Presentation Copy by a close Acquaintance of the Lawrences
LAWRENCE, T.E. The Home Letters of T.E. Lawrence and his Brothers. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. 1954.
8vo. Original cloth with dust wrapper (not price-clipped, but a bit worn and spotted); pp. xvi, 730, [1], plates in photogravure and a few illustrations in the text; a good copy with important and informative provenance.
First edition, with introduction by Winston Churchill.
“This collection of letters, edited by [T.E. Lawrence’s] brother M.R. Lawrence, supplements the David Garnett collection of 1938. The letters included here for the most part cover his early years; fully two thirds of those included are from before the war. The two collections provide a remarkable picture of the range and scope of Lawrence’s letter-writing from his youth to the end of his life. The letters of his brothers Frank and Will, both of whom died in the First World War, are also included. The whole reflects what was a truly remarkable family. This collection is a primary source for the pre-war correspondence of Lawrence” (O’Brien, Bibliography, pp. 167-168).
Together with: A two-page autograph letter by John Gideon Wilson, eminent British bookseller at Bumpus on their printed stationery, signed and dated 1954 to one Kathleen Steel of Wool in Dorset about this publication, members of the family of T. E. Lawrence, and Richard Aldington's imminent publication of the 'slanderous' book Lawrence of Arabia: A Biographical Enquiry, which came out the following year. This unpublished letter sent together with the Home Letters opens “glad you have succumbed to the Home Letters; it is a well made and worthy book … My visit to the Cottage [Clouds Hill in Dorset, T.E. Lawrence's home until his death in 1935] was a passing one, in fact, I doubt if at the time it was open; but I will see it one day … One slanderous book by Aldington is now announced for October. A. W. Lawrence [TEL's brother] was home from Gold Coast last week; he was concerned, I think, with the effect of Aldington on his mother. My own feeling is that he needn't worry. A. W. is a clever fellow; but I never found him so open as T. E. – bless his memory”. The 'slanderous' book actually came out in 1955, triggering a storm of controversy and almost (in modern terms) hate campaigns. Before Aldington there were only hagiographies about Lawrence.
At the Harry Ransom Center in Austin, Texas "is a section containing the correspondence of John G[ideon] Wilson, of J.& E. Bumpus bookstore, concerning the sale and publication of Lawrence's works covering the years 1924 through 1949 … Material under the heading for B. H. Liddell Hart, author of T. E. Lawrence in Arabia and After (1934), contains the extensive correspondence during the years 1951 to 1960 concerning the controversy surrounding the publication of Richard Aldington's book, Lawrence of Arabia: A Biographical Inquiry" (T. E. Lawrence: An Inventory of His Collection at the Harry Ransom Center, online).
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