Details
LAWRENCE, T. E. Autograph letter signed ("T.E.S.") to Pat [Knowles], Ozone Hotel, Bridlington, 13 February 1935. 2 pages, 4to.
"THESE LONG-DRAWN ENDINGS TO EXISTENCES DO NOT SUIT ME"
Lawrence, who had just completed his last Royal Air Force posting at Bridlington supervising the overhaul of ten fast target boats, discusses his imminent retirement: "...the Air Ministry warn me today that the Press are getting curious about my discharge. I'll try to dodge them by slipping away one morning from here on my fast bike, and coming to Clouds Hill by easy stages. Expect me about March 5...but don't wonder if I'm early or late by a week!" When Lawrence arrived at his Dorset cottage at the end of February, he found the place swarming with journalists. His irritation with their persistence in spite of his appeals to the Press Association culminated with his "bang[ing] one in the eye" (J. Wilson, T. E. Lawrence, London 1988, p. 211).
The rest of the letter is devoted to the renovations to his cottage at Clouds Hill and to family news. Lawrence concludes with two emphatically underlined sentences: "It will be very pleasant to get there and shut the door and sigh 'at last.' These long-drawn endings to existences do not suit me". Exactly three months later he was thrown from his motorcycle (the "fast bike" of this letter) and died after six days in a coma.
Provenance: Anonymous owner (sale, Sotheby's New York, 11 December 1984, lot 280).
"THESE LONG-DRAWN ENDINGS TO EXISTENCES DO NOT SUIT ME"
Lawrence, who had just completed his last Royal Air Force posting at Bridlington supervising the overhaul of ten fast target boats, discusses his imminent retirement: "...the Air Ministry warn me today that the Press are getting curious about my discharge. I'll try to dodge them by slipping away one morning from here on my fast bike, and coming to Clouds Hill by easy stages. Expect me about March 5...but don't wonder if I'm early or late by a week!" When Lawrence arrived at his Dorset cottage at the end of February, he found the place swarming with journalists. His irritation with their persistence in spite of his appeals to the Press Association culminated with his "bang[ing] one in the eye" (J. Wilson, T. E. Lawrence, London 1988, p. 211).
The rest of the letter is devoted to the renovations to his cottage at Clouds Hill and to family news. Lawrence concludes with two emphatically underlined sentences: "It will be very pleasant to get there and shut the door and sigh 'at last.' These long-drawn endings to existences do not suit me". Exactly three months later he was thrown from his motorcycle (the "fast bike" of this letter) and died after six days in a coma.
Provenance: Anonymous owner (sale, Sotheby's New York, 11 December 1984, lot 280).