Library and Archive Reading Rooms
View by appointment- Created by
- Edward Renouf 1906 – 1999
- Recipient
- Anny Schey von Koromla 1886 – 1948
- Title
- Letter from Edward Renouf to Anny Schey von Koromla
- Date
- 15–26 September 1932
- Format
- Document - correspondence
- Collection
- Tate Archive
- Acquisition
- Presented to Tate Archive by David Mayor, December 2007; 2015; 2016.
- Reference
- TGA 200730/2/1/35/46
Description
15 September 1932
Dear Annerl!
I’m now sitting here in my brother’s incredible office on the twentieth floor of one of the most beautiful new skyscrapers, the NEWS BUILDING. Two hundred metres from here, out of the window and to the right, stands the CHRYSLER BUILDING, the second tallest building in the world. And not much further to the left stands the EMPIRE STATE. Ten minutes’ walk from the office is the apartment, 2 Beekman Place, and it’s the sort of apartment you would like: plain and simple, a place for only the finest art, and so practical that the housework is a breeze. From the windows of the apartment you can see the CHRYSLER BUILDING and the EMPIRE STATE, and a Count-of-Monte-Christo dream of smaller, even more beautiful skyscrapers that glisten like white marble. To the left you can see the towering chimneys of a large sanitorium, and below the chimneys the EAST RIVER flows by, with steamers, ferries, sailing boats and gigantic steel bridges that span the river like fantastic spiderwebs. The pulse of the city beats through the night, smoke rises from the chimney stacks like silver clouds against the dark blue of the starlit sky, illuminated ships turn and glide down the river, far below our windows an endless bustle of automobiles and people, thousands upon thousands of sparkling lights rise to the heavens behind the windows of the skyscrapers. I’ll have to show you and the kids all this. I just know you’d understand and appreciate it! Not some tragic corpse of a beautiful past, unused and unappreciated, to be gawped at by droves of tourists. It’s only just been born and already it’s a force to be reckoned with: all-compelling, all-consuming, relentless, remorseless. Here there’s no choice but to work. For any other lifestyle this city has no sympathy, no patience. You’d feel lost and forlorn if you didn’t have something to work towards, if you didn’t have a goal. No respite, no refuge. No cafés where you can sit and dream the day away as in Paris or Vienna. No bistros and promenades on the harbour as in Toulon and Marseille, where the chaos of life passes you by like a stage-play, leaving you in comfort and safety, almost unmoved, albeit romantically or artistically inspired. There’s none of that here. But for that you’re in the midst of the present, you feel younger and stronger, you have more courage, more ambition; there’s nothing for it but to work, and there’s nothing you want to do more. It seems incredible that I should have felt all this on my first and second day. But that gives you some sense of the strength of the spirit of industry here!
2 Beekman Place, New York City
20 September
Dear Annerl!
There’s no desk for me to write at here, so I’ll have to print this letter for you on the machine. I’m glad you haven’t got one yet and that you can’t send me mechanical letters. I love seeing your handwriting. But for the sake of fairness I shall write to you by hand again just as soon as I have a room to myself.
There’s so much to tell you! Perhaps it’s best if I do it chronologically and start with Gibraltar, where I posted the second of the two letters I wrote from the boat.
We arrived in Gibraltar late at night, with the lights on the Moroccan coastline ever closer on the left and the English rock looming high above us to the right, with a crown of lights like a birthday cake. We got so close that we could see the lamps burning in the windows and silhouettes of the people going back and forth in front of them; we could see their automobiles, their carriages, even their garden fences. The Augustus let down its mighty anchor, and out came the cargo steamers. They were loading more automobiles. And all around the Augustus there was a fleet of tiny rowing boats and endless shouting as the boatmen hawked the grapes and figs they were selling. The ends of long ropes were thrown up onto the decks; hauling one over the bows would bring a basket swinging up over the sea against the fragmented reflections of the sparkling lights. Then you put a lira in the basket and sent it back down. Then you watched as the little people below – their faces aglow, casting long shadows in the light of their torches and lanterns, in boats tossed and turned by the waves ¬– bent over and filled their baskets with the most delicious muscat grapes. Then you pulled the basket back up and ate to your heart’s content.
The Augustus set off again at midnight. The only people who stayed up on deck in the chilly fog were me and one ancient Italian; together we watched the lights of Africa and Europe disappearing into the distance. The old man had just been to Italy for the fourth time, visiting his children and grandchildren. He said this was his last crossing. He had children and grandchildren in New York too. As the lights grew smaller and eventually disappeared, the two of us stood there in silence. The wind became cold and wet. Or perhaps it just seemed that way as the last pale lights of Europe went out behind the dark horizon. We looked at each other, two complete strangers, and couldn’t even make out our faces in the darkness. Even our voices were strange. We could only see that the other was shivering too, hands dug deep in coat pockets, still staring at the empty horizon.
