The fakery of Martha Gellhorn

Martha Gellhorn was a long-legged blonde American writer and journalist who became Papa Hemingway’s third and penultimate wife. She got her start when H.G. Wells, then nearly 70, fell for her rather badly, advised her on her writing, and paid her a small retainer to keep him up to date on American trends. She was 27 at the time. Wells had met Martha at the White House during the Franklin Roosevelt years before the war, Eleanor having been a friend of Martha’s mother, who was known around St Louis for having a mad crush on the First Lady.

Yes, dear readers, sex existed even back then, but people didn’t tweet about it, they just did it. I never met Martha Gellhorn although she lived a few doors down from me in Cadogan Square, and the times I spotted her — a very old lady carrying some plastic bags — I was not about to interrupt her routine with questions about my hero Papa, and why she disliked him so.