AUTUMN TERM
I'm just going to blast through this essay, paraphrasing Evelyn Waugh's diary, quoting from it liberally (but legally, I hope), and inserting Pat Grinling's photographs whenever I get the chance…
Thursday, 24 September, 1925
Richard's car was affected by 'wheel wobble' so Evelyn Richard and his girlfriend, Liza, got to Aston Clinton late. According to Evelyn they ate a wretched dinner sitting in front of a prodigious ewer of water. (So speaks the alcoholic.) After dinner they went to the Bell, a local pub, Liza drove back to London leaving Evelyn and Richard very depressed at the prospect of the coming term.
Friday, 25 September, 1925
The timetable wasn't finished. Evelyn was not impressed by the headmaster's speech. Evelyn was not impressed either by the ignorance of the boys he gave an English lesson to. At the end of the day, Evelyn bought some beer at the Bell which was drunk in Richard's bedroom. I'm going to assume (mostly for a comic effect that you're going to have to wait for) that Richard Plunket-Greene, Evelyn's true friend, also had a bedroom overlooking the front drive.
Saturday, 26 September, 1925
Evelyn likes the look of a boy called Westby, 'who is not mad but diseased'. Waugh then enjoyed a luxurious bath. 'Drank beer until late. Home by way of speech-room windows.' Imagine Evelyn going home at night, almost any night, his head aflame with drink.
Photo by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
This speech room reference suggests that the house was locked at night, perhaps for the boys' security. However, some means of entry would have to have been established for the adults of the school, and so it seems teachers were given a key to the conservatory, so that they could come and go when lights were out without disturbing the household.
Sunday 27 September, 1925
Evelyn recorded that they went to church dressed in tall hats and tail coats. 'Richard was covered in dung by a dog just before service and had to take snuff.' Not sure if Evelyn or Richard are in this next photo, I suspect not, but it records some such Sunday outing at Aston Clinton. All teachers were required to have top hat and tails.
Photo by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
Thursday, 1 October 1925
Evelyn reported that he had to take shooting in the morning and that it was a farce because he let the boys shoot 'with the guard over the foresight and the wind gauge registering a hurricane'. However even when that was put right they failed to hit the targets. I don't think Evelyn Waugh is in the next photo, but it sets the scene:
Photo by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
This was the day that the school was given the afternoon off, and so Richard drove Evelyn to London, from which innocent outing they got back by 2am.
Friday, 2 October, 1925
'Taught lunatics. Played rugby football. Drank at Bell.'
Thursday, 8 October, 1925
Another Thursday half-day. So Richard drove Evelyn to London where Evelyn got his hair cut. In Bond Street, Evelyn bumped into John Sutro with whom he drank absinthe. Evelyn was dining with his mother and Olivia Plunket-Greene when Richard phoned to tell him he'd just been left £100. Which meant an invite for drinks in the Café Royal. There they drank red wine which made them feel unwell. This time they got back to the school at 3am.
Friday, 9 October, 1925
Evelyn informs his diary's readers that he and Richard both felt utterly weary, but that by great good fortune Crawford ordained another half-holiday.
Thursday, 15 October, 1925
Evelyn and Richard hosted a dinner for their Oxford friends, but Evelyn was not pleased by the turnout. Liza's brother and Richard's brother came from London but no-one came from Oxford. I should explain that Liza (Elizabeth Russell) was Richard's girlfriend and that they were engaged. An exquisite, previously unpublished photo of the couple is coming up. I should also explain that Evelyn's ex-lover, Alastair Graham travelled to Aston Clinton throughout the term, usually at weekends. But that Evelyn's present squeeze was Olivia Plunket-Greene, Richard's sister, who did not squeeze back. Rather she would kiss any other man.
Friday, 16 October
By tea-time, Richard and Evelyn were sleeping from depression on opposite ends of the sofa. Suddenly some ladies were announced and they went down to find an enormous Rolls Royce containing Olivia Plunket-Greene, David Plunket-Greene, Robert Byron and Babe Magustie, the extremely rich woman that David had told them he was engaged to the previous day. The party had tea at the Bell while Evelyn and Richard took afternoon school, and then they all drove to Oxford for dinner at the George. The arrival of Babe Magustie at Aston Clinton was surely the model for Margot Beste-Chetwynde turning up at school sports day in Decline and Fall. Although Margot herself was based on someone who hadn't yet entered Evelyn's orbit, as argued in an earlier essay.
