BR TO GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD. / STANLEY UNWIN, 24 MAY 1952
BRACERS 11838. TLS(X). McMaster. Russell 15 (1995): 46–7
Edited by K. Blackwell

<letterhead>
41 Queen’s Road
Richmond
Surrey1
24 May, 1952.

Dear Unwin,2

Thank you for your letter of May 23, which crossed one from me.3 I am very glad of what you tell me about the arrangements concerning The Impact of Science on Society.4 It all sounds most satisfactory.

The writer who said5 that I plan to write a major work in a year or two confused intuition with prophecy. I have not at the moment any major work in view, and I think all that I said was that past experience led me to suppose I should write another book presently. The stories to which you allude are another matter. I have so far written three6 of lengths 10,000, 10,000, and 18,000. They are not intended to be serious or to have any sort of a moral but merely to amuse. One of them, which might be called “Satan in the Suburbs” or, alternatively, “Mephistophilesa in Mortlake”, should really, I think, be called “Horrors Manufactured Here” as there is nothing supernatural about it. If you like, I will send you the three stories. I have others in my head that I may with luck be able to do this summer.

The article “On Denoting” appeared in Mind for Oct. 1905. It is, I suppose, the most important thing I have done in philosophy. It has never been reprinted7 and I do not even have an offprint of it. The difficulty about reprinting it is that it would not go well in a book of essays on general subjects, and that since Mysticism and Logic my books of collected essays have not been technical. I should, however, like to have it reprinted if a convenient opportunity could be found.8

Thank you for your kind congratulations.9

Yours sincerely
Russell

• 1

  [document] The letter was edited from a photocopy of the typed original, signed by BR, in the Allen & Unwin archives at Reading University. The letter exists as dictated to Edith Finch (BRACERS 11838) in RA1 750, where it is number 1 for its date. In typing it she supplied no fewer than a dozen (justifiable) commas and changed single quote marks to doubles. There is no valediction in the dictation. Published in K. Blackwell, “Two Days in the Dictation of Bertrand Russell”, Russell 15 (1995): 37–52 (at 46–7).

• 2

  UnwinUnwin’s letter is at BRACERS 50768.

• 3

  your letter of May 23, which crossed one from me BR’s letter of same date is at BRACERS 48238. In it he discloses his short-story writing.

• 4

  arrangements concerning The Impact of Science on Society The arrangements were that Simon and Schuster would take over the existing stock of the first, shorter edition (B&R A88.1a) of Impact from Columbia University Press when the former’s expanded edition appeared in 1953, and destroy it. In the meantime, Columbia would continue to sell its edition, of which Unwin says 775 copies remain.

• 5

  The writer who said “Private Wire” reported that BR “plans to write another major work in a year or two, spending the interval in reflection” (“Our London Correspondent”, Manchester Guardian, 17 May 1952, p. 6).

• 6

  three The short stories composed by this time included “Satan in the Suburbs” (title story in B&R A151), “The Corsican Ordeal of Miss X” (already published as C51.42), and “The Infra-redioscope” (C53.03).

• 7

  It has never been reprinted There had been at least one reprint of “On Denoting” (B&R C05.05) by this time: in Herbert Feigl and Wilfrid Sellars, eds., Readings in Philosophical Analysis (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1949). The editors state in a note that “On Denoting” is reprinted with “the kind permission of the author” (p. 103n.). There is a letter from BR to Unwin of 9 August 1947 agreeing to his “asking $25 from H. Fiegl <sic> and W. Sellars for the permission they want” (BRACERS 48099). The permission they sought was for “The Validity of Inference”, a chapter from An Outline of Philosophy (Unwin’s letter of 6 Aug. 1947, BRACERS 49712), and yet “On Denoting” was the only selection from BR to be reprinted in the volume. When Unwin told him on 11 June 1953 (BRACERS 50795) that there was a reprint of “On Denoting”, BR supposed that he must have given permission.

• 8

  like to have it reprinted if a convenient opportunity could be foundUnwin had noticed Stuart Hampshire’s praise of “On Denoting” in “Bertrand Russell: His Contribution to Philosophy”, Manchester Guardian, 17 May 1952, p. 6. An opportunity soon presented itself in Robert C. Marsh’s suggestion of a volume of BR’s technical essays. It was published in 1956 as Logic and Knowledge. See also Marsh’s portrait of BR from memory (“Talking with Russell, 1951–55”, Russell 15 [1995]: 21–35).

• 9

  Thank you for your kind congratulations. On BR’s 80th birthday.

Textual Notes

• a

  Mephistophiles Corrected by hand from “Mephistophilis”. Whether the correction is in BR’s hand or Edith’s is undetermined; however, his preferred spelling was “Mephistophelis” (see BRACERS 21491 and Papers 12: A66: 1).