THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

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

[29th November 1939]

My Dear
We will fix up something while you are in London. I am sure to be coming up.
I am speaking from London on Sunday¹ – so no travelling except too [sic] and from Dorking. I take the chair at a F.U.² meeting here on Sat.
& my 1^st lecture concert is tomorrow³ & on the 4^th I give away prizes at a school in Penge! So pretty active.
Do you know the last 10 lines or so of P. Unbound?⁴
Love from
RVW

1. “Speaking from London” on Sunday 3 December – this was a 15 minute BBC broadcast at 8.45 pm on “Making your own music.”
2. The Federal Union meeting at the Friends’ Meeting House, Dorking was in the afternoon of Saturday 2 December. See R.V.W.: a biography, p.234.
3. The first lecture concert was on 29 November (so VW must have started writing the letter on Tuesday 28). It was on chamber music and the Frederick Jackson Trio provided illustrations.
4.  Prometheus Unbound, by Shelley. See R.V.W.: a biography, p.231. VW used this text in the Song of Victory, no.4 in his Six choral songs – to be sung in time of war, Catalogue of Works p.178 (1940/1).