Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Michael and Eslyn Kennedy
Letter No. VWL3553
Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Michael and Eslyn Kennedy
Letter No.: VWL3553
From R. Vaughan Williams,
10, Hanover Terrace,
Regents Park,
London, N.W.1.
December 27th 1957.
Dear Eslyn & Michael
Thank you so much for both the books. I expect the Metaphysical poets are more for Ursula, but I have a particular interest in Robert Graves as I know him slightly. I think I told you of our last meeting, but will repeat it, in case I haven’t. It sounds like a game of consequences! We discovered that we had both been at Charterhouse, where upon we both started singing the Carmen Carthusianum in a majorcan restaurant in loud voices – this caused a thunder storm, whereupon Robert Graves upset his coffee over Ursula and a cat.1
Our love to you both and hopes for a happy new year.
Ralph2
1. The Kennedys had given VW for Christmas a revised edition of Robert Graves’s memoir Goodbye to all that originally published in 1929. For the full story of the encounter with Graves in Majorca see R.V.W.: a biography, p. 375.
2. This letter printed in part in Michael Kennedy, Works of Vaughan Williams, p. 390.
-
To:
-
From:
-
Scribe:
-
Names:
-
Subject:
-
Format:
-
General Notes:
Typewritten, signed.
-
Location Of Original:
-
Shelfmark:MS Mus. 159, f.207