Contents lists
Updated June 2012
T. E. Lawrence to Sydney Cockerell
25.xii.23
Dear Cockerell
Yes, I think Mr. Perrin and Mr. Traill deserves well of the world. Ask him, will you, to write to me, or send me his address. I have to explain to each possible subscriber the hazards and disadvantages of the book, that no one may waste his money blind-eyed.
There will be about a hundred thirty-guinea copies: less if it costs less than £3000 to print, more if more. No time promised: but the work is started. About a year hence.
There seem to be quite a number of ultra-rich willing to pay. How they will curse when they get the dull thing!
No libraries: but God knows how many libel actions!
I refused Max Gate for Xmas. It is not good to be too happy often. May see Shaw tomorrow if I can wrangle a pass to Bournemouth, and transport thither.
The Rover - many many thanks. What a fine effort for a man who has written all he wants and is carried only by the momentum of old effort. Magnificent. He could write in his sleep;
It's awfully good of you to have sent me it.
Yours ever
T.E.S.
| Source: | SCC 360-1 |
| Checked: | jw/ |
| Last revised: | 1 January 2006 |
T. E. Lawrence chronology
1888 16 August: born at Tremadoc, Wales
1896-1907: City of Oxford High School for Boys
1907-9: Jesus College, Oxford, B.A., 1st Class Hons, 1909
1910-14: Magdalen College, Oxford (Senior Demy), while working at the British Museum's excavations at Carchemish
1915-16: Military Intelligence Dept, Cairo
1916-18: Liaison Officer with the Arab Revolt
1919: Attended the Paris Peace Conference
1919-22: wrote Seven Pillars of Wisdom
1921-2: Adviser on Arab Affairs to Winston Churchill at the Colonial Office
1922 August: Enlisted in the Ranks of the RAF
1923 January: discharged from the RAF
1923 March: enlisted in the Tank Corps
1923: translated a French novel, The Forest Giant
1924-6: prepared the subscribers' abridgement of Seven Pillars of Wisdom
1927-8: stationed at Karachi, then Miranshah
1927 March: Revolt in the Desert, an abridgement of Seven Pillars, published
1928: completed The Mint, began translating Homer's Odyssey
1929-33: stationed at Plymouth
1931: started working on RAF boats
1932: his translation of the Odyssey published
1933-5: attached to MAEE, Felixstowe
1935 February: retired from the RAF
1935 19 May: died from injuries received in a motor-cycle crash on 13 May
1935 21 May: buried at Moreton, Dorset