The Richard Burton Diaries (249 page)

176
Another Welsh hymn – ‘Bryn Calfaria’ or ‘The Hill of Calvary’. This line translates as ‘Revive me with a breeze from Calvary’.

177
A line used frequently in
The Merchant of Venice
, Act IV, scene i.

178
Act III, scene iv.

179
The Dorchester Hotel, Park Lane, London.

180
H.S. Hawker Siddeley.

181
‘Saes’, abbreviated ‘Saeson’, Welsh for the English.

182
Windsor, Berkshire.

183
Horsley Towers, East Horsley, Surrey.

184
Craig Berkeley had a brief career in the 1980s and 1990s as a make-up artist, starting with the Burton mini-series
Wagner
.

185
Eton and Harrow are considered to be the top public schools in England.

186
By ‘Buck House’ Burton means Buckingham Palace.

187
Tony Pellissier (1912–88), actor, screenwriter, producer, director.

188
Le Bourget airport, Paris.

189
Ringo Starr (1940—), former Beatle and actor and his wife Maureen (1946–94). Starr had appeared with Burton in
Candy
.

190
Possibly Richard Marden (d. 2008), the film editor, who would work on
Anne of the Thousand Days
.

191
This is a reference to
Hamlet
, Act I, scene v, where the ghost tells Hamlet ‘I could a tale unfold whose lightest word / Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood’.

192
Charles Dickens,
A Christmas Carol
(1843).

193
Werner Keller,
The Bible as History
(1955).

194
Arthur Schlesinger (1917–2007),
A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House
(1965).

195
Cadonau, Promenade, Gstaad.

196
The Apollo 8 mission launched on 21 December and returned on 27 December, having orbited the moon. The astronauts were Frank Borman (1928—), James Lovell (1928—) and William Anders (1933—).

197
Princess Elizabeth's first husband was Howard Oxenberg (1919–2010).

198
Burton had been involved in a scuffle outside The Load of Hay public house, Praed Street, Paddington, London. Most accounts suggest this took place in January 1963.

199
Carter Brown, pseudonym of Alan Geoffrey Yates (1923–85), author of crime fiction.

1969

1
John Arthur Chapman (1900–72), drama critic of the
Daily News
, 1943–71.
Tell It To Sweeney: The Informal History of the New York Daily News
(1961).

2
C. S. Forester, pseudonym of Cecil Louis Troughton Smith (1899–1966).
Lord Hornblower
(1946). Herbert Ernest Bates (1905–74),
Fair Stood the Wind for France
(1944).

3
Avare
: Miser.

4
Mary McCarthy (1912–89). Kevin McCarthy (1914–2010), divorced from his first wife in 1961, was not to remarry until 1979. His girlfriend in 1969 was Swedish.

5
Henry Longhurst (1909–78), had published
Only on Sundays
(1964), a collection of his pieces from the
Sunday Times
, and
Talking about Golf
(1966), a collection from
Golf Illustrated
.

6
Harold Nicolson (1886–1968),
The Age of Reason
(1960).

7
Frederick II, known as Frederick the Great (1712–86), King of Prussia (1740–86). Catherine II, known as Catherine the Great (1729–96), Empress of Russia (1762–96). Peter I, known as Peter the Great (1672–1725), Emperor of Russia (1682–1725). Louis XIV, also known as the ‘Roi Soleil’, the Sun King (1638–1715), King of France (1643–1715).

8
'The Crazy Gang’: British entertainers including Bud Flanagan (1896–1968), and Chesney Allen (1893–1982) active from the mid-1930s to the late 1950s.

9
Dorado, also known as Mahi-Mahi, commonly known as the dolphin fish.

10
Mismaloya: a beach 40 miles south of Puerto Vallarta, where much of
The Night of the Iguana
was shot.

11
Jack Keyward (possibly Hayward) – also a friend and neighbour in Puerto Vallarta.

12
La Grande Cascade au Bois de Boulogne, Allée de Longchamp, Paris.

13
Belons: flat oysters.

14
Presumably a reference to the appearance of survivors of the Nazi death camp at Bergen-Belsen.

15
The pub in Richard's home village.

16
This is a rather inaccurate borrowing from Archibald MacLeish's (1892–1982) poem ‘The End of the World’, published in 1935. The relevant lines are ‘Those thousands of white faces, those dazed eyes, /There in the starless dark, the poise, the hover/There with vast wings across the canceled skies, / There in the sudden blackness the black pall/Of nothing, nothing, nothing – nothing at all.’

