The entry about Gregory (Nobody at Home, 8 October 2008) set me thinking about a dead person’s continuing presence in the land of the living. Here, memories are not enough. You want tangible proof of what once was and maybe still exists. Then I remembered the books we shared, which were often intended not as works of literature but as bearers of inscriptions. Greg favoured pulp gems like this autobiography of Diana Dors, Britain’s answer to Marilyn Monroe, which he gave to me when he already knew he was dying. Inside, in Dutch, he wrote, “I love you”: a simple way of ensuring that I would never forget.
Photo: Annie