T. E. Lawrence Correspondence – Page 230

To R.A. Fontana, Angmere, Bexding, Isle of Wight. Karachi 2.5.28 Dear Fontana, I am just about to leave Karachi for some squadron (I don't yet know which) inland. The R A F generally sends on letters, though. Your letter saying that I was a bit slow about your samples worried the ... on their way back to you. My habit is to read once, forget, and read again. Somehow my mind is a very dense one. It can read fifty times, & yet find more that is to be learnt in the fifty-first reading. Edward Garnett, Cape's reader, replied to me about it. He is prepared to taste your MS, m... ly & carefully, if you do not get snapped up by some-one else. He agrees with my opinion of it, but says he had to tell Cape that there was no money in it. In that last idea he's quite probably right. Your "strut" hadn't got a sex-appeal. (My Revolt in the Desert incidentally, had the denial of a sex appeal, which is almost better!) I'm glad Garnett thought it was the real thing. His judgement is unusually good, I fancy. He thought Blackwood your most likely publisher: but Blackwood is a bit too blue-colored for my taste. I suspect there'd be patches in your complete text which would freeze them against you. Blackwoods clients & customers are too often outposts of Empire: and he dares not shock them by being independent. Let me know about Faber & Gwyer: and if they fail, let me know before you write again to Cape. I'll have Garnett send to you for the M.S. on Cape's behalf, this time. Yours T.E.S.