It seems that Higham offered us your volume of short stories which my fellow directors did not think strong enough to justify our committing ourselves to any degree about the novel, particularly in view of the fact that there were no previous novels to give us any hint of your abilities with this form; so that is the position and I can only express the hope that The Catalyst may find another publisher […]“ (Brief vom 7.8.1958). - II. „I’ve now been through the revised SOLITUDES and here are my views as to how the volume might be presented. I think that the volume itself should be called THE SOLITUDES (which is the original title) with a sub-title ,And Other Poems’. THE SOLITUDES would actually be the first section, followed immediately by ,The Postcards’. I would like to include in THE SOLITUDES section all the poems which seem to me to spring from the same inspiration, including ,Lettera Amorosa’, ,The Warning’, and ,The Plea’. After ,Postcards’ I should put ,The Need’. ,Canzone’ seems to me to belong to ,The Solitudes’, as do ,Song’ and ,Lute Song’. Then come the other poems: ,Strope and Anti-Strophie’, ,Impromptu for a Child’, Solitude No. 15 which doesn’t seem to me to be a Solitude at all, and possibly ,Amo Ergo Sum’; ,The Crone’s Lament’ certainly, and ,Air Raid’ is a good poem. You might, if you like, end up with ,The Calendar’. I am returning the poems for you to run over again, and you will find one separate section of the poems which I should advise omitting. Some of these seem to me just not good enough; others seem to me more fitting for another volume, and I have also in mind that we don’t want a book like this to be too long. I think that with the poems which I have mentioned to be included, we shall find that the book is as long as is desirable. […]“ (Brief vom 27.8.1959).
Beiliegt: 7 Briefe und eine Postkarte mit eigenh. Unterschrift seiner Witwe Valerie Eliot an R. Duncan über ihren Mann, seine Arbeit und seine Korrespondenz bei, sowie diverse Dokumente..