23 December 1935 – 29 December 1935

It’s all very well to write that date in a nice clear hand, because it begins this new book, but I cannot disguise the fact that I’m almost extinct, like a charwoman’s duster; that is my brain; what with the last revision of the last pages of The Years. And is it the last revision? And why should I lead the dance of the days with this tipsy little spin? But in fact I must stretch my cramped muscles: it’s only half past eleven on a damp grey morning, and I want a quiet occupation for an hour. That reminds me—I must divine some let down for myself that won’t be too sudden when the end is reached. An article on Gray I think. But how the whole prospect will take different proportions, once I’ve relaxed this effort. Shall I ever write a long book again—a long novel that has to be held in the brain at full stretch—for close on three years? Nor do I even attempt to ask if it’s worth while. There are mornings so congested I can’t even copy out Roger. Goldie depresses me unspeakably. Always alone on a mountain top asking himself how to live, theorising about life; never living. Roger always down in the succulent valleys, living. But what a thin whistle of hot air Goldie lets out through his front teeth. Always live in the whole, life in the one: always Shelley and Goethe, and then he loses his hot water bottle; and never notices a face or a cat or a dog or a flower, except in the flow of the universal. This explains why his highminded books are unreadable. Yet he was so charming, intermittently.