Ned ROREM (1923-2022). L.S. "Ned", New York October 1, 1980, - Lot 113

Ned ROREM (1923-2022). L.S. "Ned", New York October 1, 1980, to André Fraigneau; 1page in-4 dactyl, headed with his name. Beautiful letter to his old friend, whom he hasn't seen in years, evoking his life in New York, his fame, Jean Cocteau and their mutual friends. "Mon bel André, in April I was in Paris for the first time in many, many years (I left France, as home, permanently in 1957, but have made a few visits since then)". He would have liked to see him... He's told "that you're well, and that you wear a healthy, white leonine mane... It's natural that I should think of you, since you were among the first French people I met in 1949, and your Human Grace has remained dear to me for three decades". He is part of a Franco-American congress that wants to put on a Cocteau exhibition: "I may be sent to Paris in a few months to do some TV interviews with certain people, including you, about Cocteau and music... In the meantime, I live as always in New York and Nantucket (an island in the Atlantic where I have a little house that I live in with my 13-year-old friend. He's not 13 - the situation started 13 years ago, and I'm losing a bit of French). I'm becoming famous on my own turf as a composer, and also as a writer [he won the Pulitzer Prize in 1976]. Henri Hell has all my books, and I'd like him to lend you some... I never see James Lord... [...]. I saw H. Sauguet in Paris, with delight... I haven't smoked in 10 years, and I haven't touched a drop of alcohol"...