A Very Private Celebrity by Hugh Purcell Page B

anachronistic consistency, reminiscent of that of the aristocratic rebels of the early nineteenth century. His principles were curious; but such as they were, they governed his actions. In private life he showed none of the acerbity that marred his writing, but was a genial conversationalist, not devoid of human sympathy. He had many friends but had survived almost all of them and politically, during his last years, he was as isolated as Milton after the Restoration. He was the last survivor of a dead epoch.
    Freeman took Russell through his life with probing but courteous questions and the old genius replied succinctly, sometimes with an air of mischief. He was well capable of avoiding Freeman’s traps:
    FREEMAN: Do you think, on the whole, the fanatics in the world are more useful or more dangerous than the sceptics?
    RUSSELL: I think fanaticism is the gravest danger there is. I might almost say that I was fanatical against fanaticism.
    FREEMAN: But then are you not fanatical also? In your current campaign in favour of nuclear disarmament you encourage your supporters to undertake extreme demonstrations. Isn’t that fanaticism?
    RUSSELL: I don’t think that’s fanaticism, no. I support them because everything sane and sensible and quiet that we do is absolutely ignored by the press and the only way we can get into the press is to do something that looks fanatical.
    Two years after the recording, Russell was sent to prison for taking part in an anti-nuclear sit-down in London.
    In May, the guest was the poet and critic Dame Edith Sitwell, the 71-year-old grande dame of English letters. This was an extraordinary encounter, partly because of her eccentric attire. With a headdress she called her ‘bird-king’s hat’, an ermine jacket, and huge, exotic rings on her fingers, she looked like what she said she was – ‘a throwback to ancient ancestors of mine’ (an impression the Topolski caricatures did nothing to dispel). Her deathly white, sharp features stood out against the black background. Some of her answers made her sound less like a medieval ‘throwback’ than a witch in a fairy story:
    There was a peacock, you see, and he and I loved each other very much. I was four years old. He would fly up to the leads outside my mother’s bedroom, when I went to say good morning to her, and would give a harsh shriek. Then he would give another scream and fly down to the garden to wait for me. We would walk round the garden arm-in-arm, excepting he hadn’t any arms; I would have my arm around his neck; and I was asked why I loved him so and I said, ‘Because he is proud and has a crown, and is beautiful.’ And then my father gothim a wife, with his usual tactlessness, after which he never looked at me again, and my heart was broken.
    Freeman’s questions on this occasion were gentle, almost flirtatious. He tried to coax her into frank answers, though not always successfully:
    FREEMAN: Have you ever – I hope I may ask this – seriously contemplated marriage?
    SITWELL: That I think I can’t answer.
    FREEMAN: No reason why you should at all. Do you consider, looking at young people today, that the standard of taste and behaviour is lower than it used to be?
    SITWELL: Well, you see, I think you said that I was a forbidding old lady – well, I’m very forbidding. No young person would dare misbehave in my presence, and I can think of one very great poet who died some time ago – I never saw him behave in a way that a great man shouldn’t behave.
    FREEMAN: Would you tell us who he was? I can guess and it would be nice for you to…
    SITWELL: …Dylan Thomas. He always behaved impeccably in my presence.
    The interview was another success. The Daily Herald declared: ‘Here was a living legend captured on the popular screen.’
    Grace Wyndham Goldie was delighted:
    8 May 1959, from assistant head of talks television
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    My dear