Contextual Information: Rosenberg's Letters
A Selection of Rosenberg's Letters
Like many of the soldiers during the War, Rosenberg kept up a constant correspondence with friends and associates back home. These letters are invaluable to our understanding of his attitudes to the conflict, his contemporaries, and above all his own work. In October of 1915 Rosenberg enlisted in the Bantam Battalion of the 12th Suffolk Regiment, 40th Division. His reasons were purely financial as he continually expressed his abhorrence of the War and warfare in general. Up until his death in 1918 he gives insights into his feelings and the conditions of Trench warfare in his letters. Similarly, throughout his career, he was continually questioning his own talents as both a painter and writer. In his letters he expresses these self-doubts, as well as an awareness of his contemporaries.
Letters About the War
August 1914
August 8
1914
Cape Town
Dear Marsh
I enclose the lecture. By the time it reaches you I expect the world will be in convulsions and you'll be in the thick of it. I know my poor innocent essay stands no chance by the side of the bristling legions of war-scented documents on your desk; but know that I despise war and hate war, and hope that the Kaiser William will have his bottom smacked Ð a naughty aggressive schoolboy who will have all the plum pudding. Are we going to have Tennyson's ÔBattle in the airÕ, and the nations deluging the nations with blood from the air? Now is the time to go on an exploring expedition to the North Pole; to come back and find settled order again.
Yours sincerely,
Isaac Rosenberg
October 1915
October 1915
Bat. Bantam
Regt. 12th Suffolk
New Depot
Bury St. Edmunds
Dear Mr Schiff
I could not get the work I thought I might so I have joined this Bantam Battallion (as I was too short for any other) which seems to be the most rascally affair in the world. I have to eat out of a basin together with some horribly smelling scavenger who spits and sneezes into it etc. It is most revolting, at least up to now Ð I don't mind the hard sleeping the stiff marches etc. but this is unbearable. Besides my being a Jew makes it bad amongst these wretches. I am looking forward to having a bad time altogether. I am sending some old things to the New English and if they get in you may see them there. I may be stationed here some time or be drafted off somewhere else; if you write I will be glad to hear,
Yours sincerely,
I. Rosenberg
March 1916
2452A Coy, 12th South Lancs
Alma Bks, Blackdown Camp
Farnborough
Hants
?March, 1916
Dear Mr Schiff
I have been in this reg about 2 months now and have been kept going all the time. Except that the food is unspeakable, and perhaps luckily, scanty, the rest is pretty tolerable. I have food sent up from home and that keeps me alive, but as for the others, there is talk of mutiny every day. One reg close by did break out and some men got bayoneted. I don't know when we are going out but the talk is very shortly...
June 1916
France
June 1916
[To Miss Seaton]
We made straight for the trenches, but we've had vile weather, and I've been wet through for four days and nights. I lost all my socks and things before I left England, and hadn't the chance to make it up again, so I've been in trouble, particularly with bad heels; you can't have the slightest conception of what such an apparently trivial thing means. We've had shells bursting two yards off, bullets whizzing all over the show, but all you are aware of is the agony of your heels...
Autumn 1916
France
Autumn, 1916
[To Laurence Binyon]
It is far, very far, to the British Museum from here (situated as I am, Siberia is no further and certainly no colder), but not too far for that tiny mite of myself, my letter, to reach there. Winter has found its way into the trenches at last, but I will assure you, and leave to your imagination, the transport of delight with which we welcomed its coming. Winter is not the least of the horrors of war. I am determined that this war, with all its powers for devastation, shall not master my poeting; that is, if I am lucky enough to come through all right. I will not leave a corner of my consciousness covered up, but saturate myself with the strange and extraordinary new conditions of this life, and it will all refine itself into poetry later on...
April 1917
France
April 8, 1917
[To G Bottomley]
All through this winter I have felt most crotchety, all kinds of small things interfering with my fitness. My hands would get chilblains or bad boots would make my feet sore; and this aggravating a general rundown-ness, I have not felt too happy. I have gone less warmly clad during the winter than through the summer to what we call 'dumping' a great part of my clothing, as I thought it wisest to go cold than lousy. However, we've been in no danger - that is, from shell-fire - for a good long while, though so very close to most terrible fighting. But as far as houses or sign of ordinary human living is concerned, we might as well be in the Sahara Desert. I think I could give some blood-curdling touches if I wished to tell all I see, of dead buried men blown out of their graves, and more, but I will spare you all this.
February 1918
France
February 14, 1918
[To Miss Seaton]
We had a rough time in the trenches with the mud, but now we're out for a bit of a rest, and I will try and write longer letters. You must know by now what a rest behind the lines means. I can call the evenings - that is, from tea to lights out - my own; but there is no chance whatever for seclusion or any hope of writing poetry now. Sometimes I give way and am appalled at the devastation this life seems to have made in my nature. It seems to have blunted me. I seem to be powerless to compel my will to any direction, and all I do is without energy and interest.
