Letter from Adeline Vaughan Williams to Cordelia Curle
... they found the Carillon player - a celebrated man of 70 with 2 pupils - The Canon wdnt let R climb quite to the top for the parapet was blown away by a shell & he said it was very dizzy work -
The view was misty - so it was chiefly the excitement of the bells which made the climb so worth while - The canon was educated in England & Oxford - a man about 60 & he & 2 sisters live very comfortably in a dark old fashioned house in a courtyard - He was in business & became a priest after the war - his people are well known publishers - There was a little Polish monk staying in the house. R found him delightfully simple - he also liked the Organist very much - (Canon Dersain1 has a brother in Dorking!)
He enjoyed both his crossings - nothing could have been more successful.2
Your
A
1. Transcribed ‘Derain’ in RVW.
2. This account refers to a visit by VW to Malines, apparently in September-October 1928. See VWL820 and R.V.W.: a biography p.173. A performance of VW's Mass in G minor had taken place - see VWL2418.
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