I heard (on the grapevine, through the Knoxes) that Vellum Publishing is being bought out by a bigger publishing company. I don’t know the details—but I’m just crossing my fingers that, whatever’s happening, John Honey’s staying on as editor-in-chief, all projects will proceed as per schedule, and this is just some money-salvaging operation that won’t make any difference to my book. I’ve tried to call, but John’s not answering the phone and I daren’t send him a telegram in case he thinks me neurotic and unbalanced. Waiting to hear more. Will finish this letter in a bit. X

UPDATE

Talked to John. He says all is expected to run smoothly, just needed extra money on board. All systems go, as they say.

Had a lovely letter in the mail today from a woman in Newcastle who read my poem ‘Brilliant-ine’ in Crossroads. First bit of fan mail. (It went straight to my head.)

Write me soon,

X VEDA

† † †

12 OCTOBER 1969

Dear Tilde,

The new publishers are a ‘consortium’. I’m not sure exactly what that means—I thought it a legal term denoting a husband’s right of access to his wife—but I think it means they’re not interested in books per se, only in the money that might be made from books. Perhaps all publishers are like that and I’m naïve to have thought them any different to purveyors of automobiles or insurance plans. Would Frank or our father be interested in sheep if they couldn’t make money from them? Of course not. I’m entirely too naïve for this world, clearly.

Today, they have written me a letter seeking a further postponement of my book. Yes. I write this with my teeth gritted and my heart murderous. John Honey has phoned me and apologised and said we must do what we can do, keep it on track, go gently-gently, allow them time, et cetera, et cetera. Says they need to be ‘brought around to poetry’, be convinced of its commercial value.

I have bitten my nails down to the quick enough times over this that a little more can hardly hurt. Except it does. And blood is inevitably drawn.

The new bosses say they need to ‘reconsider the content’ and ‘reassess the sequencing’ of my book. They would like to remove ‘Distraction in E’ and ‘Mild Summer Kill’. They would like to remove ‘Coat and Coat-hanger’ and ‘Kindness When You Drove Me’. They think a different opening poem is required (perhaps a sonnet? they suggest, because didn’t Shakespeare write lots of those?)

They would like an alluring picture of me for the back cover.

Alluring picture? Shall I drag something out from ten years ago? I’m about as alluring as a dead cat these days.

Why don’t they just fling me into their incinerator of dead poets and stop wasting my time?

I feel like putting a needle through my eye.