17
Dic Bach y Saer – literally ‘little Dic the carpenter’, Richard's father.

18
The Galerie d'Elysée of Alex Maguy. Edouard Vuillard (1868–1940); Moise Kisling (1891–1953); Albert Marquet (1875–1947): painters.

19
Maurice de Vlaminck (1876–1958), French painter.

20
Maurice Utrillo (1883–1955), painter.

21
Ruth Hatfield of the Dalzell Hatfield Galleries, Ambassador Hotel, Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles.

22
John Edward Reginald Wyndham, 6th Baron Leconfield and 1st Baron Egremont (1920–72).

23
Michael Innes, the pseudonym of J. I. M. Stewart (1906–94).

24
Paul C. Petrides (1901–93), art dealer, sole agent of Utrillo.

25
Possibly for the LP
The World of Dylan Thomas, in Poetry and Prose
(1971).

26
Thomas Thompson, ‘Power and Liz Burton’,
Sunday Mirror
, 19 January 1969.

27
David Orsmby-Gore (1918–95), 5th Baron Harlech.

28
A reference to the line by Sir Walter Raleigh (
c.
1552–1618), in ‘The Passionate Man's Pilgrimage’ (1604): ‘Give me my scallop-shell of quiet’.

29
'Like quills upon the fretful porpentine’, a line spoken by the Ghost in
Hamlet
, Act I, scene v. John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster (1340–99), and a character in Shakespeare's
Richard II
.

30
'Whither thou goest, I will go’ – from the Book of Ruth in the Old Testament, Chapter I verse 16.

31
A reference to what was by this time known as the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, located at Fountain Avenue, Los Angeles.

32
G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936), journalist, poet, novelist, critic. The line is usually rendered as ‘How beautiful it would be for someone who could not read.’

33
The Desert Inn, hotel and casino, Las Vegas (1950–2000).

34
The Pantages Theatre, built for the entrepreneur Alexander Pantages (1876–1936) in 1930. Phil Ober (1902–82), actor, married to his third wife, Jane Westover.

35
Charles Collingwood (1917–85), newscaster and writer. Louise Allbritton (1920–79), actor.

36
Ray Marshall, house agent in Puerto Vallarta.

37
Today a resort complex.

38
Burton's article, ‘Who Cares About Wales? I Care’, would appear in
Look
on 24 June 1969.

39
Gwyneth Jenkins, a close friend of Gwen, Ivor's wife and Richard's sister-in-law.

40
Ian Fleming (1908–64),
You Only Live Twice
(1964).

41
Nathaniel West,
Miss Lonelyhearts
(1933).

42
Red Smith (1905–82), sports journalist who had worked for the
New York Herald Tribune
.

43
Another version is that his last words were to ambulancemen: ‘Awfully sorry to trouble you chaps’.

44
Denis Brogan (1900–74), historian, academic, author of
The Development of Modern France, 1870–1939
(1940),
The French Nation, 1814–1940
(1957) and
French Personalities and Problems
(1946).

45
Philip Roth (1933—),
Portnoy's Complaint
(1969). Octavio Paz (1914–98), poet and essayist.
The Labyrinth of Solitude: Life and Thought in Mexico
, 1950; English translation 1961.

46
Simon Raven (1927–2001), novelist.

47
This would appear to be a paraphrase of Paz's argument rather than a direct quotation.

48
The quotation is not entirely accurate: it should be ‘certain principles, contained in brief formulas’, and ‘A person imprisoned by these schemes ... he cannot grow or mature’ (
Labyrinth of Solitude
, p. 25).

49
Michael Redgrave (1908–85), actor, father of Vanessa. Norman Charles Hunter (1908–71).

50
A Touch of the Sun
(1958).

51
Presumably typed on the following day.

52
Hotel Rosita, Paseo Díaz Ordaz, Puerto Vallarta.

53
Mario Puzo (1920–99),
The Godfather
(1969).

54
Victor Wolfgang Von Hagen (1908–85), historian, anthropologist and writer. Burton might have been reading his
The World of the Maya
(1960).

