Item 43 - Letter from Bernard Dickinson to James Smith

Boarbank Hall, Grange-over-Sands.—Apologises for not replying earlier. Urges him not to worry about the way in which he (Smith) wrote, or about his spiritual state. ‘Fribourg has greatly disappointed me. I think we can thank the British Council for jamming up the works.’ Discusses Harding’s idea of Eliot’s ‘new concepts’, and responds to Smith’s remarks on the Chester miracle plays. Will try again to ‘produce something’. They have had a flood of visitors since Easter, and he has been helping two French girls (nieces of the Mother General, who has been staying there) with their English. Reflects on the qualities of Newman’s Apologia. Urges Smith to produce ‘something really first-rate on the paths on English though[t] from its philosophers thro’ its more purely “literary” writers’.