Letter from James Ivory, Mumbai, India, to Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Delhi, India, 1968 April 23 : typescript signed.

Acknowledging Ruth's letter containing news of the death of her teenage nephew David, and relating the death of another young man close to him. "Merlie's 21 year old nephew"; admitting he doesn't feel ready to travel to London with "The Guru" for dubbing, as "half the sound hasn't come yet" and the editors are still busy assembling the rushes; reflecting on his feeling that "This film"-- "The Guru"-- "seems so different from the others [we have done]," and wondering why that is, since nearly all the elements-- her writing, his, direction, Ismail's organization, Mitra's cinematography, MIP production-- are the same; wondering if it's because they have a star of the magnitude of Rita Tushingham; asking her to bring his winter clothes to Bombay, presumably in preparation for London; telling her the amateur theatrical production he saw [see MA 23840.423] "wasn't all that bad," and the young actor he came to see "was good, and I liked him"; describing the producer Pearl Padamsee; describing taking Amita Malik to dinner at the Taj that evening, being "regaled with real jackaal stories of her fellow film journalists," and describing an entertainer at the Taj called Sherrie "who we must take you to see"; describing seeing "The Round-Up" at the New York film Festival the previous year-- "I liked it, but I was probably the only person who did"; saying they will be watching "the Hotel de Paris scene" that night, which features Michael York.