BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, 1 OCT. 1948
BRACERS 19854. ALS. McMaster
Edited by S. Turcon. Reviewed by K. Blackwell

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British Embassy
Oslo1^, 2
1 Oct. 1948

My darling Colette

It was lovely to find your dear letter3 here when I arrived today. I can’t tell you what a profound joy it is to me to have found you again after all these years — In a world where everything is going to pieces, it is doubly comforting to find something that survives. It will be lovely when you have your cottage near us4 and I can walk up and be with you — as completely as ever, I hope and believe — Thank you a thousand times for your letter and for your love — which means a very great deal to me —

Goodbye for now, my dear dear love.

B.

• 1

  [document] Document 200861.

• 2

  British Embassy Oslo After writing this letter BR was in a flying-boat airplane travelling from Oslo to Trondheim which crashed on 2 October. After surviving the accident, BR continued the next day on his planned lecture tour. There was newspaper coverage of the incident.

• 3

  your dear letter Not extant.

• 4

  your cottage near us On 12 September Colette wrote to her friend Phyllis Urch (BRACERS 113274) from the Pengwern Arms near BR’s cottage in Ffestiniog. She and BR had looked at cottages for her to buy. One did look promising but then became unavailable. She had also looked at one on the road to Bala. She was to stay in Wales until September 20 when she would leave for Oxford to visit Professor A. Oras.