18 SEPTEMBER, 2021

Dear Harry,

I realize, belatedly as usual, that it’s time to acknowledge what has become obvious even to your stubbornly obtuse son! Time to give up the original conceit that these letters are about me trying to get to know you. The truth is the opposite, it’s about wanting you to get to know me. The “tell me who you are” turns out to be reversed. But you probably understood that from the start.

From the time I left Cambridge and strode out—with a quite few stumbles yet to come—onto the world’s greater stage, I had very little contact with you, other than what I have lately discovered to be a remarkably extensive correspondence. The actual time we spent together was quite brief. Even in the previous years, my being away at boarding school for the better part of the year meant that I’d had less contact with you than most boys do with their fathers. After Cambridge, though, I spent only two years more in England, in the big city, and then left England for good. For the rest of your life, I returned only for short visits. I moved first to Germany for two years, then to Canada for another two before arriving here in the United States, I spent four years in Iowa City at the Writers’ Workshop, then moved out to California in 1968. I have lived here ever since. In short, the progression of the years put an ever further geographical distance between the two of us.

It was not long after I left England that you retired—I think in part for reasons of poor health. There were recurrent headaches, bronchial problems, a sometimes severe depression. The remainder of your days, and Peggy’s, were spent at Glenview, that little cottage by the Cardigan Bay in Aberporth, where Peggy’s parents lived, too, until their death. You set up your woodshop in what had been the garage and worked for many years at your lathe, a minister-turned-craftsman, while Peggy took care of the cottage and the cooking. You had your pub within walking distance, and when walking became difficult you took to a nicely decorated wooden cane to help you up the hill. With that, and your French beret, you became a familiar sight in the village, something of a local institution on your daily trips up to The Ship in the middle of the day.

We’ll talk more about our visits there, and the grandchildren’s, in due course. In the meantime, it’s good to have arrived at a greater clarity about my purpose. You have become, curiously, perhaps perversely, your own son’s confessor!

With love, Peter