Tilda Swinton, Ottoline & Wittgenstein

Tilda Swinton's portrayal of Ottoline in WITTGENSTEIN, Derek Jarman's 1993 film about the philosopher's studies at Cambridge with Bertrand Russell, is discussed on ANOTHER magazine this month. As if proof were needed about the Lady's hold on popular culture. She's still got it.



Read the article in ANOTHER here.

ON Ottoline

 
 
 painting by Duncan Grant
 
 
 listen to the conversation on BBC Radio4 ,here.
 
 



OTT, in celebration


We are all here,
in Celebration of a  new site, P GAYE TAPP. a visit is suggested...

Lady Ottoline Morrell; Norman Notley; Lady (Gladys Mary) Juliet Duff (née Lowther); Edith Olivier and others
(photo is as always, with thanks to the National Portrait Gallery that holds a stunning collection of photographs from Lady Ottoline's scrapbooks, etc. Visit HERE)



JULIAN

 My Christmas message this year is Childlike Faith:

ottoline & her daughter julian, 1909
photograph from the NPG here


Imagine the wonder of a child's Christmas in 1927 ?
A tree lit with candles tied to its branches. 
A mother that shares your Christmas wonder.  
Maybe a train set, or a doll- christened Patricia under the tree*
A box full of red apples, tart oranges, and peppermint sticks.*
Yes,Virginia" there is a Santa Claus. 
He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. 
Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. 
It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. 
There would be no Childlike Faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. 
We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. 
The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.


This year Renew Your ChildLike FAITH in all things!
Merry Christmas~ Gaye


My mother's favorite Christmas present as a child-and Yes Virginia-she named that doll Patricia. From an affluent family at the height of the Depression, my mother,born in 1930, remembers a single-and special gift most Christmases, and a box wrapped in colorful papers holding fruit & candy. This was her Christmas. What a contrast with today's horde.
 & a Note on Virginia:
Virginia O'Hanlan became a teacher & school administrator, earning her masters from Columbia, and doctorate from Fordham University. (read more here)



oh so MODERN OTT

I can't help but see Ottoline in the recent Maison Martin Margiela  Haute Couture Collection for the Fall. It puts me in mind of the dresses she created with antique silk lampas-





I think she would have particularly liked the veil.

 Ottoline, at left, phtographed by Beaton, and the dress she wore-


Ottoline's voluminous photographs-and scrap books can be found here at the NPG.

& Henry


 "Summer afternoon — summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.- Henry James as quoted by Edith Wharton, A Backward Glance (1934)

(Ottoline with Henry James and Ethel Sands) at the NPG here