BOTTOME (Phyllis Forbes Dennis, 1884-1963, British Novelist and short story Writer who wrote under her birth name, "Phyllis Bottome")

Autograph Letter signed 'Phyllis Ford Dennis' to Mr Wood apologising for not "auto-graphing 'Private Worlds' but lack of a secretary makes me always avoid doing up parcels which I shove on to my publishing office but I shall love to do it if we meet you (as we hope to) at Easter. We are both more than sorry about the leg and fearful that you should do work at all until it has improved! You must put pressure on it, if you travel, and also if you could rest it might resolve the tension due to physical efforts ... things clear up that looked very serious - if the whole is attended to! but I know what putting work aside means to a person who loves it ...", 2 sides 4to., Lonach Cottage, 46 Lexham Gardens, 14th November

In 1924 she and her husband started a school in Kitzbühel in Austria. Based on the teaching of languages, the school was intended to be a community, and an educational laboratory to determine how psychology and educational theory could cure the ills of nations. One of their more famous pupils was Ian Fleming, author of the James Bond novels. In 1960, Fleming wrote to Bottome, "My life with you both is one of my most cherished memories, and heaven knows where I should be today without Ernan." It has been argued that Fleming took the idea of James Bond from the character Mark Chalmers in Bottome's spy novel 'The Lifeline'.

Item Date:  1937

Stock No:  38987      £175

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