H Is for Hawk (37 page)

1
A headlong dive of rage – The Goshawk
, p. 15.

2
Your eye must see a composition
– Henri Cartier Bresson, 1957, in Adam Bernstein, ‘The Acknowledged Master of the Moment’,
The Washington Post,
Thursday 5 August, 2004, p. A01.

1
Days of attack
–
The Goshawk,
p. 36.

2
I had only just escaped
– T. H. White, in Sylvia Townsend Warner,
T. H. White: A Biography
, p. 90.

3
I had been a schoolmaster
– T. H. White, unpublished manuscript ‘A Sort of Mania’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

4
patient excursion into the fields
–
The Goshawk
, p. 27.

5
dropped out of the curious . . . monastic boy
– T. H. White, entry for 20 January 1938 in unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Horse’
,
Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

6
a velvet stoole
– Edmund Bert,
An Approved Treatise of Hawkes and Hawking.
1619, repr. Thames Valley Press, Maidenhead, 1972, p. 22.

7
I had a sort of schoolgirlish ‘pash’
– T. H. White, unpublished manuscript ‘A Sort of Mania’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

8
The old hawk masters had invented a means
–
The Goshawk
, p. 16.

9
Man against bird
–
ibid
, p. 28.

10
but the tragedy had to be kept out
–
ibid
, p. 64.

1
tolerate a loss of self
– A. D. Hutter, ‘Poetry in psychoanalysis: Hopkins, Rossetti, Winnicott’,
International Review of PsychoAnalysis
, vol. 9, 1982, pp. 303–16, p. 305. See: John Keats, letter to Richard Woodhouse, 27 October 1818, in John Keats,
Selected Letters
, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002, pp. 147–9.

1
6.15–6.45 walked round + round Gos
– T. H. White, unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Flying Supplement’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

2
It was not that one drank enough
–
The Goshawk
, p. 68.

3
The key to her management
– Gilbert Blaine,
Falconry,
Philip Allan, 1936
,
p. 181.

4
the grand secret of discipline
– Edward Michell,
The Art and Practice of Hawking,
Methuen, 1900, p. 83.

5
her eye doth still behold
. . .
acquainted with any thing
– Edmund Bert,
An Approved Treatise of Hawkes and Hawking
, p. 16.

1
For the goshawk, the necessity
–
The Goshawk
, p. 52.

2
all the family . . . He bates repeatedly on these trips
– T. H. White, entry for Thursday 30 July, unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Flying Supplement’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

3
He had to learn to stand that bustle –
The Goshawk
, p. 101.

4
the red moon . . . had seen to sink as a yellow one at dawn
–
ibid
, p. 53.

5
On the pastoral craze as cultural salvage, see Jed Esty,
A Shrinking Island: Modernism and National Culture in England
, Princeton University Press, 2003.

6
I thought of the small race
–
The Goshawk
, p. 81.

1
She purrs and chirps
– Humphrey ap Evans,
Falconry For You
, John Gifford, 1960, p. 36.

2
peculiar and somewhat sulky
– Gilbert Blaine,
Falconry
, Philip Allan, 1936, p. 179.

3
Never was there a more contrary
– Frank Illingworth,
Falcons and Falconry
, Blandford Press Ltd., 1948, p. 74.

4
not like her or her kin
– Charles Hawkins Fisher,
Reminiscences of a Falconer
, John Nimmo, 1901, p. 17.

5
a thousand pities
– Gage Earl Freeman and Francis Henry Salvin,
Falconry: Its Claims, History and Practice
, Longman, Green, Longman and Robert, 1859, p. 216.

6
sociable and familiar . . . altogether shye and fearfull . . . stately and brave
– Simon Latham,
Lathams New and Second Booke of Falconry
, Roger Jackson, 1618, p. 3.

7
joye in her selfe . . . my playfellow
– Edmund Bert,
An Approved Treatise of Hawkes and Hawking
, pp. 41–2.

8
crazy and suspicious
–
The Goshawk
, pp. 146–7.

9
man who for two months
–
ibid
, p. 37.

10
The thing he most hates
– T. H. White, entry for 14 August 1936 in unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Flying Supplement’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

11
monkish elite . . . small, tenacious sect
– Lord Tweedsmuir, ‘Gos and Others’,
Spectator Harvest
, ed. Henry Wilson Harris, Ayer Publishing, 1970, pp. 7–9, p. 8.

12
deeply rooted in the nature . . . born, not made
– Gilbert Blaine,
Falconry
, Philip Allan, 1936, p. 13.

13
It was not until I had kept some hawks
– T. H. White, unpublished manuscript ‘A Sort of Mania’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

14
that ancestor’s bony hand
–
The Goshawk
, p. 18.

15
the wind in your face
– J. Wentworth Day,
Sporting Adventure
, Harrap, 1937, p. 205.

16
Falconry is certainly of high descent . . . I believe he was mistaken
– Gage Earl Freeman and Francis Henry Salvin,
Falconry: Its Claims, History and Practice
, pp. 3–4.

1
Skipping and leaping
–
The Goshawk
, p. 100.

2
was evidently a matter of exquisite assessment
–
ibid
, p. 95.

