[Patric Dickinson, poet, translator and broadcaster.] Copy of his poetry collection 'The Sailing Race and other Poems', inscribed to his mistress Sarah Hamilton, and with autograph explanatory annotation throughout.

Patric Dickinson has not received his due. A self-styled ‘poet and impresario of poetry’, Dickinson occupied a central position in the cultural landscape of post-war Britain. As an editor and broadcaster he worked with poets such as Dylan Thomas, Cecil Day Lewis and Roy Campbell, actresses Flora Robson, Peggy Ashcroft and Jill Balcon, and actors Robert Donat, Ralph Richardson, John Gielgud. See John Mole’s obituary in the Independent, 31 January 1994. From the papers of Dickinson’s mistress Sarah Emmeline Hamilton. (His extraordinary correspondence with her, including 171 original and mostly-unpublished poems, 474 autograph letters and 349 post cards, is offered separately). The present item is 38pp, 8vo. Blue paper boards in blue dustwrapper. In fair condition, a little aged and bumped at foot of spine, in aged and worn dustwrapper. Inscribed on front free endpaper 'For Sarah / with my love / Patric'. Annotated in pencil on sixteen pages, ranging from a few words to (for 'The Sailing Race'), 'This poem doesnt come off. It is too obscure. I tried to link 'my father's ghost,' in Hamlet, & what he made Hamlet swear, with the ghost of my own father (& brother) the feeling of delight on the present clashing with my responsibility to the dead, never to forget how & why they died. (war) / This complex failed. The poem is obscure. / The actual race was for 'the Conqueror's Pint' - the big race of the year sailed in November. So the gulls' cry has a double sense, of its sound & All Souls Night'; and (to 'The Swallows'), 'The 'two' are Jill & Cecil Day Lewis. C. D. L. was staying (this was before they were married) & spent most of his time writing letters to J. He also translated some of his version of the Aeneid in the drawing-room. 38 is the only house, I imagine where bits of two versions have been written.'