DLA011-0006  Translation

30. XII. [18]96.

Dear Friend,

As you can see, I am in Berlin. We are spending the holidays with my sister, and there of course things are lively. There is lots of social life, lots of theatre etc., so that I am very busy. However, I should like to answer your letter, which I received shortly before leaving Dresden, with a few lines.

One piece of news will no doubt interest you: I have become engaged to the sister of Fräulein Tyson-Wolff, whom you met at our house that evening. Her name is Lillian, she rides a bicycle well, and as our Austrian bookbinder would say, she is “ein prächtiger Kerl” [“a wonderful chap”].  

You must be doing marvellously well! One commission after another, in all corners of the world! I congratulate you on the Kaiser portrait.^[1] I fear however that these kinds of commissions are less of an advantage to the artist in you than to the man.

In England I got to know Walter Crane, E. Burne-Jones and many other fine artists, even though briefly. This summer,  perhaps already in the next 4-5 months, I shall probably again be coming to London, as I shall probably get married there. Perhaps we shall meet then?

Did you actually receive the first two half-volumes of the Künstler Lexikon?^[2] I have quite forgotten about it and will have to see whether I have the volumes that follow. In all, 4 half-volumes have already appeared.  

My dear Fülöp, you must forgive me if I now finish this letter. In a quarter of an hour we are leaving for the theatre, to see Hauptmann’s “Die Versunkene Glocke” (The Sunken Bell) and I have to get ready. I shall write you a longer letter from Dresden.

In the meantime my best regards, yours,      

Hans W. Singer.

Pd’O

29/01/2006