BRACERS Record Detail for 19838
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"My Dearest Colette Your letter of May 19 came very quickly—it was a pleasure to see your handwriting, which seems more you than typescript."
"I am 75, and though I feel as young as ever, I have to try to realize that I must do things soon if at all...."
Persian Browne: "is now fat and middle-aged and Minister of Education. He came originally because I had written against Russian doings at Tabriz; recently, he says, their doings have been just the same at the same place".
"I was chosen to be the first atheist allowed to express his atheism at the BBC; it happened the night before last."
BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, 22 MAY 1947
BRACERS 19838. ALS. McMaster
Edited by S. Turcon. Reviewed by K. Blackwell
<letterhead>
Trinity College,
Cambridge.1
22 May 1947
My dearest Colette
Your letter of May 192 came very quickly — it was a pleasure to see your handwriting, which seems more you than typescript. I wish you were going to be in England some time — I am 75, and though I feel as young as ever, I have to try to realize that I must do things soon if at all, and I do want to see you. Perhaps next winter?
I met today a Persian3 who came to see me when I lived at Gordon Square4 and sang Persian poetry to me and said he was a Sufi. He was slim and young, but is now fat and middle-aged and Minister of Education. He came originally because I had written against Russian doings at Tabriz;5 recently, he says, their doings have been just the same at the same place.
I was chosen to be the first atheist allowed to express his atheism at the B.B.C.;6 it happened the night before last.7 Until then only Xtianity was allowed on the air. As you can gather, I was not struck by lightning.
All my love, darling Colette
Your
B
- 1
[document] Document 200844.
- 2
letter of May 19 Not extant.
- 3
a Persian Abdul Hussein Chalabi, born 1887, in Iraq. In 1932 his confidential biographic data noted he had been Minister of Education since 1929 and was a Shia Muslim (“Biographies of Prominent Iraq Men 1932”, U.S. Archives).
- 4
Gordon Square The home of BR’s brother, Frank, at number 57. BR lived there from 1916–18 when his own flat was sublet.
- 5
Russian doings at Tabriz The Policy of the Entente, 1904–1914, published in 1915 (B&R A16). Chapter 4 concerns the Russian occupation of Persia from 1909 to 1911, the year that the Russians entered the city of Tabriz and “established a reign of terror” (reprinted in 37 in Papers 13: 258).
- 6
express his atheism at the B.B.C. “The Faith of a Rationalist” as part of a series of talks on “What I Believe”. The broadcast was printed in The Listener 37 (29 May 1947): 826, 836 (B&R C47.08; 4 in Collected Papers 11).
- 7
night before last On 20 May. See BR’s letter to the BBC, 15 April 1947 (BRACERS 57574).
