Notes (1935 Version)

NOTES

[ t 9 3 5 Version J

Act One

The setting is Dim bola, the Cameron home at Freshwater Bay on the Isle of Wight. V irginia condenses the time of the action, for in actuality Ellen Terry and Watts ended their marriage in 1865, the Camcrons left England with their coffins in 1875, and Tennyson accepted the peerage in 1884. Most references in the play arc biographically accurate. An important exception is Ellen Terry's romantic escapade with John Craig. A rumor exception is the Camcrons' destination. They sailed to Ceylon rather than to the more euphonious "India."

V irginia wrote a short historical sketch of Julia Cameron for the 1926 Hogarth Press publication Victorian Photographs of Famous Men and Fair Women.

"Sit still, Charles" (page 5).

In one of several early versions of her short story "The Searchlight," Virginia humorously describes the efficiency with which Mrs. Cameron, with clenched fist and threats of damnation, forced those around her to sit still.

Virginia incorporated a number of ideas and passages from these manuscripts, now at the UniYcrsi ty of Sussex Library, into Freshwater.

"Surely you can put up with a little discomfort m the cause of art" (page 5).

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When doing a p icture entitled "Despair," Mrs. Cameron is said to have locked her model in a closet for several hours in order to get the right expression on her face. Sec Brian Hill, Julia Margaret Cameron: A Victorian Family Portrait.

Watts and Tennyson were two of M rs. Cameron's closest friends and advisors. She moved to Freshwater in t86o to be near the Tennyson home at Farringford during her husband's absence in Ceylon.

"A philosopher with his beard dipped m moonlight"

(page 5).

Tennyson used just these words in describing Mr.

Cameron. See Alfred, Lord Tennyson: A Memoir by His Son.

"The Utmost for the Highest" (page 6).

The phrase was Watts's motto. See Mary Seton Watts, George Frederick Watts: Annals of an Artist's Life, a book Virginia mentions in her diary on 30 January 1919. This is the same entry in which she first discusses her plans for Freshwater.

"six American professors are in the summer house''

(page 6).

Tennyson's son records this incident.

"the Earl of Dudley" (page 8).

Mrs. Cameron's maid, model, and photographic assistant did in fact marry a peer, although not the Earl of Dudley. Virginia's choice of this title may suggest a 56

family joke, since Mrs. Cameron's great-niece married the second Earl of Dudley. Henry Taylor's Autobiography gives a humorous account of Mary's rise from rags to riches under Mrs. Cameron's tutelage.

"he's a deal sight better than coffins any dc:.y" (page 8).

The manuscript reads "del" for "deal."

"When we lie .. . my head will be pillowed" (page 8).

Vanessa Bell's notes correct an apparent typographical error here. Virginia's manuscript reads "my heart will be pillowed."

"Oh, Signor" (page 9).

The notes to Ellen Terry's Memoirs, edited by Edith Craig and Christopher St. John and published in 1933, give this picture of her status as Watts's sixteen-year-old wife: "'The Signor,' as Watts was called by his friends, was surrounded by a little court of married women of his own age . . . who seemed to have made it their business to keep his child-wife in order. She was subjected to a humiliating surveillance and had strict injunction not to open her mouth in the presence of distinguished guests."

Ellen Terry's autobiography reveals how demanding her first husband could be: "I remember sitting to him in armour for hours and never realising that it was heavy until I fainted."

"I am not yet a Lord, damsel" (page 10).

The manuscript offers two choices in Tennyson's reply to Ellen's "Oh Lord, Lord, Lord!": 1) "That may lie 57

on the lap of the Gods." The word "knee" is deleted.

2) "That may lie on the lap of the Queen." Queen seems the sensible choice in view of the Queen's entrance at the close of the p.l.ay. Vanessa Bell's note for Tennyson's remark "Meanwhile, sit on my lap" reads "on my knee."

"Here's the turkey wings" (page 13).

This was originally M ary's speech. The manuscript here is scrambled.

"The turkey has become part and p arcel of my immortal art" (page 14).

Mrs. Cameron continually claimed to have "immortalized" her subjects.

"Come, my marmoset" (page 14).

Virginia's handwritten cast list includes "Mitzi,"

Leonard VVoolf's pet marmoset. Since the monkey was a resident of Monk's House in 1935, t his further supports the dating of this manuscript. Vanessa Bell's handwritten cast list does not include the roles of porpoise and marmoset and casts "JB" (Julian Bell) as Lord Tennyson, "Ann"

(Ann Stephen) as John Craig, and "Eve" ( Eve Younger) as Mary. Mrs. Ann Stephen Synge remembers her father, Adri an Stephen, in the role of Tennyson and is certain that she did not play a man; no one else interviewed recalls a woman playing a man's role in the 1935 performance.