March 1918
March 28, 1918
[Postmarked April 2, 1918: Rosenberg's last letter; he was killed on April 1]
My Dear Marsh
I think I wrote you I was about to go up the line again after our little rest. We are now in the trenches again and though I feel very sleepy, I just have a chance to answer your letter so I will while I may. Its really my being lucky enough to bag an inch of candle that incites me to this pitch of punctual epistolary. I must measure my letter by the light. First, this is my address
22311 Pte I R.
6 Platoon B Coy 1st K.O.R.L.
B.E.F.
We are very busy just now and poetry is right out of our scheme. I wrote one or two things in hospital about Xmas time but I don't remember whether I sent them to you or not. I'll send one, anyhow. During our little interlude of rest from the line I managed to do a bit of sketching -somebody had colours- and they weren't so bad, I don't think I have forgotten my art after all. I've heard nothing further about the J.B. [Jewish Battalion] and of course feel annoyed -more because no reasons have been given- but when we leave the trenches, I'll enquire further. I don't remember reading Freedman. I wanted to write a battle song for the Judaens but can think of nothing strong and wonderful enough yet. Here's just a slight thing. I've seen no poetry for ages now so you musn't be too critical - My vocabulary small enough before is impoverished and bare.
Yours sincerely
I Rosenberg
[Accompanying the letter was Through these Pale Cold Days, Rosenberg's last poem]
Letters About His Own Work
1910?
1910?
[To Miss Seaton]
It is horrible to think that all these hours are full of vigour and my hands and soul craving for self-expression, I am bound, chained to this fiendish mangling-machine, without hope and almost desire of deliverance, and the days of youth go by...I have tried to make some sort of self-adjustment to circumstances by saying, 'It is all experience'; but, good God! it is all experience, and nothing else...I really would like to take up painting seriously; I think I might do something at that; but poetry Ð I despair of ever writing excellent poetry. I can't look at things in the simple, large way that great poets do. My mind is so cramped and dulled and fevered, there is no consistency of purpose, no oneness of aim; the very fibres are torn apart, and application deadened by the fiendish persistence of the coil of circumstance.
July 1916
To Gordon Bottomley [postmarked July 23, 1916]
Your letter came to-day with Mr Trevelyan's, like two friends to take me for a picnic. Or rather like friends come to release the convict from his chains with his innocence in their hands, as one sees in the twopenny picture palace. You might say, friends come to take you to church, or the priest to the prisoner. Simple poetry -that is where an interesting complexity of thought is kept in tone and right value to the dominating idea so that it is understandable and still ungraspable. I know it is beyond my reach just now, except, perhaps, in bits. I am always afraid of being empty. When I get more leisure in more settled times I will work on a larger scale and give myself room; then I may be less frustrated in my efforts to be clear, and satisfy myself too. I think what you say about getting beauty by phrasing of passages rather than the placing of individual words very fine and very true.
May 1917
Postmarked May 27, 1917
My Dear Mr Marsh
I liked your criticism of 'Dead mans dump'. Mr Binyon has often sermonised lengthily over my working on two different principles in the same thing and I know how it spoils the unity of a poem. But if I couldn't before, I can now, I am sure, plead the absolute necessity of fixing an idea before it is lost, because of the situation its conceived in. Regular rhythms I do not like much, but of course it depends on where the stress and accent are laid. I think there is nothing finer than the vigorous opening of Lycidas for music; yet it is regular. Now I think if Andrew Marvell had broken up his rhythms more he would have been considered a terrific poet. As it is I like his poem urging his mistress to love because they have not a thousand years to love on and he can't afford to wait. (I forget the name of the poem) well I like it more than Lycidas.
I have written a much finer poem which I've asked my sister to send you. Don't think from this I've time to write. This last poem is only about 70 lines and I started it about October. It is only when we get a bit of rest and the others might be gambling or squabbling I add a line or two, and continue this way. The weather is gorgeous now and we are bivouacked in the fields. The other night I awoke to find myself floating about with the water half over me. I took my shirt off and curled myself up on a little mound that the water hadn't touched and slept stark naked that night. But that was not all of the fun. The chap next to me was suddenly taken with Diarrhoea and kept on lifting the sheet of the Bivouac, and as I lay at the end the rain came beating on my nakedness all night. Next morning, I noticed the poor chap's discoloured pants hanging on a bough near by, and I thought after all I had the best of it.
I fancy you will like my last poem, I am sure it is at least as good as my Kolue speech, and there is more of it.
Yours sincerely
Isaac Rosenberg
June 1917
To Edward Marsh June 1917
I am now fearfully rushed, but find energy enough to scribble this in the minute I plunder from my work. I believe I can see the obscurities in the 'Daughters', but hardly hope to clear them up in France. The first part, the picture of the Daughters dancing and calling to the spirits of the slain before their last cries have ceased among the boughs of the tree of life, I must still work on. In that part obscure the description of the voice of the Daughter I have not made clear, I see; I have tried to suggest the wonderful sound of her voice, spiritual and voluptuous at the same time. The end is an attempt to imagine the severance of all human relationship and the fading away of human love. Later on I will try and work on it, because I think it a pity if the ideas are to be lost for want of work. My 'Unicorn' play is stopped because of my increased toil, and I forget how much or little I told you of it. I want to do it in one Act, although I think I have a subject here that could make a gigantic play. I have not the time to write out the sketch of it as far as it's gone, though I'd like to know your criticism of it very much. The most difficult part I think from; I think even Shakespeare might:-the first time Tel, the chief of the decaying race, sees a woman (who is Lilith, Saul's wife), and he is called upon to talk. Saul and Lilith are ordinary folk into whose ordinary lives the Unicorn bursts. It is to be a play of terror-terror of hidden things and the fear of the supernatural. But I see no hope of doing the play while out here. I have a way, when I write, to try and put myself in the situation, and I make gestures and grimaces.
