Property of a Distinguished Collector T.E. Lawrence Autograph letter signed ("T.E.S."), to B.E. Leeson summarising his current life ("...I still boat-build for the RAF and stir up trouble and suspicion. Also I seem to retain my news-value. Yet another 'life' of me (bad, too) appears in the spring..."), and making clear that a formal dinner at Leeson's club would not suit his ascetic lifestyle ("...I have no dress clothes, no money for them or for the railway fares, nor leave this year, no leisure, and a distaste for dining well. Perfection is fish & chips in a newspaper. Fourpence, and no sitting down..."), 2 pages, folio, 13 Birmingham Street, Southampton, 21 December 1933, with autograph envelope Lawrence's attitude to his public persona was complex. In this letter, as in others, he complains bitterly at unwanted public attention and the impact it has on his current life. Yet, of course, this means that his letters in fact keep correspondents up to date with his appearances in print. Lawrence had himself cooperated with the "bad" biography, the publication of which he regrets in the current letter. This was T.E. Lawrence: In Arabia and After, by his friend Basil Liddell Hart. Lawrence's correspondent, B.E. Leeson, was a veteran of the Arab Revolt and a former airman. He had joined 14 Squadron of the RFC in January 1917 as an Observer with the rank of Lieutenant. The squadron was then providing aerial support to Arab and British forces from Rabigh, north of Mecca in the Hejaz, and later from Wejh. Leeson's personal connection with Lawrence came in late April, when the two men had been part of a small group who spent a week exploring a remote valley, Wadi Hamdh, to recover a crashed B.E.2c biplane. The temperature was 118° in the shade, the country was waterless, and their car constantly had to be cut free of thick dry brushwood. Leeson was subsequently invalided out of Arabia. By the 1930s Leeson was a successful businessman, married and living in Manchester. PROVENANCE: Phillips, 14 March 1996, lot 401
Property of a Distinguished Collector T.E. Lawrence Autograph letter signed ("T.E.S."), to B.E. Leeson summarising his current life ("...I still boat-build for the RAF and stir up trouble and suspicion. Also I seem to retain my news-value. Yet another 'life' of me (bad, too) appears in the spring..."), and making clear that a formal dinner at Leeson's club would not suit his ascetic lifestyle ("...I have no dress clothes, no money for them or for the railway fares, nor leave this year, no leisure, and a distaste for dining well. Perfection is fish & chips in a newspaper. Fourpence, and no sitting down..."), 2 pages, folio, 13 Birmingham Street, Southampton, 21 December 1933, with autograph envelope Lawrence's attitude to his public persona was complex. In this letter, as in others, he complains bitterly at unwanted public attention and the impact it has on his current life. Yet, of course, this means that his letters in fact keep correspondents up to date with his appearances in print. Lawrence had himself cooperated with the "bad" biography, the publication of which he regrets in the current letter. This was T.E. Lawrence: In Arabia and After, by his friend Basil Liddell Hart. Lawrence's correspondent, B.E. Leeson, was a veteran of the Arab Revolt and a former airman. He had joined 14 Squadron of the RFC in January 1917 as an Observer with the rank of Lieutenant. The squadron was then providing aerial support to Arab and British forces from Rabigh, north of Mecca in the Hejaz, and later from Wejh. Leeson's personal connection with Lawrence came in late April, when the two men had been part of a small group who spent a week exploring a remote valley, Wadi Hamdh, to recover a crashed B.E.2c biplane. The temperature was 118° in the shade, the country was waterless, and their car constantly had to be cut free of thick dry brushwood. Leeson was subsequently invalided out of Arabia. By the 1930s Leeson was a successful businessman, married and living in Manchester. PROVENANCE: Phillips, 14 March 1996, lot 401
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
