Letter from Edward Renouf to Anny Schey von Koromla

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Rue Bonaparte 24

14 March 1934

My Annerl!

The mere mention of the fact that you start the day with Mozart reaches me like a breath of fresh air off the heath! How I envy the hussies over there, who get to hear such tales from you!

This bloody cold has really knocked me out. For days the outside world has been obscured behind the ringing and humming in my ears, the mist in my eyes, the hammering metal that’s found its way into my head. How I long to put aside all responsibility for my days and nights, for my life, my stomach, my treatment, to be a helpless child wrapped up in warm swaddling cloths again! Only once in my life has it been a pleasure to be unwell: in your boudoir in Munich, where I was waited on hand and foot while I read and lived Rupé’s wonderful Iliad. Otherwise I never want to do anything but crawl off into the woods where there’s nobody else around, for tending the sick without bothering them is a rare art that I’ve only ever seen perfected in your household. And so I shall cherish that memory whenever I have a cold. But don’t worry about me. Yesterday I spent nearly the whole day in bed. Today I drank eight cups of tea with lemon juice and rum, then went to our restaurant, the IVe Republic, in the evening, and now I’m already feeling much better. Hopefully tomorrow my head will be clear enough to get back to work.

I found these peasant sayings in WAR AND PEACE: ‘Where there’s judgment there there’s falsehood.’ ‘It’s not by our wit, but as God thinks fit.’ ‘The beggar’s bag and the prison walls none can be sure of escaping.’ And as a prayer before bed: ‘Let me lie down like a stone, O God, and rise up like new bread!’ Nice! Especially the prayer, right?

A thousand kisses for you!

Yours

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