MS-UoR-1227-7-7-1

[0183|001] - a moment in the life of all pioneers

[0086] Thirty-seven today, sound apparently in wind and limb, apart from my old trouble, and intellectually, I have little doubt, at the peak of my powers, or thereabouts. [0087] Celebrated the occasion, as in recent years, quietly at the Winehouse. [0088] No one there I knew. [0089] Sat ^{with closed eyes} separating the grain from the chaff. [0090] Jotted down a few notes, on the back of an envelope. [0091] It is good to be home again, in my old things. [0097] The new light above my desk is a great improvement. [0098] With all this darkness round me, I am less alone. [0099] (Pause.) [0100] In a way. [0101] (Pause.) [0102] I like to get up and move about in it, then come back here to...( he hesitates)... myself.

[0105] Pause.

[0106] The grain, what do I mean by that, I mean ... (Pause.) I suppose I mean those

[0106] things ^{worth having} when all the dust has - when all this dust has settled. [0107] I close my eyes and try and imagine them.

[0108] Pause.

[0110] Extraordinary silence ^{this evening}. I strain my ears and do not hear a sound. [0111] ^{Old Miss Williams always sings at this hour.} [0112] ^{But not this evening.} [0112|001] ^{I hope nothing has happened to her.}

[0126] Pause.

[0127] I have just listened to ^{an old year,} , passages at random. [0128] I did not check it in the ^register, but it must be ^{at least} ten or twelve years ago. [0129] , ^{At that time I was living off and on} in ? street. [0141] I must say I - (A stops machine, broods at length, starts machine again.) - find this a great help before embarking on a new .. er .. review. [0142] I find it hard to believe that young man was I. [0143] Even the voice is unfamiliar. [0145] Aspirations, [0147] resolutions. [0149] To drink less, in particular. [0152] He speaks of 17 hundred hours, out of the preceding 8000 odd, ^consumed on licensed premises alone. [0155] Plans for a fuller sexual life. [0156] Last illness of his father. [0156|001] References to his life'swork. [0164] Closing with a - (brief laugh) - an appeal to Providence. [0165] (Prolonged laugh.) [0166] What remains of all that ^lumber, [0167] a girl in a shabby green coat, on a railway-station platform?

[0169] Pause.

[0170] When I look -

[0184] back on the year that

[0184] is gone, with ^{the old} eyes to be, there is of course ^the house on the canal where mother ^{lay dying}, in the early autumn, after her long widowhood, and the [0207] bench by the weir [0223] from where I could see her window. [0208] I used to sit there, day after day, wishing she were ^gone. [0210] Quite a number of people I got to know then, by appearance, ^nursemaids and children, old men, dogs. ^{[0211] One dark young woman I remember particularly, with a big black pram. [0211|001] Day after day. [0212] Whenever I looked in her direction she had her eyes on me. [0213] But when at last I ventured to speak to her she threatened to call a policeman. [0217] Lovely face she had, [0218] eyes [0219] like ... moonstone.} [0223] I was there when (A switches off, broods, switches on again) - the blind went down, throwing a ball for a dog as it happened. [0224] I looked up and there it was. [0226] I sat on for a few minutes with the [⁁]^{ball in my hand and} dog barking ^{and pawing} at me. [0233] Then I held ^{it out to him} and he took it in his mouth, very gently. [0234] An old tennis ball , all black and sodden, but not punctured. [0235] (Pause.) [0236] I wonder ^{how much there is there}.

[0241] Pause

[0244] ^{Intellectually} a ^{year of discouragement} until that unforgettable ^night in March, [⁁]^{at the end of the pier, [⁁]in the high wind} when I suddenly saw the whole thing. [0246] This, I realized in the Winehouse, is what I have chiefly to record this evening against the day when all my work ^{will be} done and perhaps no place left in my memory, and no thankfulness for the wonder that made it possible. [0247] What I saw then was briefly this. The assumption on which I had

[0247] been going all these years, namely that - [0248] (A switches off machine, winds tape forward, switches on again) [0249] - granite rocks the foam flying up in the light of the beacon and the anemometer spinning like a propellor, clear to me at last that the dark I have struggled to keep out of my work is in reality its true - [0250] (Curses, switches off, winds forward, switches on) [0251] - strange association till my dying day of storm and night with the light of understanding and the peace - [0252] (Curses louder, switches off, winds forward, switches on..) [0253] - my ^{face in} her breasts and my hand on her^. [0254] ^{We lay there} without moving. [0255] But underneath us all moved and moved us, gently, up and down, and ^{to and fro} from side to side.

[0256] (Pause.)

[0257] Past midnight. [0258] ^Never ^knew such a silence. [0261]

[0260] (Pause.)

[0261] The coming year will decide. May I be given the strength and the -

[0262] (A switches off, winds back tape, switches on again.)

[0263] - upper lake, with the ^punt, bathed ^{off the bank,} then pushed out ^{into the stream} and drifted. [0264] She lay stretched out on the floorboards with her hands under her head and her eyes closed. [0265] Hot sun, with a bit of a breeze and the water nice and lively. [0266] I noticed a scratch on her thigh and asked her ^how she got it. [0267] Picking gooseberries, she said. [0268] I said I thought it was hopeless and no good going on, and she agreed, without opening her eyes. [0270] I asked her to look at me and after a moment she did, but just slits, because

[0270] of the glare. [0271] I bent over her to get them in the shadow and they opened. ([0272] Pause.) [0276] We drifted ^{in among} reeds and got stuck. [0277] The ^way they ^went down under the ^blunt stem, hissing. [0279] I lay down across ^her with my face in her breasts and my hand on her. [0280] We lay there without moving. [0281] But underneath us all moved, and moved us, ^gently up and down, and to and fro.

[0282] (Pause.)

[0283] Past midnight. [0284] Never knew -

[0293] Just been listening to that stupid bastard I was 30 years ago, hard to believe I was ever as bad as that. [0293|001] [0296] The eyes she had! ([0297] Broods, realizes he is recording silence, switches off. Broods.) [0299] Everything there, everything, all the - [0300] (Realizes this is not being recorded, switches on.) [0301] Everything there, every bleeding thing,