The Olivier Sisters: a Biography by Sarah Watling

Author:Sarah Watling
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2019-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Raymond Sherrard

Despite her new grandson, the Wala still hoped Bryn’s marriage was salvageable and wrote to Noel asking her to pass on the message that ‘whatever happens, for the next few months at any rate, Hugh [should] do nothing’. But the situation had become further complicated – perhaps beyond the Wala’s appreciation – by Hugh’s affair with Brynhild’s cousin, Joan Thornycroft, who was married to the theatre critic Bertie Farjeon.

The family arrived in a beautiful place, lush with bright bougainvillea, fiery poinsettia and feathery clumps of bamboo. The houses of La Mortola stood staggered upon a hill, buildings crowded together, gardens studded with palm trees. The closest village was Latte, a poor and dusty place, once sustained by flower cultivation, an industry disrupted by political turmoil and hit by the loss of German buyers. Bryn watched the local women weaving baskets from bamboo to carry flowers they could no longer sell. She and the Wala set about getting in supplies and familiarising themselves with the language and currency. Italian lessons were arranged with local nuns for Andy. Various relations began to descend on the family: Hugh’s aunt, then Brynhild’s aunt and uncle, Noel’s doctor friend Marie Moralt came and stayed at the bottom of the garden.

The retreat didn’t bring respite. ‘This place is lovely & brilliant,’ Bryn told Raymond, ‘but I am too hopelessly depressed on the whole.’ A bad flu epidemic was sweeping Italy and, as Bryn put it, swept straight into her family. First Tristram, who had wandered off in the cold weather whilst the women were busy unpacking, then Andy and finally Bryn and the baby fell ill. Brynhild was confined to the villa they had taken with the worry of three small, sick children (Tony was at school in England). ‘Poor little Philip is extremely brave,’ she told his father, ‘& smiles though he can hardly open his eyes & is shaken by the most tremendous coughs.’ Nevertheless, the baby had begun to reject Bryn’s milk, and under stress and illness she soon stopped producing any. To make matters worse, Brynhild discovered that the children’s nurse was violent with them and decided they could no longer be left alone with her.

She was already intensely regretting her separation from Raymond. A letter from Hugh had followed her from England, informing her that he would not agree to a divorce and that she would have to accept this; the sooner she did, he wrote, the sooner she might feel better. Bryn did not take this advice. ‘I am no longer willing to sacrifice you,’ she assured Raymond.

During the day, the brilliant light of La Mortola – a bright but somehow unobtrusive, uncombative light that drew artists and encouraged the nurturing of fantastic, exotic gardens – could warm even the winter days. That, though, was illusory. Once the sun descended, or sheltered behind clouds, the cold was sudden and biting. Night fell swiftly and with it, loneliness hit. ‘I think it is a waste of life to go on like this,’ Bryn lamented, ‘I feel as I suppose a widow woman feels.

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