Did you know, it’s 28 years to the day that the Financial Times killed one of Britain’s finest poets? They didn’t mean to. It’s just that Gavin Ewart was 79, and the day before they’d bought him a lunch that involved enough booze to fell an ox.
The menus were not printed until 2003, so we cannot be sure of the all-time record for the most expensive lunch. It may have been achieved when Spivey met the 79-year-old poet Gavin Ewart at the Café Royal in October 1995. The exact cost is lost somewhere in the bowels of the FT accounts department. But the bill was somewhat overshadowed by the aftermath.
The main item on the agenda was alcohol, not food. Ewart began with several negronis (gin, vermouth, Campari), which is not an amateur’s drink, and carried on from there. “We departed the Café Royal in a moderately straight line,” Spivey said in the article. He put Ewart on a bus home then lurched off himself. The following day he received a call from Mrs Ewart.
“There are two things you need to know,” she said. “The first is that Gavin came home yesterday happier than I have seen him in a long time. The second — and you are not to feel bad about this — is that he died this morning.”
That’s from an excellent Matthew Engel article on the occasion of the 18th birthday of ‘Lunch with the FT’, another highlight of which is Scottish cyclist David Millar in a week off from training.
Ewart trivia: Wikipedia says he died on 25 October, which — considering his Independent obituary was published on 24th — seems unlikely
One of his best known works is Office Friendships:
Eve is madly in love with Hugh
And Hugh is keen on Jim.
Charles is in love with very few
And few are in love with him.Myra sits typing notes of love
With romantic pianist’s fingers.
Dick turns his eyes to the heavens above
Where Fran’s divine perfume lingers.Nicky is rolling eyes and tits
And flaunting her wiggly walk.
Everybody is thrilled to bits
By Clive’s suggestive talk.Sex suppressed will go berserk
But it keeps us all alive
It’s a wonderful change from wives and work
And it ends at half past five.
…but my favourite (although having a 15-year-old cat makes it tricky to get through it intact) is probably this
A 14-year old convalescent cat in the winter
Gavin Ewart (1916–1995)
I want him to have another living summer
to lie in the sun and enjoy the douceur de vivre* —
because the sun, like golden rum in a rummer,
is what makes an idle cat un tout petit peu ivre **—I want him to lie stretched out, contented,
revelling in the heat, his fur all dry and warm,
an Old Age Pensioner, retired, resented
by no one, and happinesses in a beelike swarmto settle on him — postponed for another season
that last fated hateful journey to the vet
from which there is no return (and age the reason),
which must soon come — as I cannot forget.
*sweetness of life
**‘ivre’=drunk
