A letter from Jonathan Guinness, Lord Moyne. It’s about Mark Birley.
‘He was an artist, but a more unusual one than his father. Rather than turning out portraits and still-lives, he decided to turn everything around him into a work of art. So it all had to be perfect. He was as close as any real person could be to Huysman’s Des Esseintes, central figure of A Rebours. Mark, as inventor of muslin round the half-lemon, will with luck be remembered when Polly Toynbee has been forgotten.’
What a good and civilised man Jonathan is. And how correct he is that Mark will be remembered long after the name Polly Toynbee will only signify a pain in the bum. Alas, I did not make the memorial service. I lunched with Robin Birley following it and he told me all about it.
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