System Number: 13304
Date: [26 March 1888][1]
Author: JW
Place: [London]
Recipient: William Thomas Stead[2]
Place: [London]
Repository: Glasgow University Library
Call Number: MS Whistler M111b
Document Type: ALd[3]
Sir -
I find myself obliged to notice the critical review that appeared in your paper (March 6) of the "Ten O'clock,"[4] that ap
In the interest of my Editors, I must take this occasion beg to state formally that the work is not as yet appeared - and therefore publicly who point out that what has as yet not left is still in the hands of the printers, cannot have fallen into the fingers of your official reporter incautious contributor - - formally that the work has not as yet appeared -
To emulate the early telegram may be the ambition of this premature and incautious hurried one - but when he elaborates his indiscretion and explains to your vast body of readers that the [action?] which who heard may have imposed upon them by its apparent worth, is, when seen upon paper reduced to its natural unimportance - but when he imposes upon the P. M. G. by his indiscreet haste and should be he properly rebuked -
I beg that you will kindly insert this note, lest the public suppose through your authority that the "Ten O'clock" which they cannot come upon, has in consequence of this summing up been hur[r]iedly withdrawn from circulation.
[p. 2] Sir -
I beMay I beg through the medium of your paper to state decidedly that the "Ten O'clock" of which a cordial review appeared in the Pall Mall Gazette of March 6th, has not as yet been published - The work is still in the printers hands, and could therefore not have been seen by the writer who is supposed is supposed to have read it —
This document is protected by copyright.
Notes:
1. [26 March 1888]
Dated from #10936 (see below).
2. William Thomas Stead
William Thomas Stead (1849-1912), editor of the Pall Mall Gazette from 1883-1890, founder-editor of the Review of Reviews in 1890 [more].
3. ALd
#10936 is the final version of this draft, published as Whistler, James McNeill, [Letter to the Editor], The Pall Mall Gazette, no. 7186, vol. 47, 28 March 1888, p. 5; see Getscher, Robert H., and Paul G. Marks, James McNeill Whistler and John Singer Sargent. Two Annotated Bibliographies, New York and London, 1986, B. 49. This draft is written on the same sheet of paper as #03777.
4. Ten O'clock
The 'Ten O'Clock Lecture' was JW's chief public statement of his aesthetic ideas. It was first delivered in London on 20 February 1885 at the Prince's Hall, Piccadilly. It was published by Chatto & Windus on 11 May.