February 16. Arrive at Kansas City at 7:20 & am met by a dear little dump called Mrs. Doughty. She takes me to the Baltimore Hotel, where I am put into a complimentary suite consisting of two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a shower-bathroom, three wc's, a hall, and an enormous sitting room, all filled with roses. A jolly view over the city & skyscrapers. Get a large post, including English letters, and read them in the intervals of seeing reporters. Write some letters. Mrs. Doughty comes again to fetch me for luncheon; she telephones up to my room saying "this is your friend Mrs. Doughty." I sign a lot of books in her room at the Women's Club. An anormous luncheon, where I sit between the president, an awful ill-tempered looking bedint [lower-class person, in Vita-Harold terminology] called Mrs. Bush, and an exceprionally nice, original intelligent person from Maine called Mrs. Martin. Like Mrs. Martin very much indeed; she is a real grown-up highbrow full of ideas. Am slightly disconcerted by having to lecture from the luncheon-table, with the front row of the audience about 3 feet from my nose, but it does very well & they seem delighted. "Modern Spirit in Literature" again. I am getting quite glib at it. Then I am taken for a drive by Mrs. Bush, Mrs. Doughty, & another enormously fat woman (Mrs. Hearst?) to see the city, War Memorial, and statues called the Pioneer Mother & the Scout. All rather good; the war memorial very modern; but it looks rather incomplete because they ran out of funds. The residential quarter is well & elaborately planned, with some very charming houses on hilly ground with trees. Have tea with Mrs. Hearst. Very tired. Dine at the Country Club, but am allowed not to change. The Country Club is charming, with an English looking room, a log fire, sofas and cretonne. A nice dinner; about 40 people. Sit between Mrs. Bush again & a nice old judge, but talk nearly all the time to the editor of the local paper, Mr. Haskell, a clever man who loves Hadji's book on his father. Met Ernest Hemmingway's aunt. Nice people altogether. Mrs. Doughty drives me back to the station, which I leave at 10:30 for Chicago in one of those beastly sections.
* Dagboeken van Vita Sackville-West
* Vita Sackville-West (1892-1962)
Geen opmerkingen:
Een reactie posten