BRACERS Record Detail for 17896
To access the original letter, email the Russell Archives.
"Tuesday aft." Has been to hear the Brahms Requiem in Ely Cathedral—because of Wittgenstein.
"When the ladies were gone, Winston asked me to explain the differential calculus in two words, which I did to his satisfaction."
BR TO OTTOLINE MORRELL, [6 MAY 1913]
BRACERS 17896. ALS. Morrell papers #766, Texas
Proofread by K. Blackwell et al.
My Darling
Your dear little line reached me this morning — I was glad of it. — I wonder if you have had a very bad crossing — it seems windy at some moments and calm at others. I hope Julian will not get ill or too tired on the journey — children are tiring and worrying travelling. — I travelled down with a fifth-rate actor who amused me a good deal. He says the greatest trial of an actor’s life is the love-making: at this moment, he says, he has to make love to a lady he hates — “I’d sooner touch a beetle than her, but the way I hate her is nothing to the way she hates me”. Then at Cambridge Wittgenstein and Pinsent and Muscio got in — the Brahms at Ely was wonderful — it is very great — I got back to lunch — Simpson came to coffee, and Cobden-Sanderson turned up saying he would come back to tea with two Italians — I know nothing about them. My head is in a whirl from doing so many things, but after today I shall be able to settle down. —
On reflection, I think I was unfair to my relations in saying they had taken no notice of me. Really I avoided them at the time of my marriage — chiefly because I wanted to get away from their standards, and live quietly and work, but also partly because it made me uncomfortable seeing Alys with them. Alys tried to make up for my rudeness, but I felt I couldn’t get independence except by not seeing them. I had forgotten all that, but it really wasn’t their doing, to start with, that I didn’t see them.
Now the post is going and I must stop. Yesterday was divinely happy — it made your absence much easier to bear. All my love is with you, Dearest, in absolute devotion. Goodbye my Beloved.
Your
B
