Farve . . . . . . . . . . . . . David Freeman-Mitford, Lord Redesdale
JM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jessica Mitford
Muv . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sydney Bowles Mitford, Lady Redesdale
NM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nancy Mitford
RT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Robert Treuhaft
UM. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Unity Mitford
SOURCES
AFOC
. . . . . . . . . . .
A Fine Old Conflict
AWOB
. . . . . . . . . .
The American Way of Birth
AWOD
. . . . . . . . .
The American Way of Death
DECCA
. . . . . . . .
The Letters of Jessica Mitford
H & R
. . . . . . . . . .
Hons and Rebels
OSU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Mitford Collection, Ohio State University
PP
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Poison Penmanship: The Gentle Art of Muckraking
TM-LBSS
. . . . . .
The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters
CHAPTER 1
5 “Dear Madam”: JM, interview,
Portrait of a Muckraker: The Stories of Jessica Mitford
, produced by Stephen Evans, Ida Landauer, and James Morgan, KQED, 1990 (DVD and VHS).
5 “Bank of America”: Ibid.
5 “I was never at all”: Ibid.
5 “spare shillings”: Ibid.
6 “uncompromising air”: Ottewell,
Literary Strolls Around the Cotswolds and the Forest of Dean
, 72.
6 “lunatic asylum”: JM,
H & R
, 2.
7 “The others bored me”: NM,
The Water Beetle
, 14.
7 overstimulating: JM,
H & R
, 4.
7 “are you planning to go back to Spain?” JM,
H & R
, 121.
8 “having smuggled”: JM to James Forman Junior, 20 July 1992, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 663.
8 “restless, unformulated”: JM,
H & R
, 35.
9 “We think with joy”: Lovell,
The Sisters
, 188.
9 “beastly Fascists”: JM,
H & R
, 68.
10 “Unfortunately, my will to live . . . bitterly regretted my lack of courage”: JM,
H & R
, 96.
10 “still loved Boud”: JM,
H & R
, 72.
10 “freezing shadow”: Ibid.
11 “God bless Muv”: Lovell,
The Sisters
, 104.
11 “about great movements in England”: JM,
H & R
, 63.
11 “irreverent outpourings”: JM,
H & R
, 32.
12 “a little jiggery-pokery”: JM,
H & R
, 12.
12 “an abortive attempt at running away”: JM,
H & R
, 75.
CHAPTER 2
14 “joint rebellion”: JM, interview,
Portrait of a Muckraker
.
15 “barbarian, possibly prejudiced against homosexuals . . . have gone through the same?” JM to Merle Miller, 3 November 1971, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 436.
15 “We have done all we could”: Ingram,
Rebel
, 98.
15 “amazingly long eyelashes”: JM,
H & R
, 121.
16 “very pretty”: Toynbee,
Friends Apart
, 98.
16 “a brown corduroy ski suit”: JM,
H & R
, 131.
17 “I’m afraid I’ve fallen in love with you”: JM,
H & R
, 136.
18 “completely, deeply committed . . . attractive and powerful”: JM,
H & R
, 126.
18 “a committed partisan”: JM,
H & R
, 140.
18 “He would get into a fury of frustration”: JM,
H & R
, 140.
19 “What right have you”: JM,
H & R
, 141-142.
19 “glimmerings”: JM,
H & R
, 144.
19 “far more the quality”: JM,
H & R
, 147.
19 “grim, serious town of Bilbao”: JM,
H & R
, 147.
19 “bemused, . . . all old ties”: JM,
H & R
, 147.
19 “trying to get in focus . . . understand the heroism”: JM,
H & R
, 148.
19 “determination, intelligence and courage”: JM,
H & R
, 133.
19 “sense of unreality”: JM,
H & R
, 149.
CHAPTER 3
21 “I am not a pacifist”: ER,
Boadilla
, 196.
21 “Find Jessica Mitford”: JM,
H & R
, 150.
21 “Have found Jessica”: Ingram,
Rebel
, 156.
22 “Worse than I thought”: JM,
H & R
, 159.
22 “Have them bring it out”: JM,
H & R
, 154.
22 “normal progression . . . and bedtime”: JM,
H & R
, 147.
23 “
No es sueño la vida
”: Federico García Lorca, “
Ciudad sin sueño
,” in
Poet in New York
(New York: Grove Press, 2008), 62.
