Monday, January 13th

WE HAVE BEEN having rather dismal weather, dismal because it is unseasonal, rain instead of snow, warm instead of cold. I feel physically let down, dull, and a little queasy. But I am having a great read at last, the Bedford Aldous Huxley (I had read only Vol. 1), Lady Ottoline’s Memories, and Kenneth Clark’s quite charming autobiography … it is all part of the period I am thinking about as I write the Bowen portrait.

Kenneth Clark is a very endearing person, sure enough of himself to have no illusions about himself. I marked a passage about the artist and society last night. He is speaking about Graham Sutherland who “did not recoil from smart society,” and he goes on to say, “I am not sure how much this is desirable for an artist.… Bébé Bernard was one of the few painters I have known to have survived (and only just survived) the intoxicating speed of social chatter. The artist must go at his own speed. His whole life is a painful effort to turn himself inside out, and if he gives too much away at the shallow level of social intercourse he may lose the will to attempt a deeper excavation.”