1 page (5 1/2 x 8 5/8 in.; 140 x 219mm) on specially-printed letterhead for his stay at Harvard's Eliot House, Cambridge, Mass., 8 November 1932; Vertical folds, crease in upper left corner, light circular stain (2 3/4 in. diameter) on right side of letter, slightly affecting signature.

T. S. Eliot confronts an unfounded rumor of censorship.  In this letter, the poet responds to a Mr. Abernethy who believes Eliot's poem "Animula" is banned and cannot be imported into the U.S.  The poem was published as a chapbook in Faber's Aerial Poems series in 1929.  The letter was written from Eliot House at Harvard, where Eliot was lodged while he delivered the Charles Eliot Norton lectures, later published as The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism.  When Eliot returned to Britain after delivering lectures in Cambridge and Charlottesville in 1932–33, he did not return to his wife Vivienne, makinig a final break with her.

"I am very much surprised at what you tell me about thꩲe importation of 'Animula', and feel quite sure that it must be a mistake.  There is nothing whatever in that poem which could possibly attract the censor; and if they had been going to put my poems on the index they would have had to start long before that poem was written.  The best way would be, I should think, to send a postal order … to Faber & Faber … and see what happens.  I sౠhould be more than surprised if it did not get through.  It is so impossible to find grounds on which to censor that poem that it would not be wise to take such steps as you suggest until more authoritative information & evidence is at hand."