Ten Typed Letters to Mark Bonham-Carter (one signed 'Charles', one signed 'C. W.', seven initialed in type, one signed Charles in type).

American educator and philosopher (1921-2002), one of the key figures during the reorganization of the University of Chicago’s undergraduate college in the 1960s and 70s. All ten items quarto: five items one page in length and five two pages in length. Text legible throughout, but all items creased and some on paper discoloured with age. With occasional fraying to edges and a few closed tears. Several with pencil notes by Bonham-Carter on reverse. Ten long, chatty and informative letters, which taken together give some indication of the transatlantic cultural and intellectual climate in the period immediately following the second world war. 15 May [1948?]: '[...] Acton, incidentally, I find quite a pleasant chap, though no world-shaker. I rode back from a visit to Ohio State University (Columbus, O.) with him and Mrs Acton and we had quite a pleasant trip. I got expansive on the subject of the Civil War, declaring sententiously that Gettysburg was the greatest moment in American history. He was impressed. [...] Is it true that Al Capp's schmoos were not well received in England? What a dreary place it must be. However, I agree with you about The Naked and the Dead. It is a dirty book. Of course I haven't read it, but so many people have that it must be dirty.' 20 December 1948: '[...] Sir Maurice Powicke was here this quarter and William insisted I go round to bother the poor man. I did and found him exceedingly nice. He said he knew you and paid the usual unstudied tributes to your charm and intellectual attainments. Last night (to complete the list of my recent contacts with England) I went to see Olivier's Hamlet. [...] I thought it very good within the limits imposed by my ignorance of what it ought to be. However, I do not think (and never have thought) that the "problem" of the damn thing is soluble. I speak in ignorance of what the problem really is and of the various solutions proposed and therefore probably am simply wrong, but though I find it fascinating I do not think it is intelligble. I grant that it ought to be capable of solution since Shakespeare is no booby, but if we had only Hamlet I think we might think he was.' Several references to George Kimball Plochman, e.g. 18 August 1949: '[...] Plochman has left these parts and now rejoices in a job at the new University of Southern Illinois, which is the product of the expansion of the state system and exists in a town far down-state known as Carbondale. I am rather charmed by the name. [...] This afternoon I am going to hear Acton explain Eliot's views on culture. Eliot is coming here this fall, so I must be prepared. [...] Have you become aware of the fuss about Ezra Pound and the Bollinger [sic] award? Some people interpret it as a vicious plot on the part of Eliot.' 27 December 1950: ' [...] I have sunk pretty far into the slough of despond myself in the past three months, but I now seem to discern the morning light. Perhaps we ask too much of ourselves. Or, perhaps it would be better to say that we ask too much too soon.' Several references to Robert Cumming, later Professor of Philosophy at Columbia, e.g. 'You will rejoice to know that both Plochman and Bob Cumming are also scheduled to get their degrees confirmed this month. There will be a terrific flood of certified philosophers emerging from Chicago which may well put the philosophic universe out of joint. Have I told you that Plochman is married? I went to the spring meeting of the Western Division of Amer Phil Assoc (remember Galesburg?) at Minneapolis last month. Plochman was there and had the collossal impudence to offer me a job. I had to put him in his place. He was insufferable about his marriage. It seems that his wife [Carolyn Plochman] is a great painter and they are living a life in which all the values - intellectual, moral, artistic - are summed up as a pattern for all beholders. I was invited to come down and behold, but I gracefully declined. They read the Phaedo together in the evenings. Ugh!'