大象传媒

20/06/38

Winifred Dear

What a lovely letter. I can see you as I read it. You are happy now. With the grace
of God perhaps I can keep you so forever and share your happiness. Our lives are
ours to shape as we will. Do not ever let us be content to let our lives be shapeless
and commonplace - it is in us to search out new experiences and new worlds so that
we can build up a pattern of living. Dear, we are both human and have our
imperfections, but that is the joy of it.

Winifred, you want me to tell you that I love you. Words are limited. Suppose I say
that absolute and unquestioning love is a chord of many notes - then at present I have
not all the notes, as I do not know all you, but I have a few notes which sound very
sweet; I have enough notes to make a harmony, enough to justify my quick decision
on Tuesday. It was those few notes that made me say what I did. To love you
absolutely, to find the other notes - that will come with deeper knowledge of your
lovely nature. Can you understand this, dear? I tried to convey something of it on
Tuesday. I am trying to be as honest and open as possible. Don't you think that the
final chord will be finer when each note has been well learned? You see, I am young
yet and for some time will develop. And there is the worldly business of studying.

When I got back to Richmond on Tuesday I did a lot of thinking. My head said to
me: "you should have waited, you should not have made the most important decision
of your life so quickly - it was your heart not your head that spoke to Winifred."
Well, heart has won; had I waited a year I would have asked you to marry me, and in
the meantime you would have been unhappy.

Sweet, do not idealise me. I am only a boy - shy, untutored and awkward in many
things. Let us always be honest with each other. There is much before us, but we
have each other.

Idris

19/07/39

My Darling

It was a month yesterday that was the beginning of our happiness. Had it been
otherwise I should have groped and stumbled my way about life, perhaps achieving
some measure of happiness. But I should have been playing a tune on a penny
whistle. What a lovely instrument I have now. Oh my darling let me learn how to
live so that I may play finely on it. Do you remember Robert Burns - "My love is like
a violin that's sweetly played in tune." I am always talking in terms of music, but the
best poets often do, so why shouldn't I borrow their thoughts for you?

Learning how to live - a few simple rules that one must fashion for oneself. But the
task is possible now for we can help each other - we can think about so many things
along the same lines. We can have different interpretations of the same ideas and
fuse them.

There are not many things about which I feel certain in this life - have you ever
noticed how often I use the word "things", which is a puzzled incomprehending,
inadequate word. But of you I am absolutely certain. I cannot be sure about the earth
going round the sun, about what is right and what wrong, about the existence of God;
but I know the quality of your heart. As humans we are limited and circumscribed by
matter. The rest of the world is often on the other side of a high wall. But you and I
are each other's plot of garden, a private unity. The world may fall about our ears, but
our hands will be clasped together. My darling, we may be with men and of men
living in a dark valley, but we will lift our eyes. At this very moment I am with you
on one of the hills I love at home. Nothing can part us.

Sweet one, I look to the future. It may be fragile, perishable, frightening. But of that
part of the present and of the future which is your spirit I am as certain as I am that a
hill is nearer the stars than a valley. Goodness is a part of eternity. As I have said
before, as a human you must not be idealised, but there is so much of goodness in
you.

With all my love Idris

31/08/39

My Darling

So long as your lovely heart beats this old world isn't desperate. I wish you were
here. It is so remote. I have scarcely spoken to a soul today. Never many words
about war. I still think that the whole evacuation business is simply in order to try to
convince Germany that the government has certain intentions and that the bluff may
succeed, i.e. Hitler may climb down.

It was so peaceful on the Denbigh moors yesterday. One looked down on the valley
and nothing mattered but the quiet business of tilling fields and the harvest. One
looked around on the moors and nothing was significant but colour or moving clouds.
Oh my darling you will return to these simple things awhile. How lucky I am.
Tomorrow I shall go to the hills on the other side of the valley.

