Thank you, Martin, for posting that.

Stan was my beloved partner for 21 years. His obituary is in The Guardian newspaper this morning: www.guardian.co.uk.

Diana/Dido

Martin, I'm sure everyone here would wish to join you in sending our sympathy to Diana and her family at this sad time.

Vee, indeed, I want to be included. My thoughts and condolences to Diana, our (RP's) Dido.

Martin, I have referred to your Stan Barstow web site many times. For a site you dedicated, at the time, to a living writer's work, it must be poignant for you to have to add his death.

The "realism" of Mr Barstow's work and that of his cohort of postwar-generation writers remains a favorite of mine. I've always been much more interested in stories of the UK's "real" people than of all the goings-on of its aristocrats and the prettified lives some writers have exported to us non-British, leaving us with silly romanticized notions and impressions.

I would like to give my condolences.

Dido -

I had not made the connection between you and Stan...

I am so sorry for your loss.

Dido, I also had no inkling of your relationship with Stan, I had always thought of him simply in conjunction with Martin and his excellent website. My sincere sympathy and condolences. I am so very sorry for your loss.

Thank you, fellow readers.

Stan's funeral will take place on Tuesday, 9th August at 2.00pm at Margam crematorium, Port Talbot, Glamorgan, S.Wales. You're welcome to join us afterwards at The Crown and Sceptre, Cadoxton, Neath.

So sorry, Dido. We'll be with you in spirit.

Stan's obituary is in this morning's Daily Telegraph.

Here is a link that might be useful: He hoed his own row

Also a nice obituary in the Washington Post.

I'm off work tomorrow - I'll spend a couple of hours collecting these together, along with other tributes by bloggers, and put links for them onto the site.

Here is a link that might be useful: Obituary - Washington Post

I'm so sorry to hear this, Diana. I was also unaware of your relationship to Stan.

I read A Kind of Loving after coming here and reading Martin's praise, and I enjoyed it very much.

I am so, so sorry, Diana. I hope it is some comfort to you to know his work will continue to be enjoyed for many years to come. I wish we could all leap across the electronic abyss and be there with you.

Dido,

I am so sorry for your loss. I'm one of those who didn't realize the relationship you had with him. Like Siobhan, I wish I could leap across the electronic abyss and be there with you.

'Leap across the electronic abyss' is lovely, Siobhan, and I wish you all could, for the funeral at 2.00pm today. I'm bearing up better than I ever thought I could, taking each day as it comes. And I've quite a bit of radio dramatisation already commissioned by the BBC, which should concentrate my mind wonderully.

Thank you all so much for your sympathy and good wishes.

Dido/Diana

'His life was gentle, and the elements
So mix'd in him that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world, "This was a man!"

(Julius Caesar)

My thoughts are with you Diana, on this sad day, we won't see the likes of Stan's calibre again.

I live in Horbury and went to Ossett Grammar School, Stan certainly made this area very proud of him.

A life well lived.

My thoughts are with you and yours on such a sad day.

Dear Ossett,,

I'm so glad to hear from someone from Stan's birthplace (Horbury), home town and old school. You are so right to be proud of him. I, too, am proud - to have lived, loved and worked with him for twenty-one years

Diana.

Diana, I am so sorry for your great loss. You have my sincere condolescences. I am one who had not made the connection either....

Diana, I did not know either. I am so very sorry for your loss. This must be a profoundly difficult time for you.

Martin, thank you for bringing this to the notice of the forum.

With my sincere sympathy,
Paula/Rosefolly

Diana, my sympathy, as well.

Diana -

My sympathy goes out to you.

Stan Barstow sounds such a fine man. As both of you were writers, it must have made you even closer companions. I am sorry for you loss.

Judy (laura_g)

Thank you, all my friends, for your kind thoughts and wishes. Yes, Judy, both being writers did bring us closer together. We actually collaborated on a 4-part TV script; and I dramatised several of his novels for BBC radio (A Raging Calm, Joby, A Kind of Loving). I'm going to do more of them. Being writers, we each understood the process that the other was going through - 'Don't talk, I'm working in my head' was frequently heard, and neither of us would disturb the other. Result was, we spent our days separate and in companionable silence but came together for an early-evening drink in the pub, supper and a chat or catching up on TV. In recent years, when he got older, Stan used to spend afternoons listening to his beloved classical music, the other side of the house, while I was working.

Diana

Your short description of your life together has made me cry as it is so evocative and sensitive. I am not being sycophantic when I say we are fortunate to have you producing such wonderful programs for us and I am glad there will be more to look forward to. And though it is a cliche to say it, Mr. Barstow is truly still with us through his work and yours.

Diana,
I hadn't checked into RP for awhile and was so saddened to see this. I am very sorry for your loss.
Nicole