Hotel Ambassador

North State Street at Goethe

Chicago

March 24^th

My dear, good friend:

Mrs G. was operated yesterday; the operation lasted about one hour. This morning the report is that she is doing fairly well considering the seriousness of the operation. I cannot tell you how much she suffered with agonizing pain ever since we returned from Chicago; she spent sleepless nights, walking from one room to another, moaning and crying night after night. Naturally, I could not sleep either. Mrs G. was operated by Dr Beer who is one of the best surgeons, specialising in kidney surgery. She has a fine room at the Mount Sinai Hospital, very good, attentive nurses, and the very best care and attention that money can secure. I hope she will gradually recover from the great shock and will soon be out of danger. The strain has been frightful and it requires all my energy we to keep my nerves from becoming unstrung. Mrs G. will likely have to remain at the hospital from four to five weeks, if not longer.

I heard nothing from Gertrude. She, or Mr Hicks, would address their letters care of your address – I wrote them to do so. She must be angry at the way I answered her, and if she is, I feel that she should and do not regret my attitude. She is not what I thought her to be, and although it hurts me intensely and disappoints me most cruelly, I cannot change my stand. It was my soul as an artist that was crying and craving for companionship and sympathy, for understanding and inspiration. I thought I found all that my poor, lonely and desolate spirit was yearning for incarnated in Gertrude. I felt my art affecting her profoundly, but it was all skin-deep – on the surface. I do not mention this tragic incident of my life because it pains me too much and I try to have it dormant and – to quote my own words in the annotations to the Gardens of Buitenzorg – are buried in the cemetery of oblivion. When you do get any letter from Gertrude or Hicks, please send it to me at once and always write at the same time a postcard, so that I should know that there is a letter for me at the Hotel Commodore. Do the same when you wish to write me personally.

I wrote you three days ago and I hope the letter is in your hands since yesterday. I also sent you a night message about Mrs G.’s operation. I fingered, phrased and prepared the four numbers of Java which I composed while I was in Chicago and gave them to Fischer. They are being engraved. So, that ten out of the twelve are completely disposed of. The eleventh (Native Dances) is about one third done; the twelfth is not even started. My days seem to melt into nothingness, dissolving time without creating anything. Indifferent people bother and worry me to distraction.  (I should have a place where I could retire and hide from the world – where I could meditate and think, where I could be lonely in loneliness… I feel that I am just on the threshold of my creative possibilities – merely commencing to express that which burdens my soul. Every day lost in inactivity is a still-born child of my muse – a wasted opportunity and irrevocable loss of unrecorded impressions. Isn’t the squandering of time the greatest loss to a human being? Aren’t our days, hours and minutes limited? When I think what I could have created during the years of my intensive teaching, I realise the great tragedy of my life. However, if I am spared another ten or fifteen years, during which time conditions will shape themselves to enable me to give full scope to composition, I believe I am able to accomplish things worth doing. The future will tell…                                                      My dear Vera! Write me soon and as often as you feel. I am always delighted to hear from you. Give my love to Mr Aronson, Frau Dr Kaplun, Asti, and keep a good share for yourself. L.G.