T. E. Lawrence Correspondence – Page 634

To P. L. Lucas, Cambridge 338171 A/C Shaw - R A F Oaklower Plymouth I don't want to write tonight, but I must. I'm on Fire Pickets all this week (i.e. distracted & oppressed) and can't settle down to read or write. However if I don't write you'll wonder what's the matter. Your letter about the Mint delights me because it is really useful. Detailed criticism is the only useful kind. Ever so many thanks. Now I'll run through it & see if there are notes to reply. About my writing more -- No; if ever I had to write again, by such necessity as made me write the Seven Pillars, of course I'd do it; but it's not a thing to be undertaken wantonly. I have nothing now to tell anyone; nothing to preach; nothing believed. Wherefore I cannot go on writing, can I? Of course the Mint is a cherrystome compared to the S.P. but I think it is a better bit of work: smaller in its faults (and in its virtues) but more like a work of art, as a whole. The S.P. was an afterthought, after the Revolt had ended. The Mint was meant to be written --- and these are the notes which were to guide my writing, some day. I really think, too, that the book would have been written --- if my R A F career had not been suddenly interrupted. It interests me that you should feel the R.A.F. less "big" than the Arab Revolt. Of course it isn't. Damascus and Cram... are different, but if Cram... feels less, then that's because it is less well conceived and written down. I thought Cummings had made a very good thing of the Enormous Room. Others besides yourself have been troubled by the gap between Dank and Cadet College. I was very unhappy at Farnbor...h, & decided not to put it on record. A mean C.O! and a bad show, Farnborough was. After it I had 29 years Rank Corps. Which is a different subject: X - would I think only confuse the R.A.F. picture. From