Tuesday, 20 October
I think this must have been another half-holiday. By lunchtime, Evelyn felt he could not live another day without getting away from the school, so he borrowed ten shillings from Richard (who must have had teaching duties) and took the bus to Oxford. The journey took two hours but Evelyn had The Brothers Karazmazov to read. At Oxford, he had dinner with Tom Driberg at the George and begun a highly self-indulgent afternoon and evening of drinking. Richard joined in after school hours. 'I never saw so much champagne drunk so quickly. I found Richard and brought him in and we drank large quantities of a dangerous mixture which consisted chiefly of champagne, gin and absinthe. We went for a short time to 69 the High where all the people who felt they should have been asked to Christ Church were drowning their chagrin. We were by now raging drunk and I can remember very little about the party except that I fought someone. It was a pathetic party I should think.'
You will be wondering how Richard and Evelyn got home. Well, they got into Richard's car and set off, even though Evelyn had learned at dinner that one of their friends had had another motor-accident, killing or seriously injuring a small boy when the driver had been drunk.
'About two miles out of Thame, Richard began to be sick and lay immovable in the side of the road alternately dozing and vomiting for two hours, while I sheltered as best I could under the broken hood of the car and pacified a suspicious night-watchman. Eventually we got back soaking wet at about 4 and so to bed.'
Christ, how did the next day's teaching go?
Wednesday, 21 October, 1925
'Very tired but not as ill as we had expected. I played soccer in the afternoon.'
I hope, dear reader, you are beginning to get a little curious about Richard Plunket Greene. As I have already flagged, there are some fine photos of him and Liza coming up, courtesy of Pat Grinling.
Thursday, 22 October, 1925
'I have sciatica and feel ill always now. I don't know why unless it is my bedroom.'
I wouldn't so much blame the bedroom as getting drenched two nights previously after drinking a bucketful of champagne laced with gin and absinthe. And where is this bedroom of yours, Evelyn? Here was a chance to tell us that your room indeed overlooked the balustrade, and so you could watch the coming and going of Rolls Royces driven by Babe Magustie and sundry vehicles requisitioned by your Oxford friends.
Friday, 23 October 1925
Evelyn's drawing class would not draw well. He complained to his diary that the boys had neither taste nor skill nor humility. (When did schoolboys ever show the first or third of those qualities?)
Sunday, 25 October, 1925
'Richard did all the work for me today so that I could spend the day with Alastair.' I should repeat that Evelyn's ex-lover Alastair has been mentioned occasionally in the diary during this autumn term, usually at weekends. 'Richard is gone back to London with Liza, and Alastair is gone to Barford again, and I am attacked by depression and have burned my tongue with overmuch smoking. In a few days time I shall be twenty-two years old.'
Evelyn adds that he has forgotten to say that on Saturday evening Captain Hyde-Upward made a joke about a skull and Dunhill's tobacco. Hyde-Upward seems to have been in charge of the school in the headmaster's absence. His nickname was 'the cavalry officer'. I'm not sure what that implies, or whether the joke that Evelyn mentions suggests that Captain Hyde-Upward did or did not have a sense of humour. I suspect Captain Hyde-Upward to have been one of the following individuals, captured for posterity by Pat Grinling's camera. But which one?
.
Photos by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
Check out the footwear of the usher (that's the word that Evelyn repeatedly uses for teacher in his diary) on the left. And the juxtaposition with the metal grille inset into the base of the front elevation of Aston Clinton Park. What an eye for detail Patrick Grinling had!
Monday, 2 November, 1925
Evelyn tells us that Richard has become laden with good things following his legacy. 'On Thursday night he and Liza and Anthony came back with a bottle of white rum and the news that he has got his job at Lancing.'
That would have been a blow to Evelyn. It was Richard who had suggested that Evelyn apply for the Aston Clinton job and now he was going to teach at Evelyn's old school, where he'd been a successful pupil. How was Evelyn going to keep his contact with Oxford? More good news for Richard: Liza's parents had abandoned their opposition to her marriage to him. So that would be happening during the Christmas holidays, with Evelyn as best man. Meanwhile Liza was staying at the Bell under the supposed chaperonage of a woman called Julia.
The diary entry goes on to say: 'Yesterday evening LIza kissed me - in the most sisterly manner imaginable. Richard and I had carried her down the drive in the dark and when we put her down she kissed him and then, quite suddenly, me. We were on the way to The Bell.'
The entry carries on bit, before ending with the sad fact that he was again out of money. Then Waugh wrote:
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad
Say that health and wealth have missed me,
Say I'm getting old - but add
Liza kissed me.
Wednesday, 4 November, 1925
There is second attempt to hold a party for Oxford friends, this time more successfully. They arrived a little drunk in three cars and drank masses of beer at The Bell. A rugby game was played against the school. Those in attendance were: 'Arden Hilliard, Claud, Matthew Ponsonby, two Hardings, Michael Tandy, Patrick Gamble and others.'
