A lengthy and at times hilarious letter to Waugh's French translator Jean Dauven, concerning the translation of Vile Bodies and containing a potted autobiography of his life to date as well as an inscribed portrait after Henry Lamb. Four sides of Piers Court letter paper (single foolscap sheet folded, approx. 900 words in total), signed "Evelyn Waugh". Waugh is replying, on Christmas Day, to a letter of Dauven's from the week before.The first part of the letter deals with translating some of the anachronisms from Vile Bodies into French, explaining that "chubb fuddler was chosen as a comic trade. Any French equivalent would serve. He is, in fact, the man who makes it his life's work to intoxicate fish so that, when it is neccessary to drain the fish pond, they can be moved without injury..."; that "Decorations" on an invitation card denotes royal attendance, "would 'personages royales' be correct?"; that "Blast was an avant garde publication of the time... edited by Wyndham Lewis, probably forgotten by all but a dozen Englishmen."; that kedgeree, offered to but not eaten by Adam and Nina at Doubting Hall is "an excellent luncheon or breakfast consisting of rice, eggs & salmon or haddock", and explaining a reference to Kipling's poem Gunga Din, as well as agreeing that Lecky's 'Eighteenth Century' contains "an excellent survey of the Wesleyan movement."Waugh had commented that the translation, "will breathe new life into a text which has become somewhat dated in the original", but that he "cannot help thinking in a book so localized + slangy there must have been other unfamiliar expressions.". Waugh then welcomes further enquires but also suggests it might be easier to call on "Mrs Rodd [Nancy Mitford] now in Paris at 20 Rue Bonaparte who was very much a qui of that period + would I know be delighted to help you". Mitford wrote to Waugh on 23rd January 1947, "your translator came to see me. When I couldn't cope with shymaking he lost interest. I took a great dislike to him (not only wounded pride)."The next part of the letter concerns Dauven's request for autobiographical details. Waugh comments on his family, "Arthur Waugh a literary critic of some prominence in his time... My brother Alec is also a writer."; on his education, "read Modern History (without glory) at Oxford. I think studied painting (without glory) and cabinet making (without glory)." Of his career as a writer he comments "In 1927 I published a life of Dante Gabriel Rossetti and in 1928 my first novel 'Decline and Fall' which was a success. Since then I have had no struggles for recognition & have always been unduly praised by critics... My best novel was called 'A Handful of Dust'.".He then describes how "in 1930 I was received into the Catholic Church by Fr Martin d'Arcy" and how he spent "the first fifteen years of adult life without fixed abode - travelling all over the place - tropical Africa, South America, Arctic etc.".Regarding family life he gives details of his wife Laura Herbert, noting that her father was "well known in his time", that he lives in "a pretty old manor house in the depths of the country" and that he has five children.Waugh goes on by describing his time in the Royal Marines noting that his war was "varied, enjoyable but without distinction", how he was taken on by General Laycock but, "When he went to Italy he left me behind so I did a parachute course and joined my old friend Randolph Churchill (Winstons's son) in Jugo-Salvia and finished the war among Tito's beastly partisans."Waugh finishes with his most recent novel in English (and French). "While recovering from a leg broken in parachuting (in England, no glory) I wrote a novel 'Brideshead Revisited' which is shortly appearing in translation in Paris (Edition Lafonte). This books is more serious than its predecessors, has annoyed most of the English critics and delighted illiterate Americas in a disconcerting way. But I like it."He mentions that he has "no recent photograph", so encloses "a reproduction of a portrait of me made in the year I wrote 'Vile Bodies'... but they must make plain I am now 17 years older, fatter + uglier.". The portrait, inscribed "Now aged 43 and much altered for the worse. E.W." is included here.

With the impending publication in French of Brideshead Revisited in 1947 ("Wherever I look I see Retour à Brideshead, they must have printed a huge edition" - Letter from Nancy Mitford, 1947), Les Editions de la Table Ronde, the Parisian publishing house founded by Roland Laudenbach and named by Jean Cocteau three years earlier, offered to publish a translation of Vile Bodies.
Jean Dauven translated Vile Bodies into French for Les Editions de Table Ronde under his pseudonym Louis Chantemèle. Under the same pseudonym he translated novels and stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G. Wells and Peter Cheyney. He later authored, under his own name, a monograph on Jean Cocteau (1956) as well as a book about hypnosis (1958).

Stock ID: 36726