Peter Overlooked?

[smiles]

Just General rambling but I hope you'll comment.

Having read JMB's/Peter's letters on the database over the weekend, I've come to the conclusion that Peter is very much the forgotten boy in the story of the 'Lost Boys'. Of the boys, George and Michael are clearly the focus of the story, receiving most screen time in the mini-series and comprehensive coverage in the book. Nico receives fair treatment and I think Jack's general (although not complete), ambivalence to JMB is evident.
But with Peter, once it has been established that he always hated the 'Peter Pan' tag, it seems that he is resigned to a melancholy chronicler, somewhat unloved.

But honestly, reading his letters to Barrie and the replies to them, I was far more moved than reading the letters written to George and Michael. The latter often displayed a raw emotion (I would suggest desperate frustration too), from JMB that was warmly received by G and M and they're all well covered in the 'Lost Boys'. The JMB/Peter letters however I found to be no less intense, but the wording was different because I think JMB recognised the more reserved nature of Peter, but there is huge warmth in them in both directions. Peter comes across as more stalwart, more responsible but no less devoted and compassionate, but whereas the correspondence between JMB/G&M was unusual the JMB/P letters read exactly as you'd expect the letters between a loving father and son would read.
Something of an overlooked hero for me. 

[tcarroll]

I noticed on the database that Peter wrote to Mr. Barrie very often while he was in the war.  After the death of both parents, I'm sure Barrie was his only source of the comforts of home.  I noticed too that in Mr. Barrie's letters he mentioned to a couple of his friends that he had "his boy" (speaking of Peter ) with him for a couple of days while Peter was on leave.  I think Mr. Barrie cared for all the boys very much, but George and Michael returned the love a little more than the others.  They let JMB know they needed him to be part of their lives. 

tcarroll

[smiles]

I think Michael may have been more 'needy' and therefore more inclined to show his affection but then Barrie also commented that Michael often took pleasure in being dismissive of Barrie, not so sure about George.

I also realised that the WW1 letters between Peter and JMB were not discovered until after the Lost Boys was written. I wonder if Mr Birkin would give Peter more of the limelight if he should produce an 4th edition.....

[tcarroll]

Michael seemed to be more needy from the time he was very small.  And he also seemed to be a child who was more aware of what was going on than anyone realized.  There was one part in Andrew's book where he was doing his homework in a corner in Sylvia's room while she was sick and he was crying.  The young man was obviously very perceptive. I also think he was very sensitive and caring. George seemed to be  concerned about JMB's worry about him while he was in the war.  He wrote letters telling him not to worry, so that leads me to believe he really cared about JMB. Perhaps being the oldest, George also knew the magnitude of what JMB had done for their family...what do you think?
                       tcarroll

[smiles]

TS

I think you're absolutely right on both counts, and certainly Barrie would have agreed with you about Michael, very sensitive but also manipulative.

However I think my original point was that in the original edition of 'The Lost boys' (the only one I've read), I think Peter is largely overlooked and the natural conclusion is that he is playing a lesser role in the JMB/LD Boys story. Most of the references to him are either as the author of 'The Morgue' or as George's companion at army camp. Maybe it's something to do with the ay the book opens and the suicidal Peter throwing himself under a train and his dislike of the 'Peter Pan' tag, he is instantly portrayed in a negative way. And to some extent I think that percolates through the book and he seems very much a peripheral character.
However, when I read Peter's and JMB's letter from WW1 I changed my whole opinion of him. Clearly his family was hugely important to him an he included JMB as one of them, unlike Jack who (in my opinion), saw JMB as little more than an occasionally  likeable benefactor.

[ecb]

I get the impression that Peter did his best to avoid the "family spotlight" even within the family - that is to say that since he essentially was the keeper of the family letters, which he turned into the Morgue, he had some control over what remained of him in family memory - and he sort of tried to erase himself.  This might be connected to his tendency to depression.  Also there was a period when Peter sort of removed himself from the Barrie orbit - when he was living with a married older woman - which Barrie could not approve of.  Still, I love that letter Barrie wrote to Nico about Peter at that time where he speaks of "the problem with Peter", but also says that he is still his old lovable self (I don't have the book with me at this time - but that is the idea)

There are apparently plans to make transcriptions of Peter's letters to Mary Hodgson, which would be wonderful.  Right now we can only seem to get the first pages of the scanned letters.  I mentioned it a while back, but so far it seems to still be a problem.  Also Peter did not have the greatest handwriting - it can sometimes be hard to make him out.  Nico had the clearest as far as I can see.  Very small, but very clear.

