Читать книгу Scott on Zélide: Portrait of Zélide by Geoffrey Scott - Richard Holmes - Страница 13

Geoffrey Scott himself was always haunted by Zélide, though in many ways she set him free. With the success of his biography, he was for the first time offered professional literary work, as the editor of the recently discovered Boswell Papers from Malahide. This brought him a new self-confidence, a proper salary, a degree of emotional independence, and a fresh start in America where the unsorted Boswell archive had been shipped. Edith Wharton thoroughly approved of this new literary adventure.

As if to appease the shade of Zélide, Scott made his peace with Mary Berenson. He ceased to trail after Nicky Mariano or Vita, and amicably divorced Lady Sybil (who married Percy Lubbock the next year). Sybil, in turn, published her translations of Four Tales by Zélide, including ‘Le Noble’ and Caliste, in 1925, the first time they had ever appeared in English. Her daughter Iris Origo, a distinguished biographer in her own right, later wrote with great kindness and perception of her wayward stepfather.

But perhaps Zélide’s shade remained a little jealous of Geoffrey Scott. In 1928 he found a new love in America. Muriel Draper, an artist living at East 40th Street, worked for the New Yorker. With her, he felt he was at last escaping his own entanglements in the past, and the world of Zélide. By contrast Muriel made New York appear ‘the most beautiful city in the world in a curious thrilling way: because it is all happening under my own personal eyes, and not an elegant dream of the past.’

He too now planned for the future. His editing project was going well, and in spring 1929 he signed a contract with Harcourt Brace for a major new biography of Boswell. Then Geoffrey Scott unexpectedly caught pneumonia, and tragically died in a New York public hospital in August 1929, aged forty-six.

The Times obituarist noted: ‘he was the perfect person to pass an evening with, the product of a high civilization…both critical and affectionate.’ One cannot help feeling that Zélide would have said something similar. Just fifty-five years later, in 1984, her Complete Works were republished in ten volumes.

The editor would like to acknowledge the pioneering work of Richard M. Dunn on Geoffrey Scott’s family papers. See Further Reading.