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Poems by Isaac Rosenberg

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INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR<br />

The end is an attempt to imagine the severance of<br />

all human relationship and the fading away of<br />

human love. Later on I will try and work on<br />

it, because I think it a pity if the ideas are to<br />

be lost for want of work. My ' Unicorn , play is<br />

stopped because of my increased toil, and I forget<br />

how much or little I told you of it. I want to do<br />

it in one Act, although I think I have a subject<br />

here that could make a gigantic play.<br />

I have not<br />

the time to write out the sketch of it as far as it's<br />

gone, though I'd like to know your criticism of it<br />

very much. The most difficult part I shrink from ;<br />

I think even Shakespeare might :—the first time<br />

Tel, the chief of the decaying race, sees a woman<br />

(who is Lilith, Saul's wife), and he is called upon<br />

to talk. Saul and Lilith are ordinary folk into<br />

whose ordinary lives the Unicorn bursts. It is to<br />

be a play of terror—terror of hidden things and<br />

the fear of the supernatural. But I see no hope<br />

of doing the play while out here. I have a way,<br />

when I write, to<br />

try and put myself in the situation,<br />

and I make gestures and grimaces.' 11<br />

To Gordon Bottomley (Postmark, July 20, 1917).<br />

" My sister wrote me of your note, and it made me<br />

very glad to feel you thought in that way about my<br />

43

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