23 “total war”: JM,
H & R
, 155.
24 “
Armes Kind
”: JM,
H & R
,159.
24 “You will honestly
adore
Esmond”: JM to Muv, late February 1937, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 24.
24 “My darling”: Muv to JM, 23 February 1937, OSU.
24 “I cannot help blaming myself”: Muv to JM, 3 March 1937, OSU.
24 “Oh, poor duck”: JM,
AFOC
, 6.
25 “I realize you are my guardian now”: JM interview,
Portrait of a Muckraker
.
25 “except Jessica”: Lovell,
The Sisters
, 456.
25 “I knew I was cut out”: Anthea Fursland,
Jessica Mitford: A Levinsonian Study of Mid-Life
, Berkeley, California: Wright Institute, 1996, 146.
26 “Esmond was always trying . . . dog of his choice”: JM,
H & R
, 173.
28 “singleness of purpose”: JM,
H & R
, 176.
28 “In Esmond’s view . . . being a member”: JM,
AFOC
, 20.
28 “Philip was forever . . . were hardly persuasive”: JM,
FOP
, 25.
28 “instinctive understanding of subtleties”: JM,
H & R
, 165.
28 “political vision” that made her seem “almost clairvoyant”: Dr. William Kurt Wallersteiner to Decca, 5 December 1980, OSU.
29 “in an open and declared”: Toynbee,
Friends Apart
, 112.
29 “Being good was never conspicuously on our agenda”: JM,
FOP
, 29.
29 “we need someone like Hitler over here”: JM,
H & R
, 165.
29 “rich vein of lunacy . . . humanity and culture”: JM,
H & R
, 280.
CHAPTER 4
31 “I am going to have a baby . . . I’m not any more now”: JM to NM, July 1937, in
TM-LBSS
, ed. Mosley, 108.
32 “known for his inability”: JM,
H & R
, 264.
32 “the center of my existence”: JM,
H & R
, 182.
32 “considerably more militant . . . seriousness of purpose”: JM,
H & R
, 177.
32 “lined up to boo”: JM,
H & R
, 177.
33 “tired, white-faced dockers”: JM,
H & R
, 177.
34 “a little gamine”: JM,
H & R
, 182.
34 “the entire community . . . as red as you may think”: JM,
H & R
, 178.
35 “Too thin”: Lovell,
The Sisters
, 259.
35 “light-hearted maternal competence”: Toynbee,
Friends Apart
, 115.
36 “Dearest Hen”: JM to Debo, 31 May 1938, in
TM-LBSS
, ed. Mosley, 88.
37 “willingness to fight and die”: Rosenstone,
Crusade of the Left
, 314.
38 “Their furled umbrellas”: JM,
H & R
, 185.
38 “unthinkable . . . tormentor”: JM,
H & R
, 190-191.
38 “Esmond had a theory . . . more ways than one”: JM,
H & R
, 191.
40 “‘Oh—Chamberlain”: JM,
H & R
, 186.
41 “depressed and restless”: JM,
H & R
, 188.
41 “An ordinary middle-aged”: JM, “She’s Come for an Abortion: What Do You Say?”
Harper’s
, November 1992, 49.
42 “he was absolutely furious”: Dinky, interview by author, January 2007.
CHAPTER 5
43 “was drawn into a war”: “Only Human,”
New York Daily Mirror
, 20 April 1937.
43 “mentioned that Herr Hitler”: Pryce-Jones,
Unity Mitford
, 224.
44 “We sat in a dim, plushly upholstered”: JM,
H & R
, 201.
44 “an amusing and sometimes”: Roger Roughton to JM, 28 January 1939, OSU.
44 “he’s an authority on burlesque” . . . “He’s exactly as you would imagine him” . . . “an elderly millionaire” . . . “who is very nice indeed” . . . “an English communist”: Ibid.
45 “In America what they want”: Walter Starkie to ER, 23 November 1938, OSU.
45 “Sex Life at Oxford University”: JM,
FOP
, 36.
45 “The Inner Life”: JM,
H & R
, 194.
46 “undeliberate but crushing domination”: Toynbee,
Friends Apart
, 155.
46 “Do you like America? . . . one could do about it”: JM,
H & R
, 205.
47 “perversely, and although”: JM,
H & R
, 261.
47 “My attitude toward Esmond is as follows”: UM to JM, 11 April 1937, OSU.
