Beschreibung:

Papers of the Second World War poet Captain Richard Spender of the Parachute Regiment (1921-1943), including draft verse, corrected proofs, letters home, photographs, etc., comprising: (i) Autograph manuscripts of all nine poems that he sent home shortly before his death, while serving with the Parachute Regiment in Tunisia, and which were published posthumously as Parachute Battalion: Last Poems from England and Tunisia (November 1943); in publication order: 'Before the First Parachute Descent' (opening: "All my world has suddenly gone quiet/ Like a railway carriage as it draws into a station/ Conversation fails, laughter dies..."), 'Wing and Arrow' ("...The girl who wears a badge of wings/ Holds hands across tea cups with the man/ Who breaks the bombers flight with rushing shell./ Thus does the bird love the arrow./ And thus the bow kisses the wing it pierces..."), the three poems that make up the sequence 'Embarkation Leave' ('Train Journey', 'Big School' and 'School Chapel', the last two in draft form), 'Heart's Song' ("...'Learn to laugh until you're blind,/ 'And then the fear that lurks behind/ 'Will not be seen, will not be known..."), 'Women of Sleep' (ending: "For I have seen men, who had kissed you in darkness,/ Wake to your cold sister Death's chilly stare"), 'Parachute Battalion' (two manuscripts, with the note "If security allows title should included Bttn number (mine) II"), and ' Tunisian Patrol' (opening: "The Night lies with her body crookedly flung/ In agony across the sharp hills..."), in an envelope marked "Original M.S.S. of some of Dick's poems, including all those sent from Tunisia" (ii) Set of unbound page proofs, one corrected and revised seemingly by Spender, for his first book of poems, Laughing Blood; plus a copy with presentation sticker signed by him (as "Toad") to his aunts, who acted as his literary agents (see below); and copies of his posthumous Parachute Battalion (1943) and Collected Poems (1944), with later editions (iii) Series of over seventy autograph letters to his parents, with a few to his brother Jim in the RAF, the last dozen or so written while on active service in Tunisia, the others when on training, a series combining a youthful mix of world-weariness, idealism, cynicism and humour; and touching on his own poetry ("...I am waiting anxiously for news of arrival of poems 'School Chapel', 'Train Journey', & 'Parachute Bttn'. Now don't get too conceited about your poet son! There is no need to bother your heads about my skin. Just keep well yourselves, Old Folks, & keep the Home Fires switched on...") as well as the routine of everyday life in the army ("...My batman tells me that after this war, the 'oristocracy' will be all swep[t] away, & that he & his brother, (who earns millions at Nuffield's for staring like a drunken cow at a lot of foolish machinery) will employ me. I told him it was very kind of him, but what could I do? He found that difficult, so I promised that I would write odes on all the tin plates he & his brother churn out. I would like to see my batman running a factory. I should also like to do business with him. I should make a lot of money. Well my unbelievable blossom, cheerio, & if the bottom falls out of things, just pickle my memory in alcohol & press it in the pages of a rhyming dictionary..."), and touching on practical matters ("...Now don't get all agitated about all this as I say, money doesn't matter & if (horrible pause) I catch or stop a packet, nothing will be wasted as all the stuff is spread round the boys..."); the letters to his brother Jim likewise discussing his literary career ("...That little bastard of a brother of yours Dick, gave up his cushy Battle Bulls job to become a parachutist. He is now in N Africa with the 1st Army. Heard of us? He has also just published a book, & all the best papers now publish his work. Times, Daily Telegraph & Observer. He is a household word, just like Lux & Oxo. There is no more news & no paper. Be careful &