Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Caspian Mist


Found between pages 32 and 33 of a copy of The Unquiet Grave by ‘Paulinurus’, this scrap of paper torn from the top left of a sheet. It contains both typescript and manuscript. On one side is the left half of a typed poem, with the rest missing – the demi-title reads DOWN IN SH[…]. There are also a few ms notes in ink, trying out various ways of introducing a girl called Nellie (although the poem is not a limerick).

The other side of the scrap is in pencil and includes a short shopping list (wine, marmalade, batteries, hovis biscuits), the words CASPIAN MIST, a note that to Benedictines the fourth vow is The Conversion of Manners, and the words Maltby’s of Oxford, a bookbinder, particularly of theses, and perhaps a clue to the note-writer: a student? There are also definitions of some words: Aureole, Ovine. Aspects of the hand are similar to that of the ownership signature on the free front endpaper, which reads, in blue-black ink Eveline (or possibly Eirene) Beck, April 1946.

There is something poignant, even slightly eerie, about these fragments of a life from seventy years ago, caught by chance between the pages of a book. The most evocative phrase, 'Caspian Mist', might simply be the name of a racehorse, or a cocktail. No doubt with some diligent research and detective work, some of the clues here could be pieced together to form a portrait. But even as they stand these stray words seem to convey in an oblique way some sort of story.

Mark Valentine

5 comments:

  1. All those details are evocative, indeed. In truth, they sound a lot like doodles by Connolly himself, as that melancholy hedionist greatly relished fine food, fine bindings, travel, odd words,and the like. Perhaps he was hoping to seduce a local barmaid named Nellie, whirl her away to Paris or the South of France for a weekend. To my mind "Caspian mist" actually sounds like one of the magic elixirs used by the sorcerers in Jack Vance's fantasy novels and stories. I see the workshop of Murgen the arch-mage, stoppered flasks on shelves, one of them labelled "Caspian mist." Inside swirls a slightly greenish gas, one whiff and . . alas only Vance could tell us of its dire or fortunate properties.--md

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    1. Thank you, Michael. Indeed, 'Caspian Mist' would have made a great title for another book of meditations by Connolly, or a book of travel by Robert Byron.

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  2. "Caspian Mist" seems to be a type of pattern, such as would be woven in cloth. Amazon.com has for sale scarves with a Caspian Mist pattern. Since the writer of the note was female, she possibly wanted to buy some clothes with that pattern.

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  3. It has also been suggested that Caspian Mist might have been a perfume, and a continuation of the shopping list.

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  4. Somewhere I read that it was believed that the caspian sea was always covered by mist.

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