British archaeologist, soldier, adventurer, and writer (1888–1935) immortalized in the epic 1962 screen biography Lawrence of Arabia. He attained international renown for his role as British liaison in the Arab Revolt of 1916–1918, which he recounted in his best-selling memoir Seven Pillars of Wisdom. ALS, in pencil, signed “T.E.S.,” one page, 8 x 13, no date. Letter to “Dear Williamson.” In full: “Your village book is the real thing—with just the touch of the preacher behind it, trying to convert the heathen. I am loving it. On page 50 I checked for the first time at a point of prose: 1st sentence (you find beginning difficult, always, I think):—in red brown swirls…pushed by…drained into…by a hundred…in the valley. Rules are made to be broken but one shouldn’t usually have more than one of each preposition in a sentence: nor more than 5 or 6 of any upon a page. A counsel of perfection, that all my writing fails to read: but then my writing does just fail, unlike yours…The badger hunt struck me as restrainedly & magnificently ghastly. I despair of finishing this. It began weeks ago. Since, I have had not a spare moment. Now I have lent the Village Book to Higgins, one of ones who reads impatiently, & has been asking for it for weeks. I was only dog-in-a-manger by it. The fellows here like your books, & queue up for them. Later, I will get it, and leisure to read it. I think it is most lively & truthful stuff.” In fine condition, with Lawrence changing from a standard pencil to a blue pencil halfway through writing, intersecting folds, some light wrinkling to top and bottom edge, and some stray ink marks to top left.
Williamson’s book The Village Book which was published in 1930 and contained stories of 1920s life in the village of Georgeham and the surrounding area during the winter and spring. Lawrence chastised his grammar, but admitted to his own writing failures. As a literary judge, he was more than competent. The men of letters became friends and Williamson wrote a book called Genius to Friendship: T. E. Lawrence which described their friendship. Their amity cooled when the writer introduced G. B. Everett, a thinly veiled Lawrence, in The Gold Falcon. By 1935, they stopped meeting and Williamson visited the National Socialist Congress at Nuremberg where he was impressed by the Hitler Youth Corps; he later joined the British Union Fascists. After Lawrence's death, Williamson claimed that the adventurer wanted to meet Hitler, but most historians believe this was a transference of his own desire to his onetime friend. Pre-certified John Reznikoff/PSA/DNA and RR Auction COA.
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