Contents lists
T. E. Lawrence to Eric Kennington
Clouds Hill
Moreton
Dorset
10.02.24
Dear K.,
I'm unable to improve the libel chances. It stands this way. The book is libellous, as against Some Englishmen, Some Frenchmen, Some Arabs, Some Turks. The danger of proceedings run in this national order.
I'll do my best to prevent them
(i) by toning down.
(ii) by informing my victims, before proofs are passed, of what I say about them.
but I don't guarantee the efficacy of either proceeding.
Consequently the wise man
must prepare for trouble. As I explained, the trouble can't hit me. A soldier is
too poor a being to pay damages, too degraded a being to fear imprisonment.
I intended to tear of the printer's name, and lay claim, if challenged in the
first six months (after that there is no real risk) to have printed it myself.
I've asked law-men, (not professionally, but in friendly guise) and they tell me
that in the circs. no action could well be taken against my printer. He must
take my wages, and is not himself, but an extension of me. Pike will make the
form of the book a credit to our firm. . . and if there are no libel actions
(odds 90 to one there won't be) then he shall have All the credit of te
appearance. If there is trouble I get it.
Meynell wouldn't ever come in. He could say simply that Pike had hired of him a press.
Many thanks for the Roberts photos. I think it's a good piece of work: though at first glance it puzzled me.
Some Nashes attached for judgement. Please tell me what you think of them. One is of 'A wilderness of sandstone peaks'.
Source: | DG 454-5 |
Checked: | dk/ |
Last revised: | 23 July 2008 |
T. E. Lawrence chronology
1888 16 August: born at Tremadoc, Wales
1896-1907: City of Oxford High School for Boys
1907-9: Jesus College, Oxford, B.A., 1st Class Hons, 1909
1910-14: Magdalen College, Oxford (Senior Demy), while working at the British Museum's excavations at Carchemish
1915-16: Military Intelligence Dept, Cairo
1916-18: Liaison Officer with the Arab Revolt
1919: Attended the Paris Peace Conference
1919-22: wrote Seven Pillars of Wisdom
1921-2: Adviser on Arab Affairs to Winston Churchill at the Colonial Office
1922 August: Enlisted in the Ranks of the RAF
1923 January: discharged from the RAF
1923 March: enlisted in the Tank Corps
1923: translated a French novel, The Forest Giant
1924-6: prepared the subscribers' abridgement of Seven Pillars of Wisdom
1927-8: stationed at Karachi, then Miranshah
1927 March: Revolt in the Desert, an abridgement of Seven Pillars, published
1928: completed The Mint, began translating Homer's Odyssey
1929-33: stationed at Plymouth
1931: started working on RAF boats
1932: his translation of the Odyssey published
1933-5: attached to MAEE, Felixstowe
1935 February: retired from the RAF
1935 19 May: died from injuries received in a motor-cycle crash on 13 May
1935 21 May: buried at Moreton, Dorset