The Final Manuscript: Agnes Mason's
Contribution
It is difficult to identify precisely when Agnes Mason did her
copying. Owing to the lack of detailed information about her from
biographical sources, we have to concentrate on clues offered in the
manuscript. Her pages have remarkably few further revisions by Lawrence,
which suggests that she may have made her copies late in the revision
process. All Mason pages with 'thick' revisions must, however, have been
written in 1909. There are a few corrections by Corke, so those copies
must have been made before Corke checked that part of the manuscript in
March-April 1910. Any pages copied by Mason in Part III of "Nethermere
I" would have been thrown away when Lawrence completely rewrote that
section. In the following analysis I describe noticeable features of each
surviving block of Mason's pages and attempt to draw conclusions about
when they were written.
The first page in Mason's hand is on A paper (page 77), and
continues on directly after Holt until the end of Chapter 3 on page 82.
Mason uses the name Saxton throughout. She did not number the pages,
and as the number
style is different from that on Holt's pages, it was probably done by
Lawrence. This was definitely before Helen Corke's involvement, for on
page 77 Mason mistakenly wrote: 'She played with of the book' (see
WP 29:25), and Corke corrected it by adding 'the leaves'.
Mason's A pages were presumably left over from the supply used by Holt.
Papers A and D were also used by Corke, but never by Lawrence. He
entered 'thick' revisions onto the existing manuscript pages rather than
make fair copies, although he later rewrote Part III on a different paper
type altogether.
Many of Mason's pages are single sheets inserted in a main block of
B paper. Judging by her largest contribution (pages 272-326), she appears
to have had papers A, C and D all to hand at the same time for these fair
copies. In Quire XXIV, pages 275-286 (a twelve-sheet quire) of C paper lie
between pages 272-274 and 287-289 of A paper. The tear of page 272
matches page 289, page 274 matches 287 and page 273 matches 288, whilst
the cross of a 'T' on page 288 carries over onto the back of page 273 (the
quire had not yet been torn into single sheets when she wrote the 'T').
Quire XXV (page 290-305) is all A paper (some tears match). Quire XXVI
(page 306-326 plus one blank A page) consists of fourteen pages of A paper
split into two groups of seven bracketing a central section of eight D
pages.
It is difficult to date the writing of pages 272-326 and to say why they
were copied out in the first place. The writing must have occurred before
Corke's involvement, since on page 279, for example, Corke changed
'[Marie's hair] lies wavily, to coil in her neck' to read 'lies low upon her
neck in wavy coils' (WP 107:39). This time Mason did not
write the page numbers, as she did with her single sheets. The new page
numbers were written by Corke; the ink colour is the same as for her
corrections. It seems likely that Lawrence simply gave Mason's pages to
Corke to correct and number, although he did give them a final 'thin'
revision. There is little revision on these pages, suggesting that Mason
copied them at a late stage in the manuscript's evolution. The text had
certainly been revised since the E pages of "Laetitia II" because H. G.
Wells's novel Tono-Bungay, which Lawrence had not read
when he wrote the E pages (see WP 121:17), is mentioned.
The
plot
content of these pages is not, however, sufficiently distinctive to tell
whether the material copied by Mason had been largely transferred from
"Laetitia II" or consisted of new work written for "Nethermere I". The plot
deals with Lettie's birthday/engagement party; George's resentment seems
appropriate for the plots of both "Laetitia II" and "Nethermere I", but the
fact that Mason copied this large section suggests that Lawrence had heavily
revised this scene at some time during or after the writing of "Nethermere
I".
Mason's pages 90-91 have no corrections, and the page numbers have
the same ink colour as the text, which is clearly different from the
surrounding block of B paper in Lawrence's hand (pages 83-116). Mason
must have copied out pages 90-91 after Lawrence numbered his B pages,
which was some time after he had written the B text; the ink is different,
and there are signs that B pages were left out before numbering began. At
the bottom of page 146, for example, a sentence once continued onto the
next page. During 'thick'
revision, the sentence was deleted and the next page (and possibly others)
was thrown away. Lawrence then numbered the pages individually for the
first time; page 147 is the start of a new chapter.
Mason's pages 117-119 and 160 stop short of being full of text,
indicating that although she was tidying up Lawrence's B pages, she was
obliged to keep to an existing numbering system. Pages 134-135 are
unrevised by Corke or Lawrence and, like page 126, are crowded at the
bottom, presumably again because Mason was keeping to the numbering
system. Page 202 is also crowded at the bottom, and unrevised. Her fair
copy stands in dramatic contrast to the following page. Page 203 on B
paper is covered with corrections in Lawrence's 'thick' style. For some
reason she did not make a fair copy of this page.
Mason's pages 117 and 124 on D paper, and 164 and 167 on A
paper, have clear matching tears, and so were probably written at the same
time. The slope of the top margins of pages 164 and 167 also confirms that
they originally formed one sheet of paper in a quire. Upside down on the
reverse side of page 167 Mason began to copy out the text found in full on
page 164, but stopped after a few words. She must have realised that she
had started her new sheet the wrong way around, by writing in the small
bottom margin. The tear patterns of Mason's other A pages (77-82 and 171)
are not sufficiently distinctive to allow matching.
Mason's single pages of A, C and D paper are all numbered in a
similar style and ink colour. This style and ink are noticeably different from
the surrounding B pages written by Lawrence. It may seem probable that
Mason's pages were all written after Lawrence numbered his B pages, and
before the final revisions by Lawrence and Corke in March-April 1910.
This conclusion is supported by an analysis of the revisions on Mason's
page 171. Her text is cramped at the bottom, indicating that she was trying
to squeeze a fixed amount of revised B material onto the new page. At
some time after this Lawrence wrote in pencil on the back of page 170:
'"You'll mesh yourself up in a silk of dreams."' (see WP
66:15). Helen Corke copied this correction onto Mason's page 171.
Furthermore, page 171 has revisions in Lawrence's 'thick' style, indicating
that it was copied in October 1909 and subsequently revised; the same is
true of page 117.
The dating of these pages should not, however, be extended to
include all of Mason's single sheets, judging from a fragment of
"Nethermere I" which Helen Corke tore in half lengthways and used as a
bookmark.[15] The fragment is of Type
B paper, was once the start of quire 14 and was removed when Agnes
Mason copied it out as page 135 of "Nethermere II". This dating is
suggested by the levels of revision on the page. There is 'thick' revision
and a pencil revision by Lawrence, and a minor blue-black revision by
Helen Corke. Mason must therefore have copied out page 135 (which is
unrevised) after Corke's involvement in March 1910. The same is therefore
possible for Mason's other unrevised pages. It is simply not possible to tell.
Mason's pages
would therefore seem to have been copied at different times throughout the
mid-September 1909 to March 1910 period.