"vVhy did I say 'rosy'? Because it is a fact-" (page 15).

Ruskin singled out this line as a "pathetic fallacy."

Thomas Wilson in Reminiscence quotes Tennyson as 58

follows: "Why the very day I wrote it, I saw the daisies rosy in Maiden's Croft, and thought of enclosing one to Rusk in labelled 'A Pathetic Fallacy.' "

"The donkey is eating thistles on the lawn" (page t6).

There follows the deleted line: "There are moments when I despair of modern life altogether."

"The moan of doves .. . innumerable bees" (page t6).

These two lines are from Tennyson's The Princess: A Medley. The second l ine should read "And murmur-

.

,

mg ...

"The mellow ouzel . . .

" (page t6).

This is from "The Gardener's Daughter. " The correct line reads "The mellow ouzel fluted in the elm."

Following the stage directions for Watts to open his book (page 19), Virginia deletes the following passage: MRS. C.

Come here, Ch arles. Let me dry your head. Let Julia Margaret Cameron work up to the last moment in the service of her art. [She dries him.]

All my sisters were beautiful, but I had genius.

They were the brides of men� but I am the bride of art. I have sought beauty in public houses. I have found her playing the concertina in the street. My housemaid sold bootlaces at Charing Cross; she is now the wife of the Earl of Dudley�

my bootboy stole eggs and was in prison� he now waits at table in the guise of Cupid. I have sought beauty in the most unlikely places-59

We find this passage in an expanded form in the earlier version of Freshwater ( see pages 7 4-75).

"Sir Henry Taylor" (page 19).

Another close friend of Mrs. Cameron, he appears in Virginia's early drafts of "The Searchlight " manuscripts.

"I .

. have made Modesty symbolise the fertility of

.

fish" (page 19) .

Watts emphasized throughout his life that art in its highest form is always symbolic.

Following Mr. Cameron's closing line in Act One (page 19), these final passages have b een deleted : TENN.

That's what comes of toying with symbols. I have always said, take care of the sound and the sense will take care of itself.

MRS. C.

Oh Signor, Signor! You have made Modesty symbolise the fertility of fish_

ALL THREE fspeaking together]

Signor has made Modesty symbolise the fertility of fish!

David Richman, director of a production of Freshwater at Stanford University in 1 974, reinstated the above passage to help support what he terms the musical structure of the play: "Not only docs the play have an operatic quality; the st ructure of the three acts is much like that 60

of a symphonic composition. The fast-paced first and third acts are similar in their abundance of thematic material to the outer movements of a classical symphony. The middle act, a lyric section which focuses on Ellen Terry and her lover, is in the nature of an andante." "Directing Freshwater," Virginia lVoolf Miscellany, Spring, 1 974-Act Two

"The Needles" (page 23).

This refers to a group of chalk rocks off the southwest coast of the Isle of Wight.

"John Craig" (page 23).

Virginia's naval lieutenant IS apparently fictional.

Ellen Terry's two children by Edward Godwin, with whom she lived briefly after her separation from VVatts, were subsequently given the legal name Craig.

The only man who ever jumped over her head on horseback, however, seems to have been playwright Charles Reade, the friend who was responsible for bringing Ellen Terry back into the theatre.

" [Lor' ] what a lark" ( page 23).

The manuscript reads simply "I say, wha t a lark ! "

Nell's response suggests a n omitted phrase.

"Titian" (page 24).

Titian was one of Watts's favorite painters.

"Is this the Isle of Wight" ( page 28).

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Nell's reply to John's question is scrambled and hard to decipher from the manuscript corrections.

"And the nightingales forlorn" (page 29).

This phrase occurs in "The Searchlight" manuscript along with a number of bird images that appear in Freshwater.

Act Three

"Yes. There is something highly pleasing m the

pride of life" (page 40).

"Pride" may be a typographical error for "prime."

"a beautiful young woman who was found drowned"

(page 42) .

Found Drowned is the title of a painting by Watts. His wife described it as "the wreck of a young girl's life."

Ellen Terry left a two-word note, "Found Drowned,"

attached to a photograph of Watts when in 1 868 she ran off with Godwin.

"Browning could find a rhyme for Craig" (page 44) .

Tennyson's son records a conversation between his father and Browning in which the latter claimed "that he could make a rhyme for every word in the English language."

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