Your letter just received. Oh, thank you, Mister Copperfield, for that remark! It is so true! Oh, I am so much obliged to you for this confidence! Oh, it’s such a relief, you can’t think, to know that you understand our situation, and are certain (as you wouldn’t wish to make unpleasantness in the family) not to go against me!1
Quite providentially, a speech I was supposed to be making at Brighton on the 14th. has been transferred to another date,2 so I will come up to Town and lunch with you with joy and alacrity. There are going to be lots of snags in this thing – in particular, the invention of ordinary, human, connecting dialogue for Christ. It’s all right making up conversation for the disciples and people, but it’s difficult doing it for Him; and if one doesn’t, we are going to get just the effect one wants to avoid – namely, a perfectly stiff, cardboard character, different from, and unapproachable by, common humanity, doing nothing but preach sermons. He must be allowed to say at least things like, “Good morning”, and “Please”, and “Thank you”, whether they are in the Bible or not. Also, it’s going to be a job to make each play a more or less complete bit of theatre in itself. If you look at the New Testament, it’s full of disconnected episodes – often quite good theatre in themselves (e.g. the raising of Lazarus or the little gem of domestic drama about the blind man at the Pool of Siloam) but not tying up together. Except, of course, the Nativity Story and the Passion.
It’s not made easier by the fact that I still don’t really know how many plays they want. They began by saying twelve, which would cover the ground pretty well. Then Dr. Welch startled me by saying they would want “six at least”. I pointed out that in that case we should either have to give up the Ministry altogether, or deal very summarily with the Passion. He then said we had better compromise on “about ten”. It doesn’t seem to occur to people that one writes each play of a series with a view to its relation to the whole series.
The general theme of the series is to be the Kingdom. That seemed a suitable line to take on the thing just at this moment, when everybody is bothered about what sort of government the world should have. That means that we have got to get in certain things, whatever happens. We must, for instance, have the Temptation, in which Christ is faced with the choice between a kingdom of this world and a Kingdom of God in this world. This, I am sorry to say, involves us with the Devil – always an awkward character to make plausible. Also, it means we must get in one or two of the Parables of the Kingdom, which necessitates a certain amount of preachment. Further, we can’t focus on the Kingdom and leave out the Entry into Jerusalem, which is the sort of queer ironic counterpart to the Temptation – the moment when it looked as though the kingdom of this world might be grasped after all. So at present we seem to have the following fixed points:
Nativity Play – kingdom of Herod, and the sort of fairy-tale kings of Orient.
Temptation – worked in with John the Baptist as forerunner of the Kingdom, and the Baptism of Christ.
Jerusalem – Entry into, with other episodes.
Last Supper – including the arrest at Gethsemane.
Trial Scene – Caiaphas, Herod, Pilate, with record of crowing cock for Peter.
Crucifixion – where the conflict between realism and suitability for children is going to become acute.
Resurrection – ending, I think, with that amazingly atmospheric appearance at the Sea of Tiberias (last chapter of St. John).
There, whatever Dr. Welch says, I propose to stop, and not go into what became of the Disciples and the Church afterwards. I know what we are leaving out, the Ascension and Pentecost. But I don’t really see how anybody is to go up into Heaven by wireless. I could do it in a film, or even at Drury Lane; but in my opinion – my ‘umble but fixed, opinion – the thing that speech-without-sight is least capable of conveying is physical movement of an abrupt and unlikely kind, and I fear the general effect would be that of the ascent of Montgolfier’s balloon3 amid the running commentary of a bunch of sight-seers. Nor do I feel that the “speaking with tongues” would sound like anything but a cross between a row at the League of Nations and the Zoo at feeding time.