Evelyn made some tries and the school won the match but not as easily as Evelyn had feared. Some boisterous activity involved the crashing of cars and the over-running of Dr Crawford's flower beds. More beer was drunk. Then dinner afterwards. When everyone had gone, it was discovered that no one had paid any money and that Richard and Evelyn had to pick up the bill of 8 or 9 pounds.
The dating of the diary is a little confusing at this point. Evelyn seems to be describing what he did over half term. 'On Saturday morning, Richard, Liza and I spent some hours drinking cocktails.' They were waiting for lift to Oxford. Evelyn had agreed to help Terence Greenidge finish the film, The Scarlet Woman, that had been started in London in the summer. Evelyn seems to have story-boarded it and played two leading roles. But Evelyn didn't like the assembled company and took off in a taxi after an hour's filming. 'Met Liza and her party looking for me in the Cornmarket. To avoid them - I was behaving very oddly, I think - I took refuge in the Clarendon bar. They followed and I climbed out of the window and fell on my ankle.'
The upshot of this was that Evelyn had to spend a few days lying on the sofa of his father's house, immersing himself in a study of the Pre-Raphaelites. 'On Tuesday, as I was going to sleep, Richard came in on his way to Aston Clinton, quite drunk with wealth, and only able to wave his arms and pour out an inarticulate description of his new acquisitions - suits, shirts, rings, watches, motor cars, and so on… On Thursday, Liza came to luncheon and drove me down to Aston Clinton.'
Sunday 15 November, 1925
Evelyn tells us that he'd been warned that Olivia and her brother David would be visiting him at the school. Also a party from Oxford. So in due course and in different vehicles Evelyn (travelling alone in a Daimler that had been hired for the day by Babe McGustie) and Richard travelled to Oxford. There was a party which Evelyn had expected to be awful but which he enjoyed immensely. However, Olivia Plunket-Greene, who Evelyn was in love with, 'as usual behaved like a whore and was embraced on a bed by various people'. Richard and Evelyn drank masses of brandy to Liza'a health. Babe kissed Evelyn. Another member of the party was sick from and over the car. The Daimler or Richard's car? The diary entry does not make that clear.
Sunday 22 November, 1925
After a quiet week at school, Richard and Evelyn went to a house where Liza was the only guest. 'We sat in front of the fire in the billiard room and talked about waistcoats. Richard went to sleep.'
Monday 23 November, 1925
'Elizabeth spent the day at the Bell and we had our meals with her. In the evening the mad boys were allowed to listen to a concert on the wireless because Richard's father was singing. It confirmed in me my detestation of the invention.'
This is a time where Evelyn's diary and Pat Grinling's photo album converge. The following photo makes it clear that the wireless was set up in the speech room, in honour of Richard's father, Harry Plunket-Greene. Pat Grinling didn't take the photo as it is he who is pointing to a knob, perhaps explaining something about the radio to his audience, which comprises no less that Richard Plunket-Greene and Liza. Voila:
Photo by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
How do I know it's Richard and Liza? Well, for several reasons, but this next photo, taken of the party that had holidayed on Lundy Island at Easter, between the two terms that Evelyn had spent teaching at the Welsh school, shows them at either end of the photo. Funnily enough a couple of the Waugh biographies crop these two figures out of the photo, presumably in order to get it to fit the space available. As if suggesting that Richard and Liza played no particularly important role in Evelyn's life. Whereas as these diary entries show, they were intimates.
Apart from Evelyn, sitting in front of the group, the others in the picture are the very tall David Plunket-Greene, plus the babydoll-looking Olivia Plunket-Greene, plus Gwen, the mother of the Plunket-Greene brood. Oh, and Terence Greenidge smoking a cigarette. 
Photo by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
Liza in the above pic is recognisably the Liza of the wireless image.
And then there is this masterly photo taken by Pat Grinling, I assume. Clearly, it was taken the same evening as the radio broadcast. Richard again has his hair smeared back across his forehead and is clasping his wrist as he is in the Lundy Island pic. He does like his threads.
Photo by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
What level stares, from the pair that would be getting married shortly after the end of term. Which suggests to me that they didn't really know the photographer, but were happy to trust him.
Thursday, 26 November, 1925
'Babe McGustie came down in a motor car called a Phantom Rolls-Royce with Liza and David and took us back to London for tea. She lives in an opulent house in Grosvenor Square with a common stepfather called Bendir and an animal called a lemur which is half a cat and half squirrel and half a monkey. We went to an excellent tie shop called Sulka and to Hawes and Curtis for a waistcoat and then to Sumner Place for Olivia and then to Kettners for dinner. The fish was good but the rest of the dinner rather dull and Richard morose and Liza overcome with mumps and David sad because Babe couldn't come and Olivia sad because she could afford so few cocktails. Home by a late train and very weary.'
