Letter to the Editor

The Editor,
The Byron Journal
12 February 2013

Dear Jonathon,

I write to say how much I enjoyed reading Bernard Beatty’s article ‘The Byron Journal at Forty’ (40.2, pp. 103–13). Having read most of the contents of the journal from its first issue in 1973 to the present day I thought it summed up those years splendidly. As a non-academic I endorse what he had to say. I was especially pleased to read his comments on Elma Dangerfield and I thought that Bernard chose his words very well.

I met Elma many times over those past forty years and certainly she could appear intimidating to anyone that she did not know. Elma was one of those persons who chose to go on the offensive when dealing with someone for the first time – as if to test their mettle! If you withstood this initial onslaught, and sadly many did not, then you could enjoy a much more cordial relationship based on mutual respect and trust.

I talked to her a number of times, especially around 1988 when we formed The Newstead Abbey Byron Society and these talks were conducted in a positive and friendly manner. You could not, however, take her compliance for granted and she would home in, with vigour, on any point which you had not thought particularly important. This was her way and sometimes it bore fruit and sometimes it had the opposite effect. However, I can say that she succeeded in her efforts and I admired her tenacity. She well earned her right to become the first lady of The Byron Society and of the journal. Having assured her that our intentions were to work with her rather than in opposition, we gained her blessing and full support.

What prompted me to write to you is to say that I have, what I consider to be, a wonderful ‘action’ photograph of Elma at Newstead Abbey, taken in the early 1990s. It was taken by me and has been in my Byron archive ever since. I thought it would be a fitting tribute to her if you would consider publishing it in the journal for all to see.

I also read with interest Geoffrey Bond’s obituary of Derek Wise, who I also met and talked with on a number of occasions, particularly on a Byron Society visit to Greece in 1999. I enclose too a photograph, taken at the ruins at Sounion on that occasion, of The Earl of Lytton with Derek and myself enjoying some Greek sunshine. It shows Derek enjoying himself ‘away from the office’. Byron wrote memorably of Sounion in the ‘Isles of Greece’ in Don Juan Canto III:

Place me on Sunium’s marbled steep,    Where nothing, save the waves and I,May hear our mutual murmurs sweep;    There, swan-like, let me sing and die:A land of slaves shall ne’er be mine –Dash down yon cup of Samian wine!

Figure 1.

Elma Dangerfield at Newstead Abbey, taken in the early 1990s.

Figure 2.

Derek Wise, the Earl of Lytton and David Herbert (Greece, 1999).