Letters About Other Writers
On Criticism
To Miss Seaton [Written in hospital, Autumn 1917]
I was very glad to have your letter and know there is no longer a mix-up about letters and suchlike. Always the best thing to do is to answer at once, that is the likeliest way of catching one, for we shift about so quickly; how long I will stay here I cannot say: it may be a while or just a bit. I have some Shakespeare: the Comedies and also 'Macbeth'. Now I see your argument and cannot deny my treatment of your criticisms, but have you ever asked yourself why I always am rude to your criticisms? Now, I intended to show you_______'s letters and why I value his criticisms. I think anybody can pick holes and find unsound parts in any work of art; anyone can say Christ's creed is a slave's creed, the Mosaic is a vindictive, savage creed, and so on. It is the unique and superior, the illuminating qualities one wants to find___discover the direction of the impulse. What ever anybody thinks of a poet he will always know himself: he knows that the most marvellously expressed idea is still nothing; and it is stupid to think that praise can do him harm. I know sometimes one cannot exactly define one's feelings nor explain reasons for liking and disliking; but there is then the right of a suspicion that the thing has not been properly understood or one is prejudiced. It is much my fault if I am not understood, I know; but I also feel a kind of injustice if my idea is not grasped and is ignored, and only petty cavilling at form, which I had known all along was so, is continually knocked into me. I feel quite sure that form is only a question of time. I am afraid I am more rude than ever, but I have exaggerated here the difference between your criticisms and _____'s. Ideas of poetry can be very different too. Tennyson thought burns' love-songs important, but the 'Cottar's S.N.' poor. Wordsworth thought the opposite.
The Renaissance
To Miss Seaton [Written is hospital, November 15, 1917]
London may not be the place for poetry to keep healthy in, but Shakespeare did most of his work there, and Donne, Keats, Milton, Blake___I think nearly all our big poets. But, after all, that is a matter of personal likings or otherwise. Most of the French country I have seen has been devastated by war, torn up___even the woods look ghastly with their shell-shattered trees; our only recollections of warm and comfortable feelings are the rare times amongst human villages, which happened about twice in a year; but who can tell what one will like or do after the war? If the twentieth century is so awful, tell me what period you believe most enviable. Even Pater points out the Renaissance was not an outburst___it was no simultaneous marked impulse of minds living in a certain period of time___but scattered and isolated.
On Rupert Brooke (1)
22311 A Coy 3 platoon
11th K.O.R.L B.E.F
Dear Mrs Cohen
We are on a long march and I'm writing this on the chance of getting it of; so you should know I received your papers and also your letter. The notice in the Times of your book is true-especially about your handling of metre. It is an interesting number The Poetry Review you sent is good-the articles are too breathless, and want more packing, I think. The poems by the soldier are vigorous but, I feel a bit common-place. I did not like Rupert Brooke's begloried sonnets for the same reason. What I mean is second hand phrases 'lambent fires' etc takes from its reality and strength. It should be approached in a colder way, more abstract, with less of the million feelings everybody feels; or all these should be concentrated in one distinguished emotion. Walt Whitman in 'Beat, drums, beat' has said the noblest thing on war.
I am glad Yeats liked your play: His criticism is an honour. He is the established great man and it is a high thing to receive praise from him. Don't talk of Noyes-he only cloys. I always think of some twopenny bazaar when I read him.
On Rupert Brooke (2)
[August 1916]
My Dear Mr Schiff
Your Georgian B. has arrived at last; many many thanks. I pounced on King Lear's Wife, and though it was not more than I expected, it was not less. The only fault I can find is in the diction. It has the aspect of talking to children, in some places.
Goneril is marvellously drawn. Lear is a bit shadowy perhaps, but altogether as a poetic drama, it is of the very highest kind. The conception of Lear making love to the servant beside the bedside of his dying wife is unsurpassable.
In one way I do not think the play equal to some things in 'Chambers of Imagery'; at least I never got that startling pleasure from the play as I did from those. Rupert Brooke's poem on Clouds is marvellous; his style offends me; it is gaudy and remini[s]cent. The second half of the second line, and the whole of the 4th line are so uninteresting. Forgetting these it is a really wonderful thing. I also received your packet of papers which I've had no time yet to look into. I trust you've heard well of your nephews. I wonder how Bomberg behaves. I must write to him.
Is the novel growing? I am a bad midwife to ideas jut lately and only bring out abhortions. Yours sincerely
I ROSENBERG
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