Letter from Virginia Woolf to Thomas Hardy, 17 January 1915

I have long wished to tell you how profoundly grateful I am to you for your poems & novels, but naturally it seemed an impertinence to do so. When however, your poem to my father, Leslie Stephen, appeared in Satires of Circumstance this autumn, I felt that I might perhaps be allowed to thank you for that at least. That poem, & the reminiscences you contributed to Professor Maitlands Life of him, remain in my mind as incomparably the truest & most imaginative portrait of him in existence, for which alone his children should be always grateful to you.

But besides this one would like to [Page 2] thank you for the magnificent work which you have already done, & are still to do. The younger generation, who care for poetry & literature, owe you an immeasurable debt, & in particular for your last volume of poems which, to me at any rate, is the most remarkable book to appear in my life time.

I write only to satisfy a very old desire, & not to trouble you to reply.

Believe me

yours sincerely

Privacy Policy