THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

From R. Vaughan Williams,
The White Gates,
Westcott Road,
Dorking.

[late October 1939]

Dearest Grace
I listened in on Tuesday.¹ All is much clearer & more direct & purposeful than it used to be. I liked the last movement best (I expect I oughtn’t to) & the slow – the others not so much – But the whole thing is certainly a great advance – This is the first music I’ve really listened to since war began – I find I can’t listen though I like thinking about music.
Good news about Betty’s daughter.²
I enclose the latest bee in my bonnet
love from
Uncle Ralph

1. The first performance of Williams’s Four Illustrations for the Legend of Rhiannon, for orchestra had been broadcast on Tuesday 24 October 1939.
2. Elizabeth Maconchy had given birth to her first daughter, Elizabeth Anna Le Fanu.