The next morning there was a storm that lasted three days. The dining room was virtually empty at meal times. There was moaning and groaning in every corridor, loud prayers to the Mother of God, the shrill screams of fearful children. Just as people had scoffed their food without moderation or restraint the day before, so they succumbed to their despair without shame or inhibition now. For me it wasn’t so much the storm as the company that frequently brought me to the point of despair. I only got through it by staying away and keeping my imagination on a tight leash. And all the while the giant Augustus leapt around like a mad hare; it seemed diminished and helpless in the immense tumult of the enormous waves. The wind was so strong that you couldn’t stand up straight on deck without holding on. Every third or fourth wave would clear the bows of the ship and crash into the high windows of the bridge in a seething mass. The ship rose and fell, and the green water gushed over the window of my cabin, plunging the cabin into a strange deep-sea twilight for seconds at a time. At night the waves leapt at the ship like righteous raging boxers, throwing blow after howling blow. As the ship rose and fell the boxers pummelled the belly of the poor Augustus with dull jabs and hefty uppercuts. The Augustus trembled and lurched as the blows fell hour after hour, and from the dark corridors inside the ship the hoarse cries of helpless souls appealed to the Mother of God, distraught human voices lost in the roaring thunder of the struggle between steamer and high seas.
During the storm an electric fan was ripped from the wall and fell on a woman’s neck. The woman died instantly.
There was a sixty-year-old French lady sitting at our table, a teacher from Colorado. She complained that her life thus far had passed without a single romantic liaison. She’d worked hard her whole life . . . and the reward? . . . now she was no more than a withered old maiden . . . with nothing, nothing . . . not a single romantic memory! As news of the fatality was whispered around the room, the French lady cried out: ‘If I were the husband I should take the steamer company to court! I wouldn’t let an accident like this pass without recompense. I could make money from such an accident! Money, lots of money!
‘And that’, I wanted to say, ‘is why you’re an old maiden.’ But I held my tongue and left her to her own devices.
By the afternoon of the thirteenth we were chugging towards New York through a sea of oil and filth, six hours late. There was a warm haze on the horizon, and we could tell we were approaching dry land long before we saw it. Then a white strip of sand suddenly came into view a few hundred metres to the right of the Augustus, gas tanks and rooftops started to appear above the band of fog, and to the left, under a camouflage of lush green lawns, canons peered out from a fortress in the harbour.
23 September
I had to break off because my brother called me away, and now it’s the 23rd already. I’m currently in my pyjamas, lying in my bed in a little room in Brewster, New York. This afternoon we drove out to visit my dear old grandfather, and we’re staying here until tomorrow afternoon. I’ve just endured something that every writer must no doubt go through. We were sitting in the lounge after dinner and my well-meaning brother Heinzl took the opportunity to read one of my novellas to our grandfather. Heinzl was nervous – like stage-fright – and his reading was so garbled, with emphases in all the wrong places, and so bad in every way (though he usually reads well), that even by the end it still wasn’t clear who was who and who wanted what. I don’t think this lack of clarity can be entirely my fault, because the novella in question (Winderl-Sepl) was the one Bullitt had been in raptures about. If only I’d written it in German and my Annerl had been there to read it for me!
It’s late, and if I know anything at all in this big wide world, it’s how much I long to see you, to hear your voice, to taste my sweet little fruits! I long for the intimacy of Clifford and Ellen, for the assurance of our perfect communion, giving all, taking all. Neither my brother nor any of the young people here have ever experienced anything like it. They don’t know what love can be. I won’t know such happiness again unless I can find my way back to you, liberated and invigorated, once I’ve got somewhere with my work. But for now I’ll just put out the light and think of you, and I’ll try to be as happy in the knowledge of our unbreakable bond as I am unhappy about the prospect of the Annie-less months that lie ahead.
26 September, New York
My dearest Annerl!
It’s already Monday afternoon again and this is the first opportunity I’ve had since Friday night to sit down and write to you undisturbed. It was wonderful seeing grandfather again, not least because we were all in the right frame of mind to enjoy each other’s company. Over the last four years both Heinzl and our old grandfather have become more kind, more patient and more caring than I’ve ever known them to be. And they’re both very well, body and soul. It was a particularly nice surprise to find that Heinzl, having been through such a bad patch, has recovered and is now feeling strong and resilient again. Everyone says I’ve matured and that my character has improved more than they thought possible in the space of four years. But they don’t know our secret: that the Edward of 1928 is now Annerl’s Etl in 1932. Other than that, there’s no discernible difference in me. I’m glad when people are pleased with how I’ve turned out, because I can turn to you and whisper: ‘Look, Annerl! See how these people all love you! Because it’s you, it’s you they’re all raving about, a part of you that’s become part of me!’ You’ll always be with me, wherever I am and whatever I do; and whenever I see something wonderful, my first thought is of you: ‘I must show this to my Annerl!’ And may wish come true!
