Letter from Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Delhi, India, to James Ivory, Mumbai, India, 1970 August 4 : autograph manuscript signed.

Discussing her dogs, two of whom are in heat and "are driving Nixi [the third] crazy"; worrying about her daughter Ava, her academic performance, and her educational and professional future; describing what Ava does instead of studying; assessing James Tod's "Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan", which she is reading "in lieu of a trip [...] on which no one will take me" and questioning Tod's conclusions about the culture he is writing about ("The pride and nobility for which Tod admires them so much seem to consist mainly in taking offense at petty insults"); postulating that "Englishmen always did like that type of barbarian--probably because they didn't have to regard them as equals"; comparing Ivory's tendency to identify with his art ("you talk about The Film") to when "Dr. Fabri" referred to Christopher as "The Child--like that, in capital letters, as you would talk of the child Jesus"; telling him that she would be more inclined to do things for him rather than for "The Film. For A Film. For Any Damn Film".