Even as it stands, that gives us seven plays; and, if ten is the maximum,4 the whole Ministry between the Temptation and the Last Supper will have to go into three plays. That would be all right, only there is a certain difficulty about getting the characters properly set and prepared for the final catastrophe. Judas is the real difficulty. Nothing in the New Testament gives one any real idea of what that unhappy man was driving at. He just comes on with his mind all made up to be villainous. I’ve got a rather subtle idea about him, but whether it can be made intelligible in the time at our disposal I don’t know. He’s got somehow to be the Corruptio optimi pessima5 – the man with the greatest possibilities for good, and the very worst possibilities of corruption. If he hadn’t had good possibilities, why was he ever called as one of the Twelve? I mean, it’s got to sound plausible if one isn’t to make Christ look either a fool or something worse. And there’s not much time in which to depict the gradual deterioration of Judas. And I won’t have those awful explanatory bits by the announcer, saying “We do not know what motives led Judas to – “or, “But, alas! there was among the little band of the Disciples one who –” because it’s that kind of thing that jerks one out of the theatre into the schoolroom. All this is my trouble and not yours, of course, but it may influence us if we want to make a combined stand about the number of plays, or anything like that.
I’m glad you like “Kings in Judaea”. I think we ought to have some fun with the Herod scenes. (Billy Williams6 will want to play Herod, because I once light-heartedly said I would write him a Herod play some day, but I don?
We are going to be badly off for female relief – nothing but male voices. I wish most of Christ’s female friends had been rather more respectable; but we must get in Mary Magdalen, however delicately we skimble over her profession. She really is fearfully important, because of the Resurrection; so I shall try to do the Lazarus-story and the household at Bethany, and if possible the precious ointment episode. (I don’t care if the critics have said that Mary Magdalen and Mary of Bethany were different people – Church tradition has always made them the same, and [we] can’t have all these hopelessly disconnected characters.)
I’m going to try and do as little as possible with effects and noises off. Du Garde Peach’s plays on St. Paul are a perfect orgy of shipwrecks and camel-drivers. Some crowds we must be bothered with, I’m afraid, because “the multitudes” are always being mentioned. The two really important ones will be the ones shouting “Hosanna” in the Jerusalem scene and the Jews crying “Crucify Him!” in the Trial scene. Then there’s the students in the first play, and a crowd of people being baptised in the second play and of course there will have to be some crowds to be preached at and to be astonished at miracles and things. That just can’t be helped. Will it do if I keep to about the same number of speaking parts I’ve got in “Kings in Judaea” for each play? It’s difficult to keep the numbers down when one is encumbered with all those disciples and Pharisees and so on. But all the decor shall be kept as simple as I can.
Dr. Welch has just written to say he will be in Town on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday of next week. We had better have a talk with him, hadn’t we? He really has been very nice and helpful and very patient with my screams of rage. But I should like to have a go at the problems with you in private so that we can deal with the technicalities unhampered. Shall I just refer him to you for the actual time of meeting? I can get to Town by about mid-day, if Hitler doesn’t choose Thursday night to blow up the line, and can be at your disposal as and when you choose.
Don’t bother to answer all this; I’ve just put it down to give you a line on the way I’m trying to work it out.
Yours ever,
[D. L. S.]
1 Echoes of Uriah Heep, in Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield.
2 See letter to the Editor, The Sower, 21 April 1941, note 1.
3 In 1783 Jacques Etienne and Joseph Montgolfier, brothers, who were paper manufacturers, filled a large bag with smoke from a straw fire and saw it rise to a great height. Others soon made use of the principle but the earliest experimental flights, first with animals and later with humans, were made with Montgolfier hot-air balloons.
4 There were ultimately twelve.
5 Latin: the corruption of the best [is] the worst corruption.
6 Harcourt Williams.
7 See letter to The New Statesman, 17 February 1937 and note 5.
8 Mark, 15, 39: “And when the centurion, which stood over against him, saw that he so cried out, and gave up the ghost, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God.”
9 Luke, chapter 7, verses 2–9.
10 Time was made for it. See the third play, “A Certain Nobleman”.
11 Thomas the Twin, known also as Doubting Thomas.
[24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex]
TO LADY FLORENCE CECIL
12 March 1941
Dear Lady Florence,
Thank you so much for your letter. It is very kind of you to enquire after a new novel, but at the beginning of the war I rather rashly made a vow to write no more detective stories until the Armistice. It is true that I am pretty busy on other things, but also it has been borne in upon me that people are getting rather too much of the detective story attitude to life – a sort of assumption that there is a nice, neat solution for every imaginable problem. I am now spending my time telling people that real difficulties, such as sin, death and the night-bomber, can’t be “solved” like crosswords!
