An autograph letter signed by Sigrid Undset to the Melbourne Art Theatre Players (Jack Beresford Fowler)
Trimmed to approximately 114 × 182 mm, one page, Lillehammer, Norway, 5 July 1947.
Creased where folded for posting; mounted on a slightly larger piece of paper cut from an album leaf; the original postage stamp has been cut from the envelope and attached to the letter, with traces of old stamp hinges near it (well away from the text of the letter); two filing holes punched in the left-hand margin of the letter and mount; overall in good condition.
'My sincerest wellwishings for the Melbourne Art Theatre Players! I am grateful and happy to be given an opportunity to contribute to the realization of their plans, be it with ever so tiny a show'. From the dispersed collection of Jack Beresford Fowler (1893-1972, actor, producer and director): 'On stage, he seemed to have everything against him: deafness, a harsh voice which lacked any modulation, a slight speech impediment and a determination to promote plays that commercial managements would not touch. But the Art Theatre Players was an oasis in Melbourne's cultural desert.... "J.B." was no radical protesting against the corruption of commercial theatre; he simply carried the torch for a threatened tradition and saw no need for an apology to justify his position' ('Australian Dictionary of Biography'). This genial response from Sigrid Undset to a letter that Fowler would have sent to her, when read in context, is a little more than routine. We have not been able to identify the 'show'. Provenance: Collection of The Hon Barry Jones AC.
Item #115597
Sold