[Steve Bucknell]

Sterling work, Jerome. Back from Corfu yesterday I've just been on the phone to Richard. I was telling him how much I enjoyed reading "The Questing Beast" on holiday, and how much my wife Adrienne enjoyed it too. I asked her to read it because I felt I was perhaps losing critical objectivity where R.P. was concerned...But I don't think so; like me she was laughing out loud at R.P's typical sharpness and wit.

It's excellent about life in wartime, about psychiatry and the search for love and meaning. Adrienne pointed out parallels between it and Rose Macauley's "The Towers of Trebizond". Richard agrees, and says he loved her work, and the paths of their travels seem to have crossed, though they never met. He has vivid memories of Trebizond in Turkey, and said "You must go."

I passed on our pleasure in discovering his poems. He really thinks this is wonderful; he thought "they had all been forgotten". I received a copy of his first novel "The Way Backwards" today (1950, Collins). It contains a dedication written by R.P. at the time; he remembers the people, friends of his first wife, and how they would watch cricket at Lords together after the war.

I hope to go to London and meet him in person soon. I have said I will send him a copy of this thread, and he was keen to see it.I passed on that people here were rediscovering and enjoying "The Idle Demon".

On a personal note I would like to thank Alex. Without the stimulus of having this lively and interested community at the Sphere I don't think I would have had the impetus to track down this most elusive and charming man.