[ecb]

No sooner do I mention that the problem with seeing only the first page of the letters in the database continues, than I check and see that it has been fixed!!

Thanks Dafydd!

[andrew]

Yes, I would most certainly have given Peter a bigger role in both the book and TV if I'd known about those letters. They were discovered years later by Peter's son Rivvy at the back of an old desk. He gave them to me, and I at once blessed and cursed the Gods, for having found them - but too late.

When Yale republished my book in 2003, they insisted on keeping Constables' original type-setting - presumably to save money, although they palmed me off with predicable flattery about not over-gilding the original. They did, however, allow me to add a few new margins photos, along with extended captions - hence the mention of Peter's letters being on this website, on p257. Mind you, there's a none-too-serious part of me that wonders if Peter didn't conspire to keep those letters hidden on purpose. He detested personal publicity, and more than once Nico questioned whether he'd done right by loaning me (and Janet Dunbar before me) the Morgue.

btw, no less moving - and infinitely more desperate and melancholic - are Peter's post-WW2 letters to Mary Hodgson, also to be found on the database - as are Peter's WW1 letters to JMB, in his own beautiful pencilled handwriting...

[ecb]

Peter's letters to Mary are indeed very melancholy reading.  I will have to reread them now that the database is complete again.  You can also get a notion of what was going on in Peter's life by reading Nico's letters to Mary.  In the latter part of the 1950s he begins to talk about Peter's growing depression and health problems.

[andrew]

Peter's transcribed letters to Mary will be posted (on Peter's page) within the next few days...

[smiles]

Excellent, thank you. Looking forward to it.

Andrew, do you recall if Nico ever mentioned that Peter was prone to depression before he served on the Western Front?

(On an unrelated note, I'm doing some research into Jack's deployments throughout the Great War. Not sure if it's of interest to anyone but me but I'll make the finding's available to the website if I get anywhere with it)

[smiles]

I've just finished reading the Peter/MH letters and the previous comments about them are spot on. However I find that the more I read the more I find myself liking Peter, he evidently has a very big heart.

I was interested to read that he didn't get along paticuarly well with Jack whenever they met but was fine with him as long as they just corresponded by mail. And I didn't know that Peter's second son was called Geroge..touching.
It's interesting to see the effect of 'The Morgue' on his mindset, I find myself wishing he had left it well alone.

Thanks to everyone involved in making these wonderful documents public, I hope Peter is sitting on a cloud somewhere taking it easy and not cringing.

[Nicholas]

A military historian friend of mine prepared a list of Jack's postings from 1914 up to the outbreak of war in 1939.  It's a rather dry document but I'm happy to share it or compare it with other peoples' work.  In general, Jack started on destroyers but moved to battleships after the war.  He was seconded to the Royal Australian Navy for a while, and served later as fleet photographic officer.  My friend described Jack as a "passed over two-and-a-half" - whatever that is. 
Unlike the other Davies boys Jack went to the naval school at Osborne.  He entered the school in the same group as Edward, Prince of Wales (alias Edward VIII, alias Duke of Windsor) and both Jack and Edward are reported as hating the place.  Even by the standards of the times Osborne had a bad reputation for cruel discipline and bullying.  It opened in 1903 and closed, unlamented, in 1921.  Osborne figures in Stephen Poliakoff's excellent The Lost Prince which is in some ways a companion piece to JM Barrie and the Lost Boys.

[smiles]

Nicholas

Excellent, thanks, email sent.

[ecb]

Here's a description of  ‘passed-over two and a half’ from this site:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/stories/22/a4870622.shtml

"The Captain of H.M.S. Londonderry, Lieutenant Commander Scott, R.N., was a ‘passed-over two and a half’, so the crew said. In the peace-time Royal Navy, promotion of an officer is automatic by length of service, up to the rank of Lieutenant Commander. After that there are too few openings for everyone to rise higher. Less than one in four talented, or lucky, or favoured, ones are awarded the three broad stripes of a Commander, with "scrambled egg" on the peak of his cap, and the chance to rise to Rear Admiral, Vice-Admiral, and Admiral. The others, "passed over two and a half s" are eventually retired on half pay, to eat their hearts out ashore."