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Letter from Kate O’Brien, The Fort, Roundstone, [county Galway] to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. Kate thanks Lorna and her brother Ken for their cheques, with the help of which she will be able to get by for a good while. She talks about her cats and mentions having entertained Peggy Tisdall to lunch. She gives a lengthy description of the flourishing state of her garden. She narrates in detail a scandal involving the theft of a pig carcass from a convent near Clifden by an elderly member of a respectable family. Kate has started taking Irish lessons in the village. She asks for news of Darina [Silone]. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien in Galway to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. She gives a brief account of her talk [to the Galway Women Graduates’ Association]. She expresses concern that the editorship of the University Review is an unreasonable drain on Lorna’s time and energy and urges her to take care of herself. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien, [The Fort], Roundstone, [county Galway] to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. Kate is besieged by tomcats assaulting her house and the noise they make is driving her to distraction. Apart from tomcats, she has also had the ESB men prowling round the house examining the wiring. She is starving, but afraid to go into the kitchen for fear of her sex-mad cats making their escape to the toms. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien, [The Fort], Roundstone, [county Galway] to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. Kate has had an awful time of acute anxiety, tossing between nightmare and wakeful hell, and seeks escape by writing to Lorna. She describes a Connemara Choral Society’s concert in Clifden organised by a group of local Protestants. The concert was excellent, but only attended by fifty people, not one of whom was from Clifden and only three of whom were Roman Catholic, which she finds disgraceful. She discusses the works of James Stephens at some length and, while not disliking his works, confesses to not sharing Lorna’s high opinion of him. She has been reading Kenneth Tynan’s Bull Fever and [Salvador de] Madariaga’s Hernán Cortés, both of which she finds splendid. She encloses some opening pages (now not present) of her article [‘As to University Life’] to give Lorna some idea of it. She asks Lorna to direct her if she feels Kate has taken a wrong line with the piece. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien in Galway to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. Kate got a lift to Galway from an ESB man and is writing to Lorna in a hotel before going to the Neilans who are not expecting her until late. The letter deals mainly with her cat Tess, who to Kate’s amazement casually and without any warning gave birth to a solitary kitten while sitting on her lap. She mentions Mary Lavin, who is in Kylemore Abbey and is hoping to visit Kate. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien, 334 Russell Court, Woburn Place, [London] WC1 to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. She hopes Lorna will go to Roundstone and gives advice on what to do once she gets there. She has read Ben Kiely’s novel, which she found good but untidy, and attempted to read one by Peadar O’Donnell, whose works she loves, but found it so bad she could not finish it. Kate is staying with her sister Clare and the only reading material her flat provides are copies of Kate’s novels and [James] Boswell’s Life of [Samuel] Johnson, which Kate gave Clare long ago. She has been re-reading it and finds it as wonderful as ever. She has looked at prints of Picasso’s Child with a Dove, but finds them far too big and too expensive. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien, [The Fort], Roundstone, [county Galway] to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. Kate is expecting overnight guests, Liam Robinson and Eoín O’Mahony and resents the inconvenience of their visit. She describes an inspiring thought she has had regarding her novel [As Music and Splendour] and its characters. She describes her two guests and asks heaven to deliver her from men and allow her to live with her cats. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien, [The Fort], Roundstone, [county Galway] to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. The letter deals almost solely with Kate’s arrangements for the tenants who will be occupying her house from June onwards. She is sad that no one heard her talk on the radio this evening as to her mind it was a lovely account of life in Roundstone. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien, 88 King Henry’s Road, [London] NW3 to Lorna Reynolds, La Casa, Celbridge, county Kildare. Kate describes an excellent supper party given by Darina [Silone] and Keshev to her and Mary [O’Neill]. Darina gave them the first ten chapters of ‘Gigli’ [The Memoirs of Beniamino Gigli, translated from Italian by Darina Silone] to read, and both she and Mary think them excellent. She discusses Maria Bugli, whom she considers an interesting woman. Her chances of getting to Spain in the spring look slim. She is trying to earn money in any way she can, but her prospects are poor. Her novel [As Music and Splendour] crawls along, mainly because she has developed an intolerance to adverbs, which makes writing difficult. She has bought some aubergines which she intended to cook for lunch, but Mary found them so beautiful she wants to paint them instead. Kate has been humbled by the austerity of Mary’s life, which puts her own extravagances to shame. With envelope.

Letter from Kate O’Brien, 88 King Henry’s Road, London NW3 to Lorna Reynolds, 21 Herbert Avenue, Merrion, Dublin. Kate is horrified with the news of Lorna’s diagnosis of pneumonia. She understands now why there has been no reply when she has tried to phone her. She is about to go and give a lecture to tie Irish Literary Society on the Irish novel. Her book [As Music and Splendour] is selling well in spite of the critics. With envelope.