Naipaul, V. S. (Vidiadhar Surajprasad), 1932-2018

"I cannot write letters to you: they so quickly become obscene and mad and crazy like that long telephone call we had after your dinner party with your sister-in-law (Aileen, the excited inventor)..."

"There are times when I think that what we have so settled and deep that it will last for much longer than the three or four years you have in mind - I do want this to last, and I will not be the one to let you down..."

"They are asking a number of writers to do articles on their favourite pleasure. Well, of course, it immediately occurred to me that the purest pleasure I have known is trussing you up or turning you over or sitting against you with my head in that angle that your waist makes with your hips..."

"Of course I will buy you a Coca-Cola, especially if you ask in English. So many thoughts of you during these days; such longing for you at Stockholm (and the Swedes charged £13 for that call); and memoirs that I can scarcely bear, of your lip, your belly, the curve of your waist and hip when you lie on your side; your tongue tasting the dew-drops of semen you call forth; the bristle above the pussy that receives me so well..."

"A strange adventure in this my most miraculous year of you. Shall I tell you? Do you remember my telling you about the Scandinavian girl I met in Paris in 1951, saw for a fortnight, and never attempted to make love to, and regretted it and regretted it afterwards? Well, in Helskinki about 3 weeks ago, after an appearance at their great new bookshop (on six floors, like Selfridge's), a definitely middle-aged woman came up to me and said we had met..."

"... of course I will cherish the photograph, of which you seem eextraordinarily vain. I was especially happy to get your letter, with its simple and beautiful affirmation of love in your postscript, because for the fortnight before I had been grieving for you and half-fearing that you had forgotten me..."

"I often think: I'll write this afternoon, after the first few dear hours in the day when (in the morning) I can think very clearly and do my best writing. But then I am mentally so exhausted that I prefer not to write, because everything will only be mechanical. It is so good of you to say that you understand what I tried to say about the process of writing with me..."

""Ever since I delivered the article to the Sunday Times I have been planning to be with you; and as a result I have never been able to finish any of the letters I have begun to write you. I have more unfinished letters to you than you have received..."

Consists of correspondence from V.S. Naipaul to Margaret Murray Gooding, photographs, negatives, notes, clippings, ephemera, and correspondence between Naipaul and others.

"I was wretched on the aeroplane, more wretched than I have ever been when leaving you, carrying that picture of you walking on the top of the roof of the airport building. During the night I fell asleep in my (seat in the aeroplane) chair; then someone crossed over my legs and woke me up. Waking, I thought: But that was Margaret. She is with me after all..."