18 March 1935 – 24 March 1935

The only thing worth doing in this book is to stick it out: stick to the idea and don’t lower it an inch, in deference to anyone. What’s so odd is the way the whole thing dissolves in company and then comes back with a rush; and Swinnerton’s sneers and Mirsky’s—making me feel that I’m hated and despised and ridiculed—well, this is the only answer: to stick to my ideas. And I wish I need never read about myself or think about myself, anyhow till it’s done, but look firmly at my object and think only of expressing it. Oh what a grind it is embodying all these ideas and having perpetually to expose my mind, opened and intensified as it is by the heat of creation, to the blasts of the outer world. If I didn’t feel so much, how easy it would be to go on. Having just written a letter about Bloomsbury I cannot control my mind enough to go on with The Ps. I woke in the night and thought of it. But whether to send it or not, I don’t know. But now I must think of something else. Julian and Helen last night. L. advised me not to send the letter and after two seconds I see he is right. It is better, he says, to be able to say we don’t answer. But we suggest a comic guide to Bloomsbury by Morgan and he nibbles.

Too jaded again to tackle that very difficult much too crowded raid chapter. In fact I am on the verge of the usual headache—for one thing yesterday was such a scramble. I have resolved to leave that blasted chapter here and do nothing at Rodmell. Yet, as I see, I cannot read; my mind is all tight like a ball of string. A most unpleasant variety of headache; but I think soon over. Only a little change needed. Not a real bad headache. Why make this note? Because reading is beyond me and writing is like humming a song. But what a worthless song! And it is the spring.