I have not sent you heather as I thought of bringing you some on Sunday. If you are
being evacuated will you let me know your address so that I can send some there. If
you will still be in Claygate I will send you some home, as as yet I don't know
whether I shall be able to return on Sunday.

Dear Dad is sitting up in bed - it must be wrrying him, but he doesn't say very much.

I shall go up a hill tomorrow and think about you.

God bless you,
All my love , sweet one,
Idris

04/10/39

My sweet one,

Your last letter gave me a quiet joy. Everything is uncertain but for your readiness to
have a go at this business of living with me. The fuzziness of the picture no longer
oppresses. One has the determination to go through whatever lies before and the
hope then of making each other happy. Darling, their is no more precious gift than
the sure love of a good woman. I am going to treasure that gift all my life. Do you
remember in Wolfe: "The adventure of being man and woman is continued in them."
Tonight I am not going to write a long letter. All I want is to tell you of the joy
within.

God bless Winifred,
All my love,
Idris

11/01/40

Your head is in the stars, love, but your feet are on good solid earth. Remain so, and
some day we will come together and make a decent job of this business of living.
Certainly we will if I play my part. You make me realize that it is more up to me
than to you. Nobody can fulfil himself or herself to every atom of the personality
from one other person. The small and unimportant things we want outside each other
we can find. The essentials we will provide for each other. It is not a question of you
making yourself "more worthy " of me, it is a question of my coming to a proper view
of things and not being infatuated by an impossibly perfect woman who exists in the
imagination, a product of idealising fancy. I am grateful to you for not rejecting me.
You have pulled us together again. In faith, then, we will go forward exploring life. I
want from life an interesting job, a certain amount of money, steady love and a home,
somebody to live with who has a zest for living, and leisure during which to do things
which give me satisfaction - exploring ideas and experiences. I think we can do most
things together - all that matters. For the rest, we are tolerant enough to go separate
paths occasionally. Whatever you want from life, dear one, I will do my best to give
you. For you are a precious personality who can achieve much good.

Love, Idris

14/01/40

Sunday night, feet on fender, books on shelf, many things done, much to do
tomorrow.

Please always be as happy as you have appeared to be from your last letters and don't
worry about an undeserving Idris who doesn't know yet how blessed he is by having
Winifred - but he may realise it some day when he is living with her. Sometimes I
can, as at this moment, stand aside and look at myself and see the approximate lines
of the future. At other times I wallow about like a colt who hasn't found his legs -
then you are liable to be hurt. But I shall find my feet and we can get on with our job
of living.

Nobody knows what the next year or two has for me - somehow though I feel it will
be all right. And forever you will be a certain, a sure foundation. If you were only to
give me a home and content, that would suffice. But you can give more, with your
patience and your fine heart. Please God I get my sense of proportion right and be
patient. When the times are more normal and I can relax the pressure of living a little
(not that it is very high, but it is quite a lot - there is much to think about), I shall find
my touch both with life and with you - more and more sure.

God bless you,
Love, Idris

20/02/40

Just now life is very pleasant. I am not doing a great deal of work, as it is not so
desperately urgent as it seemed to be. I am enjoying the introduction to "Back to
Methuselah"- such witty and flexible prose. After the lecture this afternoon I cycled
to Shalford and looked at cows, trees, people, I listened to the tentative bursts of song
from the birds - every day they are learning new notes and more tunes.

Last night Malcolm and Edward got idiotically and disgustingly drunk on whisky.
With the assistance of two soldiers they were got to bed. Today I have been nursing
Malcolm. One of the soldier lads was most interesting - we began a discussion on
D.H.Lawrence in the digs in between putting people to bed, and continued the
discussion in the High Street while waiting for a taxi to take home his colleague who
was also helpless by now.

My dearest one, I want more than ever to give you what you want from life and to
make myself more worthy of the dearest one. We shall know the completest peace.
Inside me there is an urge to live a life that is not, to my little mind, too
commonplace. Sweet, with you I have the best chance of succeeding. Never let me
get into a groove - though I intend to drive myself on, but we can help each other.