Saturday, 28 November, 1925
'Richard had a concert. The mad boys and Captain Hyde-Upward sang songs. I had all my meals at the Bell because I was so depressed.'
Thursday, 3 December 1925
Doctor Crawford was the father of three daughters, and 'the Crawford girls' asked Evelyn, Richard and Liza to tea. Evelyn enjoyed the event, and was amused by the enormous drawing room 'with nakedness on the roof', a reference to the room's decoration. The alert reader will recall that Doctor Fagan in Decline and Fall had two daughters, one of whom got engaged just as one of Doctor Crawford's daughters was engaged. Fagan's girls, Flossie and Dingy were both described as 'unattractive' whereas Evelyn clearly liked the Crawford girls. 'Richard muttered to Liza inaudibly about Lady Victoria's taste in hymns and said, "Oh you beautiful' very loudly and suddenly.'
'After tea we felt rather cheerful and drank masses of very bad cocktails at the Bell and ate quite a good dinner and drank rum. A wheel came off Liza's car.' So both Richard and Liza had cars, it seems.
Monday, 14 December, 1925
Evelyn tells us that there were only two more days of term. Richard's new motor car had come and it took up most of his time. On Thursday, Evelyn went to London and played with the lemur in Grosvenor Square. He adds: 'I have bought some trousers in Aylesbury and Richard has bought me rather a lovely waistcoat. I am tired of this term and most of the boys. Some are charming. I go and talk with them in the evening usually, and that is the nicest part of the day. I am rehearsing a scene from The Tempest with them. They act contemptibly.'
On December 21, Richard married Liza. Evelyn's diary tells us: 'Richard and I lunched together first at the Berkeley and arrived at the church rather late.' Evelyn was best man and in a convoluted way the situation brings to mind the marriage of Paul Pennyfeather and Margot Beste-Chetwynde in Decline and Fall. In the comic novel, Paul Pennyfeather (Evelyn) is getting married and Peter Pastmaster is the best man. Peter is also Margot's son by her first marriage, and Paul is supposed to be giving him organ lessons at the Welsh school, though Paul is not at all musical. In fact, it is Richard that is musical, he teaches the Aston Clinton boys' music and one of the reasons that he has taken the job at Lancing is so that he will be able to teach boys on the organ of the remarkable Lancing School Church.
The Paul/Margot marriage didn't actually happen though, whereas Richard and Liza's went off with only a few hitches mentioned in Evelyn's diary, such as one guest wearing check trousers, another being 'taken queer' in the vestry and the priest calling Richard 'Robert'.
Evelyn spent a lot of time and Richard's money in tipping the church servants. That night, Richard and Liza drove off in Richard's new car while the rest of the marriage party ate and drank to their health. Evelyn drank beer and ate eggs till late and had to witness 'Olivia doing that disgusting dance of hers' and listen to a discussion about the chances of Liza being a virgin.
In someone's photo album there will be photos of this wedding. If you, dear reader, come across such material, do please consider letting me know. The Evelyn Waugh world would be very keen on seeing a pictorial record of such a unique occasion, not least Olivia doing that dance of hers.
Meanwhile, Evelyn would spend the vacation in Paris with a friend, Bill Silk. Then he spent some time with Alastair and Mrs Graham prior to embarking on his second term at Aston Clinton. Are you with me so far, reader? There is a lot more to come, including a photo of Evelyn as you will never have seen him before.
But hang on, you won't want to be fobbed off with the promise of an Evelyn photo to come. You'll be wanting to see something of our Evelyn in the autumn term. Well, how about this partial page 22 from Pat Grinling's carefully composed but not strictly chronological album. I'm thinking it shows that there are two ways to get to Oxford from Aston Clinton: 
Photos by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
That is, the low road, as taken by C.R.M.F. Cruttwell, History Tutor at Hertford College, Oxford, when Evelyn was in residence; and the high road as envisaged by Evelyn Waugh once he'd had a drink or two. The difference between the alternative routes? Only puddle water available to imbibe (through the oxters) on the former route. Whereas champagne served in a flute came as standard on the latter.
Or should I leave it to Evelyn of Aston Clinton, dressed in the shabbiest of suits, to explain? Though not through words, never written words at this stage in Waugh's development. Rather, by simply standing there sulking in a Sulka tie
Photo by Pat Griinling. Courtesy of Rupert Grinling and Sue Willis.
Two trips to Oxford had nearly killed Evelyn in the Michaelmas Term of 1925, but what didn't kill him made him more bullish. He still had Easter and Summer Terms in front of him and so do we.
Are you with Evelyn so far, dear reader? Or would you rather take the low road out of Aston Clinton?
Next page.
