[‘I feel a survivor: Winston should be dead’: Lady Diana Cooper, society beauty, actress and memoirist.] Autograph Letter Signed to ‘My dear admiral’ (Sir William Milbourne James), regarding their books, people and the past.

Written with the charm for which she was renowned. See her entry and his in the Oxford DNB. 2pp, 4to, on two leaves of cartridge paper. In good condition lightly aged. Folded twice for postage. Mostly written in pencil, with good firm signature (‘Yrs / Diana Cooper’) and last few lines in red ink. Begins: ‘My dear admiral - Forgive the scruffiness of the paper & the rudeness of a pencil but I’m in an unoccupied house & can find no essentials, tho’ I found y. letter to-day & have no idea when it was posted. I hope not to long ago for you will have been thinking that I wasn’t pleased to receive y. very amusing & entertaining letter. I used to hear an old friend A. E. W. Mason talk about Reggie Hall by the hour you must have known him too. I have not read the books you love writing but I am going to start “The Order of Release” [his 1947 book about the scandal surrounding the marriage of his grandparents Effie Ruskin and John Everett Millais] at once as the story of Effie always rivets me (the other day I saw a play on the subject acted & produced admirably at the Guildford [sic] Repertory theatre - you ought to find out when next they put it on & make a pilgramage [sic]).’ She continues, with regard to her memoirs: ‘I am surprised & delighted that you have liked the books I so dislike writing. I feel quite desperate about vol III. I’ve nothing more to say. Every body is alive & I can’t be funny about them.’ She finds herself ‘in a slough of despondency’, and has to drag herself out ‘within 10 days’. She thanks him for writing, adding that she remembers him ‘as freshly as tho’ it were yesterday. Y. hair too of course: I hope it still lathers up - / Those were the good days indeed.’ After stating: ‘I feel a survivor: Winston should be dead.’ she adds in red ink: ‘O good! I’ve found a pen, & dipped it in my blood to be able to send you more thanks & the best possible wishes for 1960 / Yrs Diana Cooper’.