55
Suzanne Blanc,
The Rose Window
(1968).

56
Georges Simenon (1903–89), author of, amongst other things, the Maigret detective stories.

57
Benito Pablo Juárez Garcia (1806–72), President of Mexico. Emiliano Zapata (1879–1919), revolutionary leader.

58
James Baldwin (1924–87), novelist, playwright, essayist.

59
Sierra fish, also known as Pacific Sierra or Sierra Mackerel.

60
Presumably the ocean liner the
SS France
.

61
James Campbell (1951—),
Talking at the Gates: A Life of James Baldwin
(1991), having read (and quoted) the account of this incident relayed in Bragg's
Rich
, termed it (p. 231) a ‘hideous accusation’, suggesting that either Burton had made a mistake or that the thief was ‘Baldwin's French friend – not quite “the same thing”.’ He goes on (p. 232) to state that all of Baldwin's ‘close associates who were asked for their opinion of the incident ... recoiled at the suggestion that Baldwin could be guilty of simple thieving’. The blame is then placed on the Frenchman, who, we are told, is later discovered to have been gaoled for armed robbery.

62
Letter not enclosed.

63
In excelsis: to a high degree.

64
Neither survive.

65
A reference to the lines from ‘To His Coy Mistress’ by Andrew Marvell (1621–78): ‘But at my back I always hear / Time's wingèd chariot hurrying near’.

66
Mai Tai is a white and dark rum based cocktail also including curaçao, syrups and lime juice.

67
James ‘Skip’ Ward (1932–2003) had played the part of Hank Prosner in
The Night of the Iguana
. Stella Stevens (1938—), actor, glamour model.

68
Jalisco, the province in which Puerto Vallarta is situated.

69
Barbara Streisand (1942—), actor and singer.

70
William Shakespeare.
King Lear
, Act III, scene iv, a line spoken by Edgar, son of the Earl of Gloucester.

71
Gavin Maxwell (1914–69). The book referred to is probably
The Rocks Remain
, first published in 1963.

72
Posada Vallarta Hotel, Avenue de los Garzas, Puerto Vallarta.

73
Burro
is Spanish for donkey, although it may also refer to a Mexican breed of donkey as opposed to those descended from European stock.

74
Professor Truetta, prominent orthopaedic surgeon.

75
A reference to a charity championed by Ben James.

76
Elizabeth, Lady Longford (1906–2002). Her biography,
Victoria RI
, was published in 1964.

77
Lytton Strachey,
Queen Victoria
(1921).

78
Antony Charles Robert Armstrong-Jones, 1st Earl of Snowdon (1930—), husband at the time of Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon (1930–2002). Mrs Armstrong-Jones is presumably Jennifer, the third wife and widow of the Earl of Snowdon's father Ronald (d. 1966), who was herself to remarry in June 1969. Mrs Ogmore-Pritchard is a character in Dylan Thomas's
Under Milk Wood
. Rather than Plas Newydd, Burton may mean the Armstrong-Jones home at Plas Dinas, Anglesey. Prince Charles (1948—) was invested as Prince of Wales at Caernarfon on 1 July 1969.

79
The Investiture came at a time when minority elements within the Welsh nationalist movement were active in planting bombs and threatening violence. Two members of Mudiad Amddiffyn Cymru (the Movement for the Defence of Wales) were killed when a bomb they were planting outside government offices in Abergele went off prematurely. Burton acted as narrator for Independent Television's coverage of the Investiture ceremony.

80
Charles Darwin (1809–82),
The Origin of Species
(1859).

81
Neither enclosed. Mira L. Waters (1945—), actor, singer and songwriter.

82
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch: a village on Anglesey in Wales.

83
Richard's primary school in Taibach.

84
Peter Maas (1929–2001),
The Valachi Papers
(1968).

85
Alfred Drake (1914–92) played Claudius, King of Denmark, in the 1964 production of
Hamlet
.

86
See diary entry for 20 October 1967.

87
Ezra Pound (1885–1972), poet.

88
Cunard Cottages, Cwmafan.

89
Michael Hordern was playing Thomas Boleyn in
Anne of the Thousand Days
and John Colicos (1928–2000) was playing Thomas Cromwell. Colicos would also act alongside Burton in
Raid on Rommel
.

90
The Governor of Jalisco was Francisco Medina Ascencio.

91
Evelyn Waugh (1903–66),
Put Out More Flags
(1942).