Old favourites

Sir, – Further to Lucy Sweeney Byrne's article on Elizabeth Hardwick's book Sleepless Nights (July 11th), the object Robert Lowell was "clutching" when he died in a New York taxi was not "a photo of his third wife, Caroline Blackwood", whom he had just left to return to his second wife Hardwick. It was a painting of Blackwood by Lucien Freud.

So less a poignant reminder and more a substantial asset. – Yours, etc,

JOHN P O’SULLIVAN.