47 “I see that in the papers”: JM to Muv, 6 September 1939, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 32.
47 “fine wirenetting round their windows”: JM to Muv, 2 or 3 August 1939, in
Decca
,
ed. Sussman, 32.
47 “a sort of Winston Churchill-ish”: Ibid.
47 “a terrific Washington Big-shot”: ER to Peter Nevile, 5 July 1939, OSU.
48 “Ye Merrie England Village”: JM,
H & R
, 226.
49 “Blueblood Adventurers . . . Song in Their Hearts”: ER and JM, “Blueblood
Adventurers Discover America,”
Washington Post
, 28 January 1940. 49 “A gay and exciting salute”:
Washington Post
, 28 January 1940.
49 “discourse eloquently on”: JM and ER, “English Adventurers Stalk Job in Wilds of New York,”
Washington Post
, 11 February 1940.
50 “the best people”: Ibid.
50 “operas, cartoons, cooking demonstrations”: Ian Baird, “Television in the World of Tomorrow,”
Echoes
, winter 1997; and Ian Baird, “Television in the World of Tomorrow,” Baird Television Web site, RCA page, at
www.bairdtelevision.com/RCA.html
.
50 “old Scotch cottage”: ER and JM, “English Adventurers Stalk Job.”
50 “weaver imported direct”: Ibid.
50 “soft Lancashire brogue” . . . “lass who worked”: JM,
H & R
, 218.
51 “You see he’s planning”: JM,
H & R
, 216.
51 “As if he’d been there for hours ”: JM,
H & R
, 220.
51 “If we had such an introduction”: “Only Human,”
New York Daily Mirror
, 20 April 1937.
52 “disturbingly successful”: JM,
H & R
, 220.
53 “snobbish”: JM to Muv, 23 November 1939, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 34.
53 “old broken-down chicken houses”: Ibid.
54 “like the South of France”: JM to UM, January or February 1940, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 39.
54 “have a French butler”: JM to TM, 24 December 1939, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 35.
54 “mean, murky and meretricious”: Ingram,
Rebel
, 199.
54 “that something unpleasant”: JM,
H & R
, 270.
55 “to be recorded”: JM to Muv, 11 January 1940, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 38.
55 “Unity’s sister”: JM to Muv, 26 February 1940, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 40.
55 “terrified . . . grieved”: JM,
H & R
, 273.
55 “Do please write”: JM to Muv, 11 January 1940, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 38.
56 “a terrible quarrel with Hitler”: JM to Muv, 1 February 1940, in
Decca
, ed. Sussman, 38.
56 “I knew I couldn’t expect Esmond”: JM,
H & R
, 274.
56 “estrangement from our families”: JM,
H & R
, 261.
CHAPTER 6
58 “What a contrast . . . about a ‘social program’”: Ingram,
Rebel
, 195.
58 “very powerful anti-fascist, anti-Hitler spirit”: RT and Larsen,
Robert E. Treuhaft
, 26.
58 “lived and worked”: JM,
H & R
, 252.
58 “Not very sisterly”: Lovell,
The Sisters
, 325.
60 “the most impressive feeling”: Graham,
Personal History
, 78.
60 “brilliant, colorful, often hysterically funny”: Straight,
After Long Silence
, 141.
60 “fine satirical mind”: Ibid.
61 “outnumbered”: JM,
H & R
, 254.
62 “Why I’m so absolutely. . . small children”: JM,
H & R
, 256.
62 “very much engrossed . . . Muckraker Interviews”: Virginia Durr, interview,
Portrait of a Muckraker: The Stories of Jessica Mitford
, produced by Stephen Evans, Ida Landauer, and James Morgan, KQED, 1990 (DVD and VHS).
62 “aristocratic . . . upperclass . . . point-of-view”: Ibid.
62 “he was a man, not a boy”: Ibid.
62 “‘Ole Virginny’ . . . appreciate it”: Durr and Barnard,
Outside the Magic Circle
, 138.
63 “We’re already cramped”: Ann Durr Lyons, interview with author, telephone, February 2010.
63 “Just keep her until your refugees arrive”: Ibid.
63 “Well, Esmond . . . take her with you”: Durr and Barnard,
Outside the Magic Circle
, 138.
63 “I didn’t want to take”: Ibid., 139.
64 “come to the U.S. to get Decca”: Durr, interview,
Portrait of a Muckraker
.