Letter 82
BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, 25 AUG. 1918
BRACERS 19351. AL. McMaster
Previous Brixton letter, BRACERS 19350; next letter, BRACERS 18688
Edited by K. Blackwell, A. Bone, N. Griffin and S. Turcon

<Brixton Prison>1
Sunday. 25 Aug. ’18.

My Beloved —

Don’t think, please, because I have moments of violent impulse, that my tenderness towards you is not very real and great. It really is. I can’t bear it when I have given you pain. These impulses come, but the underlying lasting feeling is utterly tender. That is really true, Dearest.

I do want affection to grow between you and me. Affection is a slow growth, not like passion — and I fear that when I am violent I check its growth, as we both did at the Blackpool2 time. But love such as yours and mine ought to grow into a very strong affection — if it does not, it has missed its aim. I do have a true affection for you — think of the Clee Hill day. It was affection, not passion, that first brought me back after Blackpool. Dearest Love, I want your affection, and I hate to bruise it by violence.

O my dear, I shall be with you again — in your arms — before very long. Sweet Love, Sweet Dear, my Angel, my lovely Darling.

I envy Yellow Peril3 being with you all this time. I shall love seeing him again.

When your birthday comes we will have fun, and get you what shall it be? A new night dress? Something we can remember the time by, compatibly with our poverty! Goodnight my heart’s Joy — my thoughts are with you from morning till night, and in my dreams.

• 1

  [document] The letter was edited from the unsigned, twice-folded half-sheet in BR’s hand in the Malleson papers in the Russell Archives. The paper is the bottom half of a ruled sheet, turned 90 degrees.

• 2

  Blackpool The film Hindle Wakes was shot in and near Blackpool in September 1917. BR became very jealous of Colette’s affair with her director, Maurice Elvey, and this caused a serious rift with her.

• 3

  Yellow Peril Colette’s dressing gown. Colette had written on 25 August (BRACERS 113153) asking for “permission” to dye it malachite for the winter.