I recently heard of the death of Richard Ball. It is more than twelve months
since he telephoned me one morning whilst waiting for a lift to go talking.
We talked about Edwin Morgan, the Poetry Society and disablement. Below is
an obituary from Susanna Roxman.
yours
Gerald England
Welsh poet Richard Ball
B. 25 December 1919
D. 23 May 2005
Richard Ball, born at Knighton in Powys, Central Wales, was regarded as
something of a prodigy as a child, but the family was not wealthy, and he
had to leave school relatively early in order to work as an invoice
clerk.The job was dull and badly paid, and Ball gave it up, hoping to become
a professional writer. Eventually, more than a dozen poetry collections of
his had been published, in Britain and the US. He also contributed widely to
literary magazines, including Orbis, Outposts, and Pennine Platform. He was
a contributing editor and writer for Pembroke Magazine (University of North
Carolina) for 31 years. As a contributor to Understanding Magazine in
Edinburgh, he kept in touch with the Scottish literary scene. Richard Ball's
last book, Homage to the Confessions of St Augustine and Other Poems,
appeared in 2002. My review of this collection may be read at:
http://www.nhi.clara.net/bs0452.htm
A member of the Welsh Academy of Letters, Ball was also a World War II
veteran, and one of the Dunkirk survivors. He was wounded in action, a fact
that gave him some trouble as late as a couple of years ago. When young, he
was an excellent long jumper, which rendered him a silver trophy in one
case.
In 1943, Richard Ball married Dorothy Jean Donaldson; they lived together,
with several cats, at an old farmstead in North Wales. He always grew his
own vegetables, using an iron hoe that he had made himself. It was a tragedy
when their daughter died in 1965. Also his wife predeceased him, in 2001;
this was another terrible loss to him. A poetry collection of his called
Wife Sleeping, published in the same year, honours her memory.
A lover of nature, the countryside, and both tame and wild animals, Ball
wrote eloquently on these topics, as well as on other themes, such as time
and the past. He may be pigeonholed as a modernist, although he sometimes
preferred traditional forms like the villanelle. At an early stage of his
career, he befriended writers such as William Empson. Better known in the US
than in Britain, Ball lacked perhaps that ruthlessness which might have
helped him to achieve real fame.
He was a kind and cheerful person, even during his last difficult years,
when he was wheelchair-bound. He always remained mentally lucid, however.
Ball was moreover a deeply religious man to whom the company of St
Augustine's Confessions felt congenial.
Richard Ball's cats Bertha and Smoky survive him. I hope they have been well
provided for, perhaps by some neighbour.
Susanna Roxman
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