All my love, Idris

28/02/40

There will be 200 miles between us, but, my sweet, it is not in terms of space that we
will think. While we have our future and each other, we have something which exists
wherever we may be. Remember that, and have faith in our own good luck. We both
have a firm foundation on which, in good time we can build to our best desire. It will
be for us, alike and different as we are, to give to each all we can. I have you to live
for, and all for which you stand - decency, kindness, self-denial. When we come
together we shall be stronger and made of better stuff.

You shall have some heather when it blooms again.

God bless
With love, Idris

UNDATED

It is Sunday night and I have just come in from a walk. Winifred is not here to
receive me, but her spirit is not distant. If she were here I should be content. I should
sit by the fire reading while she was beside me - reading, knitting, sewing? Oh my
quiet one, there will be peace for us some day, and out of the discordant elements of
this world we will make for ourselves a pattern for our delight. We will take
sweetness where we may find it. In humility let us try to show loving kindness to
others. Do not let us live haphazardly, but let us have our standards of fineness and
decency. Perhaps we may find a religion as a compass, but experience and goodwill
will fashion for us a spiritual map suitable to ourselves for a guidance. Love, let us
try to be true to what we think is good and right. You have your instincts set that way
- help me to keep on the right track. We have certain energies, moral and physical.
The only way to be happy is to use them aright. Part of my programme of living is to
use them for your happiness. The rest, for other people and myself, by the grace of
god.

Be happy,
Love, Idris

My gentle one, with whom some day I shall be happy, you are working hard and
putting others before yourself and giving happiness to children in small ways: it is not
in vain, for I shall give you your portion of joy. We shall have our long walks and our
quiet evenings. We shall work hard and get somewhere. When all this is over, I will
try to improve my qualifications so that I can get a job worthy of you. For my own
self respect, out of obligation to my family, and for you I am very happy to be trying
to work here.

All my love, Idris

My darling,

I have read your letter again. It moved me almost as though you had spoken to me.

In my little life I have done very little which makes me feel when I think of it that
perhaps some day I shall achieve serenity and wisdom. But when I think about you
darling and your lovely nature and know that you want me I have faith in myself and I
can feel that men and women can achieve a measure of the finer qualities, of the
unheard beauties. My sweet one I shall want you for ever and ever. Some day we
shall through and with each other express our personalities. We will make small
happinesses for ourselves and other people. You have all my love. I feel very
humble when I write this to you, as though one were seeing a miracle.

Love forever, Idris

Darling,

From where I write I can see a very long way. I am alone in the great flat stretch of
the moors. There are in the distance many mountains. There are 2 lakes which I can
see, and over everything hang fantastic bulky clouds with wide broken patches of
blue. If I put my face against the rough grass and the heather I can smell the peat
underneath. The clouds nearer the sun are dark beneath but shot with light above. It
is 5 o'clock and the light will diminish soon. The heather is beginning to change its
colour. Soon it will be dark brown. I can see great cloud shadows miles away.

My darling remember that I think about you and that there is still sweetness and
reasonableness in our little worlds.

Goodnight, Idris

My Darling,

How I like your letters. They are very much Winifred. About something sad or
lovely or funny.

I have just returned from a drive in the car over into the Conway Valley. I do so wish
that I had learned to manage the new car earlier in the summer. Before petrol is
rationed one should rush around to as many places as possible.

The only way the war has hitherto affected me is by necessitating my sleeping
downstairs on a camp bed. As for the other obligations towards my country, I have
no intention of assisting in the slaughter of young Germans, hysterical though they
may be. I have no objection to non-combatant service e.g. carrying stretchers or
cleaning out lavatories. So what I'll do is to register as a conscientous objector with
the reservation that I will do non-combatant work. May be awkward but it has to be
faced. War is a contagious madness which I won't help to spread. I am ready to
alleviate suffering as far as I can.

My darling be calm and lovely forever.

All my love, Idris

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