ABSTRACT
Siegfried Sassoon [Letter to Sydney Carlyle Cockerell, dated 30 October 1923, from Siegfried Sassoon (1886-1967), poet and prose writer, who was the nephew and ward of Hardy’s friend Hamo Thornycroft. Sassoon first visited Max Gate in November 1918 and was a frequent visitor in the 1920s, becoming a firm favourite of the Hardys.]
Only last night you were in my mind, for I sat down to make that promised list of my favourite Hardy poems for you. And what a list it is! Of course, in the matter of the minor poems, one is embarrassed by one’s intimate knowledge of T.H. One hears his everyday voice in so many of his trivial versifyings – & they have an interest quite apart from their poetic de-merits! But what a precious thing to carry in one’s head – those cadences of his voice. Posterity may well envy us our incommunicable power of enjoying T.H.’s verse (pp. 31-2).
