BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, [18 MAR. 1920]
BRACERS 19631. ALS. McMaster
Edited by S. Turcon. Reviewed by K. Blackwell

<letterhead>
70, Overstrand Mansions,
Prince of Wales Road,
Battersea, S.W.1^, 2
Thursday mg.3

My Heart’s Comrade4

My dear dear love — I found your little letter5 when I got home at 11 last night — I can come Sat. and spend Sunday walking — Sunday evening I am out to hear Lansbury at Albert Hall6 — do come — he will tell all about Russia — I can’t come before Sat.

Do wire about Sat. and about Albert Hall, as tickets are hard to get.

I am very sorry you have such a cold and are feeling rotten. I love you my heart’s life beyond all words — no one else touches the depths of me at all —

The world is full of hope — I long to get to Russia7 and probably shall manage it. Saw lots of interesting people in Paris,8 including Romain Rolland9 — loved smelling Paris again — I hadn’t been there for 7 years —

All my love Beloved. Bless you —

B

• 1

  [document] Document 200624.

• 2

  [envelope] Miss Colette O’Niel | c/o F. Forbes-Robertson Esq | “Mice and Men” Co. | Bury St. Edmund’s. Pmk: BATTERSEA S.W.11 | 11.15 AM | 18 MAR 20

• 3

  [date] The date is taken from the envelope’s postmark.

• 4

  Heart’s Comrade For information on the use of the term, see BRACERS 19145, n.12.

• 5

  your little letter Not extant.

• 6

  Lansbury at Albert Hall George Lansbury, recently returned from Russia, spoke to a packed Albert Hall on 21 March 1920. He had been away for nine weeks from January until March. In his speech Lansbury praised Lenin, with whom he spoke while in Russia, and Bolshevism (“Mr. Lansbury on Russia”, The Times, 22 March 1920, p. 7). He wrote about his time there in What I Saw in Russia (London: Leonard Parsons, 1920). See BRACERS 19637 for BR’s report of the speech.

• 7

  Russia BR went later that year in May and stayed until near the end of June.

• 8

  in Paris BR had left for Paris on 11 March 1920 — Dora Black was researching there at the Bibliothéque Nationale.

• 9

  Romain Rolland (1866–1944), writer and pacifist.