English novelist, author of Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Women in Love, etc. ALS, one page both sides, 5.5 x 8.5, April 6, 1925. Lawrence writes to Curtis Brown from his ranch in New Mexico. In part, “Today it threatens to snow; but with a good log fire, I don’t care. The Indian is chopping wood in the yard, & his wife is helping Mrs. Lawrence get tidy…I wish you’d have sent to me The Calendar copies that contain The Princess. I should like to see it. A Danish woman, friend of ours, is pining to translate The Captain’s Doll novelettes into Danish. I wish you’d send her a line to say if she can go ahead…I hear Norman Douglas attacks me on behalf of [Maurice] Magnus. Rather disgusting. When one knows what N. D. is & how he treated M., would it give him a son; & when I have a letter from Douglas telling me to do what I liked & say what I liked about that MS; and when one knows how bitter Magnus was about Douglas, at the end. And when one knows how much worse the whole facts were, than those I give. - However canaille will be canaille.” Norman Douglas was a British writer, now best known for his 1917 novel South Wind. From 1912 to1914 Douglas worked for The English Review and met Lawrence through this connection. This led to a feud between the two, after Lawrence in 1922 portrayed James Argyle in Aaron’s Rod, a character that he based a character on Douglas. Lawrence met Maurice Magnus in Florence in late 1919 through Douglas, for whom Magnus was a kind of secretary and errand boy. Magnus turned to Lawrence for entertainment, pocket money, literary advice, and shelter. In mid-1920, friendless and with the police closing in on him, Magnus fled to Malta, where, alone in a rented room, he poisoned himself. Lawrence would go on to write Memoir of Maurice Magnus, considered one of his finest pieces of writing. Accompanied by a certificate of authenticity from PASS-CO. Narrow strip of edge toning, a couple rusty paperclip marks, and some scattered creasing, otherwise fine condition. Auction LOA John Reznikoff/PSA/DNA and R&R COA.
