"I was very Pleased..."

OTTOLINE'S choice to marry seems to ME  a bit -As if doing the inevitable- with someone- this someone being Philip Morrell. She chose well.
& IT WAS TIME.

1901 brought about a meeting with & the reticent courtship of Philip Morrell & By the close of the year - the same reaction from Ottoline-the reticent acceptance. No doubt  the pair were fond of each other-likely the arrangement was ideal for Ottoline, this was a woman destined to FALL in & OUT & IN & out of LOVE many many times in her LIFE. She actually needed the stability of a real friend, a companion -someone she had great affection for and she found it in PHILIP. While the pair were parting at Euston station for the holidays, Philip gave Ottoline a bouquet of Lily of the Valley.  I think this might have just cinched it for Mr. Morrell.

 
 I was very pleased with a lovely Bunch of Lilies of the Valley that he brought to the station, and treasure it all the days that I was a t Welbeck. My old friend Mildred de Lotbiniere travelled down with me in the train, and we discussed the situation. I have a vivid impression of OUR talk, she and I sitting side by side in the railway carriage and the bunch of Lilies between US, larger in importance than in Size. She was on  the whole favourably impressed, and at this I felt disturbed and distracted and undecided, but yet with A Happy Feeling underneath of close companionship and LOVE.

In the Language of FLOWERS-something very much spoken in Ottoline's Day, the Lily of the Valley represents  the Return of happiness and A purity of heart.  The sentiment says You've made my LIFE complete. The Legend of the Lily of the Valley claims it is the Flower that sprang from Eve's tears when she was banished from the Garden of Eden.

 What lady wouldn't be carried away?

On her return to London though Ottoline was not well- 
I lay tossing in bed undecided what to answer. At last i made the plunge and wired to him to

'COME BACK.'

The answer came that he was returning at once.

On February 8th 1902, at St. Peter's Eaton Square. The Bentincks drew a sigh of relief.

NUDE OTT

OTT, 1916 at Garsington with friends, 

OTT at far right, the only one looking  remotely classically Greek

 

LES Trois Grâces

at the Louvre

The marble sculpture of the Three Graces at the Louvre is an ancient Roman copy after a Greek original, restored in 1609 by Nicolas Cordier for Cardinal Scipione Borghese. The Three Graces’ are the Charites: Aglaea (Beauty), Euphrosyne (Mirth) & Thalia (Festivities).  According to Homer, the Three were part of the retinue of Aphrodite & daughters of Zeus & Eurynome, though some legends portray them as the daughters of Dionysus and Aphrodite or of Helios and the naiad Aegle. Typical- with these gods & royals -so hard to know who one's father is-

IF I WAS CASTING an OTTOLINE biopic: HADYN GWYNNE

HADYN GWYNNE is fluent in French and Italian. She studied Modern Languages at the University of Warwick before taking a five year lectureship in Italy, where she taught English. She also found the time to drive around the United States before becoming an actress in her mid-twenties, first coming to notice on television in the sharp comedy series set in a television newsroom, "Drop the Dead Donkey" (1990). She is also known for her roles in medical series "Peak Practice" (1993) and the police drama "Mersey Beat" (2001) though more recently she has played in stage musicals 'Billy Elliot' and 'Ziegfeld'. She lives in London with her partner Jason Phipps, a psychotherapist, and their two sons. (from IMDb)

She is an Olivier Award nominated British actress. Nominated for the 2009 Tony Award for Best Performance for a Featured Actress in a Musical for "Billy Elliot"
In 2002 she starred in the TV Drama for the BBC The Secret playing the character of Emma Faraday.
Her theatre work has included a variety of regional and London based appearances, from Bolton Octagon in Hedda Gabler, to Richard Cheshire's Way of the World appearing in London's West End productions of Ziegfeld, City of Angels and Billy Elliot the Musical at the Victoria Palace Theatre, for which she was nominated for an Olivier Award.^[2] She reprised her role as Mrs Wilkinson in the Broadway production of Billy Elliot, which opened at the Imperial Theatre on November 13, 2008.^[3] Haydn has been awarded the Outer Critics Circle Award, Theatre World Award, and Drama Desk Award for her performance in Billy Elliot. She was also nominated for a 2009 Tony Award. Gwynne has also performed in numerous productions for the Royal Shakespeare Company. Her television appearances are now more focused on shorter dramas, such as the role of Julius Caesar's wife, Calpurnia, in the TV series Rome. She also appeared in the first Christmas special episode of Midsomer Murders.
She has most recently starred in an episode of Lewis in the first of a new series (2008). She appeared in the first episode of Series 2, "And the Moonbeams Kiss the Sea", playing the character of Sandra Walters.
In 2010 she was also filming a film called Hunky Dory which also stars Minnie Driver and was filmed around Swansea, Wales.
Gwynne is due to perform at the Almeida Theatre in Islington, London in a performance of Becky Shaw^[4] which runs from January 20 until March 5, 2011. She is also appearing in a second episode of the Midsomer Murders series 14 called "Dark Secrets" which was aired in Britain in 2011.
Haydn is also starring in the Shakespeare play Richard III alongside Kevin Spacey at The Old Vic Theatre in London as part of The Bridge Project from 18th June until 11th September 2011.  (from Wikipedia)

born 1957.
and she''s 5'10", and bears a striking resemblance to Ottoline Divine.

HAYDN GWYNNE HERE

HOW DID I DO?

Ottoline in CARRINGTON

.

Ottoline's best lines from CARRINGTON-
Lady Ottoline Morrell: You know as well as I do it's a sickness with Carrington. A girl of that age still a virgin. It's absurd.
Lytton Strachey: I was still a virgin at her age.
Lady Ottoline Morrell: But that's my whole point. Don't you see ? So was I. Is there to be no progress ?

 Mark Gertler and OTT

I watched the movie CARRINGTON recently.  Dora Carrington, a part of Ottoline's circle, was often at Garsington, Ottoline's famed home-yet to be touched in these pages. In the movie Ottoline works to draw the younger Carrington into an intimate relationship with artist Mark Gertler.  It would seem ---if only Carrington would let go and have sex with the frustrated artist all his problems, hers, and Ottoline's would be solved.

THE ARTISTS & LOVERS

Mark & Dora

At one point Ottoline and Gertler were involved, another of Ottoline's many men-Yes, indeed. Gertler was going in one door while  Bertrand Russell was heading in the other. Ottoline and Gertler maintained a longstanding friendship despite their early romantic entanglements and Gertler is seen in many of Ottoline's scrapbook photographs now archived in the National Portrait Gallery.

  Mark, Julian, Ottoline's daughter & OTT

In the mix  from Ottoline's scrapbooks  and the movie as well was her close friend LYTTON STRACHEY. Strachey was solicited by Gertler and Ottoline to help woo Carrington for Gertler, and so goes LOVE- Carrington began her great onesided love affair with STRACHEY & a loving friendship between the pair. Their relationship is much of what the movie revolves around.

from the 1995 film  Carrington

Thompson as Carrington with Strachey played brilliantly by Jonathan Pryce 

The movie's  depiction  of Ottoline however is so unlike the sketches drawn in all of the materials I have read and so disappointing. She is frowsy and dissipated. Penelope Wilton, a great actress, plays Ottoline-most recently in Downton Abbey playing Isobel Crawley, always trying to upset the Dowager Countess of Grantham.

While interesting- I will have to wait to see a great portrayal of our great Lady-perhaps in a biopic all her own, but who?