On Saturday afternoon we left Brewster (in Heinzl’s two-seater Ford) and drove down to Greenwich, Connecticut, to spend Sunday with some good friends of Heinzl’s, the O’Neill family. It was a quiet and beautiful place: a nice big house in dubious taste right in the middle of a huge wild garden of rocks and dense woodland. We lugged some of the rocks over to the house for a terrace and cut a broad path through the woods where the O’Neills want to build an open-air theatre. There were half-a-dozen other young people there over the weekend, and countless other guests arrived on Sunday: writers, directors, musicians and goodness knows what else. In the evening we all went to see John Kirkpatrick play a piano concert in the opulent and quite tasteless house of his parents. I met this rather delicate, hollow-chested musician three years ago, while he was still studying in Paris. He played brilliantly last night. I was quite taken with it, as were the rest of the audience, which must have been about fifty people. He played Chopin too dry, but the Scarlatti and the Bach were just wonderful! After the concert we went to see an unusual girl by the name of Tubby Smith. This Tubby is two meters tall and weighs more than two hundred and fifty kilos. But she’s so genuine and such a good sport that everyone loves her a thousand times more than all the coquettish Dianas in the world. But this immense popularity didn’t keep her from playing the piano and singing – in a deep, cheerful voice – ‘You forsook my love when you said you wanted my friendship!’ For dinner we had a large tureen of onion soup, which all ten of us young folk had cooked together. (I can still taste the onions, despite toothpaste and countless cigarettes.)
And I still haven’t told you anything about one of the most important things. Heinzl and Edda came to meet me at the harbour. Edda said ‘Whoopee!’ as if she’d been practising for ages, but it was as though the soul of the expression had quietly got away in the endless repetition. She had a dreadful sty in her eye and dark rings beneath them. She looked awful. At first Heinzl also looked yellow, and his eyes were dull. He said: ‘There you are, old chap! We’ve been looking for you for more than an hour.’ This was because third-class passengers weren’t allowed into the arrivals hall and had to wait outside with the crowds on the street. The first few hours we spent together were strange, unreal. We were glad to have all the little practicalities to deal with: seeing to my luggage, driving through the crowds in Heinzl’s Ford, the distractions of the busy streets around the harbour. This gave us the time we needed to find each other again, little by little, to refamiliarise ourselves with those we once knew so well and to discover and acquaint ourselves with the things that have changed in our lives. We haven’t quite found our way back to each other yet, but I think all three of us sense that we’ll be better friends than we could ever have been before.
The very first weekend after my arrival we drove out to WALDFRIEDEN to visit mama. Even before we left New York I received one of the kindest, happiest letters I could ever have imagined from mama. When we arrived at her little house in the woods that night, she ran out to meet us, calling out in her excitement, the tears in her eyes glistening in the light of the headlamps. Her voice was weak, almost sobbing. But she was stranger to me than even Heinzl or Edda; she’s changed far more than they have. She’s fifty-seven and still looks young, but she’s terribly frail and defenceless, with an expression of fearful misanthropy in her wrinkles, only happy and at ease in the natural world, forlorn and anxious in company, thoroughly out of sorts, like a snail without its shell. She’s been spending lots of time alone and reading lots of German, so her English is worse than it was. And since she never speaks German, her pronunciation has changed, with English Rs and Ls, and her voice is so different and so weak that I wouldn’t have recognised it. I kept looking over at her and it pained something within me. I wished I could bring back the mama I once knew. How could her lonely existence and the same repeated impressions turn even her into such a different person? She reads and works with recollections from a time in her life when we children were still very young or not even born. But she’s doing a fine job of renovating her little house. She lives the simple life of a hermit, in a natural environment, estranged from men. It’s as though the time in which I knew her has disappeared from her life. She and I will have to find our way back to one another too.
My little sister has just arrived at the apartment, and Heinz will be here in a couple of minutes, and then I’ll have to stop writing again for today. So I must bring this letter to an end quickly so that I can finally send it to you. I still have so much to tell you about. How I’d stay on deck for hours at night, lying on my back and thinking of you and how nice it would have been if this reunion with my family and this attempt to make a success of my career could somehow have been combined with being near you always! This homecoming has NOT been all joy and gladness. First and foremost it meant leaving you, my nearest and dearest, the home I know best, the best I’ll ever know. While I lay there on the ship, looking up at the stars, I saw nothing but you – Schwaz, the English Garden, the harbour in Marseille – and as I sit here looking at the stars above the skyscrapers, I only ever ask after you, and all I ever want is to share everything that I have and everything that I am with you.
Heinzl’s here now, so I’ll seal this letter and start a new one, a longer one, tomorrow. May I always be this frank and open when I write to you? I want to tell you everything I feel and think and do, as if we were right next to each other in the dark and could whisper
anything in the world and everything we mean to one another.
In everything – –
Etl
Archive context
- Additional papers of David Mayor TGA 200730 (79)
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- Material relating to David Mayor’s Austrian ancestry TGA 200730/2 (79)
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- Correspondence of Anny Schey von Koromla TGA 200730/2/1 (78)
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- Letters from Edward Renouf to Anny Schey von Koromla TGA 200730/2/1/35 (78)
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- Letter from Edward Renouf to Anny Schey von Koromla TGA 200730/2/1/35/46