Two-Part Invention by L'Engle Madeleine;

Author:L'Engle, Madeleine;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2016-08-29T16:00:00+00:00

Six

Sometimes Hugh’s farawayness has been literal; physical, not spiritual.

If my childhood and young womanhood were not typical of the usual pattern of growing up in America, neither was my marriage. Hugh had to take jobs as they came. Sometimes he would go out of town with the tryout of a play that never made it to Broadway. Even if it did, we never knew how long it was going to run. When he got an out-of-town job he had to take it. Separation is a normal part of a theatrical marriage.

My second novel had been published to distinguished reviews but very modest sales, and I was running out of The Small Rain money. And we now had a baby to support, blessed in having a child who was healthy and happy and full of fun. Hugh would hold out his forefingers and she would clasp them and he would swing her, lifting her high, to my mother’s terror when she came to visit.

Television was in its early days, all live, and often exhausting. When Hugh played the John Barrymore role in The Royal Family he had to carry Florence Reed, a hefty actress, up a flight of stairs. On the day of the performance, rehearsals started in the early morning, and before the show went on the air that evening he had carried Florence Reed up those stairs twenty times. When he came home, he was so worn out that he threw up. Such was the glamorous world of the theatre.

But it was our life and I married Hugh with no illusions of stability. We managed and we were happy.

Happy with our child. Josephine had her first birthday at Crosswicks, took her first steps, began running all over in delight. Eva Le Gallienne sent her the little nursery chair that had been used in The Cherry Orchard and she carried it everywhere, using it as a stepladder. It took the place of the more usual blanket or stuffed toy.

We spent nearly six months in our run-down house, scrubbing, cleaning, painting. In those days of frequent trains I could drive Hugh down to the early-morning train at West Cornwall, and he could easily get to the city. After the train had pulled out I drove along a dirt road by the Housatonic River to Don Cameron’s for breakfast and talk. Don was an older actor from the Civic Repertory who had been introduced to me by Thelma. He was friend, father-figure, mentor. I never heard him say a mean or sarcastic word about anybody. He was realistic enough in his expectations of human relations to understand betrayal, and the complexities of human behavior, without judgment. Quietly, patiently, he taught me. Our breakfasts were a treasured part of that summer.

Hugh was away a good deal at various summer-stock theatres, so I spent much of the time alone with our little one. And I wrote. That was the summer I wrote And Both Were Young. And I learned something else about art: I

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