The Element of Lavishness

In July 1938 William Maxwell then twenty-nine years old and the acting poetry editor of The New Yorker wrote to Sylvia Townsend Warner inviting her to send him verse. Miss Warner forty-four and famous for her novel Lolly Willowes had recently begun writing stories for the magazine antic inimitable sketches of English life that Maxwell adored. The poems were sent and a remarkable friendship was begun.