Her heart is housing many a mad desire,
And she is sick for Antony.
Iris. The day
Has gone, and soon they’ll drink the heady wine
That sparkles in each other’s eyes. Once more
Venus and Bacchus meet, and all the world
Stands still to watch the bliss of living gods.
There was a little more to the same effect, and when I wrote the stuff I thought it very fine and still think it rather pretty. But a section of the musical Press attacked it violently, and for a couple of months I was quite a notorious person. I gathered from the articles and letters that appeared that my dramatic poem was not likely to engender music that would carry on the tradition of Mendelssohn’s Elijah. That had been my object in writing it. I was sick of that tradition. I wished to help to break it.
One day, while the little storm was still raging, I received a letter from Sir Henry J. Wood, who was to conduct the Festival at Norwich at which my work was to be given. (Mr Julius Harrison, who has since become prominent as one of Sir Thomas Beecham’s assistant conductors, had gained the prize for the musical setting of my poem.) In his letter Sir Henry wrote: “Very much against my will, I am writing to ask you on behalf of the Committee of the Norfolk and Norwich Festival if it is possible for you to make any alternative version of the ‘two objectionable lines’ (I fail to find them myself) in your libretto, Cleopatra.... From my point of view, the whole thing is absurd and ridiculous.”
[194]
]I could not find the objectionable lines. I showed the poem to a most maiden aunt and watched her as she read it, hoping to tell by her sudden blush when her eyes had reached the evil place. She did not blush; she simply read the thing and said: “Oh, Gerald, how nice! I do think you have such pretty thoughts.” So did I.