<div style="line-height:1.7;color:#000000;font-size:14px;font-family:Arial"><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 28px;">Hello,</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 28px;">   The line <b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Arial; font-size: 24px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">usurp the </b><span style="text-align: left; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); text-transform: none; text-indent: 0px; letter-spacing: normal; font-family: Arial; font-size: 28px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; word-spacing: 0px; white-space: normal; orphans: 2; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><b>pretence-new of the pseudo-American</b></span><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Arial; font-size: 24px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"> </b> is really disturbing. It suddenly occurred to me that Lehmann's mother Alice was American. She did not get along well with her son in the 1930s partly because of his homosexuality, and partly because of his commitment to publishing instead of diplomacy. I just guess so.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 28px;">Chen</span></div><div><br /><br /><br /><br /></div><div id="dvLetterAngle"></div><div  style="position:relative;zoom:1"></div><br />发件人：Mary Ellen Foley <mefoleyuk@gmail.com><br />发送日期：2020-09-16 20:54:34<br />收件人："陈栩" <chenxu@xisu.edu.cn><br />抄送人：vwoolf <vwoolf@lists.osu.edu><br />主题：Re: [Vwoolf] questions about John Lehmann and Woolf<br /><blockquote id="isReplyContent" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid"><div dir="ltr">> 

<i><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial">a new kind of journalism ... to drive the ... New Statesman and Spectator off the stage, </span></i><div><span style="font-style:italic;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial">> and usurp the </span><font color="#000000" face="Arial" style="font-style:italic">pretence-new of the pseudo-American</font><br /><font color="#000000" face="Arial"><br />I'm only guessing, but I'll jump in:<br /><br />The <i>pretence-new </i>is the most intriguing part of the phrasing, to my eye.  Could this be a Frenchified way of saying "the new pretension", constructing pretension in the phrase itself?  <br /><br />If so, then the aim is to take over the new pretension of the pseudo-American -- which I read as saying to take over a recently fashionable stance of trying to sound American.  What it would mean to take this over -- 'to adopt that position themselves' seems unlikely, and 'usurp', with its connotations of an unjust action, seems an odd choice -- I couldn't say.<br /><br />I don't know enough about the context to know whether this is reasonable, but I prefer it to the "Americans are crass" interpretation :-)<br /><br />(Reminds me of a tedious trip to London on a *packed* train during which a rude American in the window seats of our row of three -- I was on the aisle -- talked non-stop to her travelling companion, who faced her from the adjacent row of three.  We heard all about her -- they were bassoonists in an orchestra together, and, among other things, she told tuba jokes -- because she didn't shut up except for a brief respite when she went to the toilet, and her subject was mainly herself.<br /><br />I didn't say anything.  But when we stepped off the train at Waterloo, I said to the British people who'd occupied the other 3 seats in our 6-person group, "We're not all like that" -- and they absolutely cracked up!)<br /><br />Mary Ellen</font></div></div><br /><div class="gmail_quote"><div class="gmail_attr" dir="ltr">On Wed, Sep 16, 2020 at 12:36 AM 陈栩 via Vwoolf <<a href="mailto:vwoolf@lists.osu.edu" target="_blank">vwoolf@lists.osu.edu</a>> wrote:<br /></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div style="line-height:1.7;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-size:14px;font-family:Arial"><div style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial;font-size:14px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline;float:none;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px">Dear friends,</span><br /></div><div style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial;font-size:14px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline;float:none;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px">   It is the first time that I have come here for help.</span></div><div style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial;font-size:14px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline;float:none;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px">I have some difficulty in understanding the red short quotations that I am using in my writing as is attached below. <span style="float:none;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px;display:inline">I wonder if you could help me clarify them? </span>They are parts of Lehmann's journal taken from page 84 in his biography <i>John Lehmann: A Pagan Adventure</i>:</span></div><div style="text-align:left;color:rgb(0,0,0);text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;font-family:Arial;font-size:14px;font-variant:normal;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal"><span style="text-align:left;color:rgb(0,0,0);text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-variant:normal;word-spacing:0px;display:inline;white-space:normal;float:none;background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">

<p style="line-height:150%"><span><b>Wanted: a new kind of journalism in London to drive the elderly softnesses
and condescensions of the </b><i><b>New Statesman </b></i><b>and </b><i><b>Spectator</b></i><b> off the
stage, and usurp the </b><span><b>pretence-new of the pseudo-American</b></span><b>;</b></span></p>

<p style="line-height:150%"><span><b>Wanted: a new kind of art to blow the spunkless complacencies of Bloomsbury
sky-high;</b></span></p>

<p style="line-height:150%"><span><b>Wanted: a new kind of writing that has really caught a spark from the true
machine of modern life, the machine </b><span><b>in the terrible
powerhouse just off the boulevard</b></span></span></p>

</span><p style="line-height:150%"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline;float:none;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px">The context is Lehmann's conflicts with the Woolfs which trigger his departure from Hogarth in 1932 and also consolidate his determination to launch a magazine which turns out to be<i> New Writing</i>.  So my questions are</span></p></div><div style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial;font-size:14px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline;float:none;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px">1. What does the "pretence-new of the pseudo-American" mean in the first item? It seems most puzzling.</span></div><div style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial;font-size:14px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline;float:none;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px">2. Do you think the powerhouse just off the boulevard might refer to Hogarth Press or probably the Bloomsbury Group? I'm afraid it should be a symbol here.</span></div><div style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:Arial;font-size:14px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255);color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline;float:none;font-family:Arial;font-size:24px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:left;text-decoration:none;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"> Thank you very much.</span></div><div style="text-align:left;color:rgb(0,0,0);text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;font-family:Arial;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal"><font size="5" style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">All the best,</font></div><div style="text-align:left;color:rgb(0,0,0);text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;font-family:Arial;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal"><font size="5" style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">Chen Xu</font></div><p style="margin:0px"><font size="5"></font><br /><b></b><i></i><u></u><strike></strike><br /></p><p style="margin:0px"><b></b><i></i><u></u><strike></strike><br /></p><p><b></b><i></i><u></u><strike></strike><br /></p><b></b><i></i><u></u><strike></strike><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div id="gmail-m_-37248914344585432gmail-m_5265861499125597679dvLetterAngle"></div><div style="zoom:1"></div></div><br />_______________________________________________<br />
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