The Sixties by Christopher Isherwood

Author:Christopher Isherwood
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins

December 19. Another beautiful though slightly chilly day. Yesterday we went on the beach and something happened to my hip, I must have pinched a nerve or something. It is very painful if I make a wrong move. Christmas looms. Joe LeSueur is arriving tomorrow, Tony Richardson on Thursday—to spend a divorcee Christmas with Vanessa. Sometime in the next few days, Clint is to have his screen test for In Cold Blood—astoundingly enough, he has made his way right up to the finals—and it is largely my doing! I dread his gratitude, if he wins—or rather, the gratitude which he will feel he must feel. How utterly strange it is, the way things of this sort come to pass! I met Richard Brooks all those years ago692—and what are the fruits of our meeting? That I took his house as a setting for the opening scene of The World in the Evening, and that I was able to call him and personally recommend Clint for the part in Cold Blood.

Some clinical notes: Y. and Z. have a lot of their sex in three-somes. Y. likes to jack off, but only with other people present. If Y. and Z. have had sex with someone together, then it’s okay for either one of them to have that person separately later. But if either one goes with an outsider, the other is jealous. . . . Y. and Z. don’t sleep together, and they never touch each other except when having sex. . . .One time, when Z. had been away, Y. welcomed him home by fixing a very strong martini, taking a mouthful of it and then squirting it into Z.’s mouth. After they had done this a few times, Y. got Z. into the bath-tub and peed on him.693

The other day, Dr. Allen’s wife committed suicide—this I heard from Gavin, who had happened to call his office. So I wrote Allen a note. Now we get a Christmas card, with a printed greeting from both of them. Inside this card there is another printed card, as follows: “Official reports of December 7, 1966 stated that my wife Jeri Selma Allen had died. However, Christmas Season and what it represents are strong reminders that the report is limited in what it is able to express. I am sure you will—in the true Spirit of Christmas—have no difficulty in understanding that this message and card which we picked out together some time ago comes to you now from both of us as always.”

Danny Mann called me last night. It seems that “Silent Night” is really all set to be filmed—the only remaining decision is to be about the budget. Anyhow, my work on it is complete. And Danny is off to Austria either this week or right after Christmas. Now I have told Lamont Johnson that I want to work on Shaw’s Black Girl in Search of God. And I am planning if possible to go to England next year and work on The Torrents of Spring and the adapta tion of the Wedekind plays.

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