Sir, – Reports of the death of poet Thomas Kinsella overlook the fact that his younger brother, John, died only a few weeks ago – a loss that has gone almost unreported and unmourned in these columns.
While Ireland has undoubtedly lost a major poet, it has lost an important duo: John Kinsella was not only Ireland’s pre-eminent composer since 1980 (described by the BBC as “the most significant Irish symphonist since Stanford”) but was noted for a brilliant setting of his brother’s “A Selected Life” (1973) commemorating Seán Ó Riada, premiered by the (then) RTÉ Symphony Orchestra in 1976. – Yours, etc,
RICHARD PINE,
Perithia,
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Corfu, Greece.