3
Now, now
–
ibid
, p. 105.

4
a hump-backed aviating Richard III
–
ibid
, p. 106.

5
I braced the breast muscles
–
ibid
, p. 107.

6
grow up a big, brave . . . any of these noble things
–
England Have My Bones
, pp. 349–50.

7
I cry
prosit
loudly
– T. H. White, entry for Thursday 27 August, unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Horse’, Harry Ransom Humanities Reasearch Center, University of Texas at Austin.

8
the wisdom of certainty
– T. H. White, unpublished manuscript ‘You Can’t Keep a Good Man Down’, pp. 261–2, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

9
To anybody who has spent two months
–
ibid
, p. 271.

10
‘You went back to school voluntarily
–
ibid
, p. 263.

1
avoid the kicks which frighten me . . . actually a horrible surprise . . . only a man
– T. H. White, entry for 25 August 1936 in unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Horse’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

1
insensate El Dorado
–
The Goshawk
, p. 124.

2
It had hardly any breaking strain. It had already been broken twice
–
ibid, p. 123.

3
You bloody little sod . . . my fault
–
ibid
, p. 124.

1
To him I am still the rarely tolerated enemy, and to me he is always the presence of death
– T. H. White, entry for 2 September 1936 in unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Horse’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

2
I have lived for this hawk . . . never seen before
–
ibid.

3
growing sensual
– Sylvia Townsend Warner,
T. H. White: A Life
, p. 29.

4
He has been frightened into insanity . . . and persecution
– T. H. White, entry for 2 September 1936 in unpublished manuscript notebook ‘Horse’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

1
Rooks observed to be mobbing
– Gilbert Blaine,
Falconry,
Philip Allan, 1936, p. 199.

2
I cannot remember that my heart stopped beating
–
The Goshawk
, p. 136.

3
Love asketh but himself
– William Blake, ‘The Clod and the Pebble’, misquoted in
The Goshawk
, p. 147.

1
The exhibition was the excellent
Three Days of the Condor
by Henrik Håkansson, Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge.

1
Consider this, and in our time . . . look there
– W. H. Auden ‘Consider this’ (first published 1930) in
The English Auden
, ed. Edward Mendelson, Faber & Faber, 1978, p. 46.

2
Silver-gold through the blue haze
– T. H. White, unpublished manuscript notebook ‘ETC’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

3
He was a Hittite
–
The Goshawk
, p. 214.

4
I now flinch from anything frightful
– Siegfried Sassoon, unpublished letter to T. H. White, 15 October 1952, p. 1, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

5
tonic for the less forthright savagery
–
The Goshawk
, p. 212.

6
At a particular point in the journey
– T. H. White, ‘The Hastings Caves’,
Time and Tide Magazine
, 8 December 1956, p. 152.

7
It will be charming to have a rest
– T. H. White,
The Once and Future King
, G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York, 1958, p. 228.

1
get for you a other passager Gos
–
The Goshawk
, p. 187.

2
Plan for a Passage Gos . . . turns at this
– T. H. White, annotations to inside cover of Edmund Bert’s
Treatise of Hawkes and Hawking
, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

3
It made me feel cleaner
– T. H. White, letter to John Moore, in Sylvia Townsend Warner,
T. H. White: A Biography
, p. 92.

4
Think of Lust . . . like that
–
The Goshawk
, p. 204.

1
humans and animals can turn into each other
– Rane Willerslev, ‘Not Animal, Not Not-Animal: Hunting, Imitation and Empathetic Knowledge among the Siberian Yukaghirs’,
The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
, Vol. 10, No. 3 (Sept. 2004), pp. 629–52, p. 659.

1
Nature in her green, tranquil woods
– John Muir,
John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir
, ed. Linnie Marsh Wolfe, 1938, repr. University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, Wisconsin, 1979, p. 208.

2
Earth hath no sorrows that earth cannot heal
–
ibid
, p. 99.

3
On mourning in children and adults, see Melanie Klein, ‘Mourning and its relation to manic depressive states’, in
The Writings of Melanie Klein, Volume 1, Love, Guilt and Reparation
, The Hogarth Press, 1940, pp. 344–69.

1
‘Parfay!’ quath he
–
Sir Orfeo and Sir Launfal
, ed. Lesley Johnson and Elizabeth Williams, The University of Leeds School of English, Leeds, 1984, p. 11.

2
He departed secretly
– Geoffrey of Monmouth,
Vita Merlini,
ed. and trans. John J. Parry,
Illinois Studies in Language and Literature 10
, 1925, pp. 243–380.

3
With the passion of an Edgar Wallace
– T. H. White, ‘King Arthur in the Cottage’,
Readers’ News
, Volume 2, Number 3, August 1939, pp. 26–7, p. 26.

4
It seems impossible to determine
– Letter to L. J. Potts, 14 January 1938, in
T. H. White, Letters to a Friend
, pp. 86–7.

5
Every comely man
– John Cheever,
The Journals,
Jonathan Cape, 1990, p. 219.

6
The story of Puppy Mason is in T. H. White, unpublished manuscript fragment ‘A Valentine’, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin.

1
Kingdom of Grammerie
– Sylvia Townsend Warner,
T. H. White: A Life
, p. 99.