As usual

5 January 1960

Dear N.T.,

Thank you for your letter. It came when I had intended putting a stop to my procrastination, since coming back, of writing to you. And now I've been caught up with this new book which Fabers have commissioned, my mind and mood sway between moments of exertion and loneliness. Believe it or not, Rebecca and the kids are not back yet! She has been going through a trying period, looking for a house to buy for the mother so that she leaves the house at 8280 and so get out of the position where the threat of ejection hung over her night and day. I've been anxious myself and only today I received a letter from her saying she has found the house and is trying to raise the money for it. I'm not surprised you had no letter from her as this is the first letter I get from her since the first week in December.

And then she says her passport is still at Union Buildings so that the name of the baby is included. It takes all that age to do a small thing like that. After having been separated for 8 months now, I feel poignantly why it is absurd for one to go back to that country – but for the fact that one has a mother to attend to.

She is a poor correspondent anyhow, Norah and she might at least have dropped you a postcard. It is an inspiring note, the one you sent me, out of Race Relations News. A novel is slowly taking shape in my mind now as I write the present book, which contains a hotch-potch of introspective essays, including part of that thesis in South African literature. You once mentioned, after reading the thesis, the name of a South African lady who wrote a few things – who was it, and what titles can you think of of hers?

The visit to Britain was both enlightening, stimulating and depressing. I saw among 10 plays, West Side Story and My Fair Lady. I made it a point to see musicals as you suggested, but I'm afraid I still cannot embark on one myself – my impressions are still too muddled. If Shaka Zulu doesn't see the stage in its present form, it seems it will have to go into the waste-paper basket.