I have just finished a curious sort of book about the creative mind called The Mind of the Maker,1 which Methuen will be publishing shortly. It is about the way the artist’s mind works all mixed up with the doctrine of the Trinity. I can’t imagine what the parsons will make of it, or the artists; however, it has been very entertaining to write.
With all good wishes,
Yours sincerely,
[Dorothy L. Sayers]
1 It was published on 10 July 1941.
In March Eric Fenn again invited D. L. S. to contribute to a series of broadcast talks on the Christian faith. The subject of the talks, intended for the Forces Programme, was the Nicene Creed. He asked D. L. S. to provide six, each to last ten minutes, on the theme, the Son of God. D. L. S. preferred the title “God the Son”. Delivered on 8, 15, 22, 29 of June and 6, 13 July, they were: “Lord and God”, “Lord of all Worlds”, “The Man of Men”, “The Death of God”, “The World’s Desire”, “The Touchstone of History”.
[24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex]
TO THE REV. ERIC FENN
20 March 1941
Dear Mr. Fenn,
I am sorry to have kept God the Son waiting all this time. I think I could manage to do it on the dates you mention, if, as you kindly suggest, some of the talks could be recorded.1
I have roughed out a possible line to take on most of the points, though I think I am going to have trouble with the clauses about Judgment. There are already such a lot of people who write passionate and slightly potty letters about the Second Coming, that I tremble at the thought of my correspondence. Still I fear that we cannot remove a clause from the Creed for my convenience.
My last talk2 seems to have produced a more than usually fruity crop of candidates for the loony bin! There are two good souls who want to have the talk to read. I gather this series is not being printed in The Listener – or is it?3
Yours very sincerely,
[D. L. S.]
1 Only the first was given live.
2 “The Religions Behind the Nations”, delivered on 5 March. See letter to Val Gielgud, 24 February 1941, note 1.
3 These talks were not published.
[24 Newland Street
Witham
Essex]
TO THE REV. ERIC FENN
26 March 1941
Dear Mr. Fenn,
I am sending you the rough draft of the first two talks on God the Son. I have tried to keep them at about the same intellectual level as the talks on the Christ of the Creeds and the Sacrament of Matter,1 which you liked. It is difficult to hit upon the exact right level for the Forces, since everybody seems to be in the Forces nowadays, including those who know everything about everything and those who know nothing about anything. Also I did not realise before what a shocking lot of purely technical theological terms the Nicene Creed bristles with. Can you tell me whether the bloke who is following with God the Father, is going to be so obliging as to deal at all with the Trinitarian formula? Or is he just going to talk about the Fatherhood of a loving Creator and leave me to introduce the subject of the three Persons with no previous preparation? Similarly, is he going to tackle the meaning of the word “Heaven” which always requires a little cauti
I realise, of course, the special awkwardness of any wireless series, namely, that you cannot ever take it for granted that one single person who is listening to talk number three, has listened to both, or either, of talks one and two, or that he will then go on to listen to talks number four and five. Bearing this in mind I have tried in the second talk to bring in again the definitions of technical terms proposed in the first talk, so as to make each talk, as far as possible, complete in itself. I only hope that talk six will not be so taken up with recapitulations of previous talks as to have no room left in it for the subject matter!
Will you let me know if you think these suggestions are along the right lines. I have written them to a ten minute length, although in your letter you said that we might be able to get fifteen minutes. I only hope they are not too “packed”. The Creed itself is packed as much as an egg with meat, and it’s rather a job to unpack it, when you have to try to explain everything in everyday language. The extraordinary difficulty of explaining what is meant by the word “Person”, without giving the impression that God the Father has arms and legs and a beard, may have caused me to veer dangerously towards the Scylla of Sabellianism,2 but that is probably a lesser danger in these days than the Charybdis3 of Arianism.4
Yours very sincerely,