Whilst imagining your heart-wrenching grief emanating from these very memories, something unexpected happened: You helped me to understand my wife’s inconsolable sorrow over the lack of hers relating to her late father. I know it won’t do much, but I thought of sharing the circumstances, in hope that it may give you strength and encouragement as you pay tribute to a life-long friendship.

Born May 1959 amidst her father’s battle against Tito’s communist tyranny, my wife’s formative 12 were spent immersed into the sights and sounds of political and intellectual frontlines. Not her choice. Eventually constant harassment, the least of which incessant telephone tapping, and the complete absence of any civil rights, wore him down and the family of three were set to leave for London, to self-imposed exile. Only, with his passport confiscated at the airport, they decided to torment him some more.

Imagine the emotional turmoil: Uncertain whether or not he will be allowed to join, mother and daughter were facing a foreign city, its people and, for the 12-year old, a completely unknown language, alone. Over one year.

How my wife came top of her class at the end of that fateful year, never fails to inspire awe in me. But it came at a price.

Harrods’ and Harvey Nichols’ glamor proved a all too ready catalyst. No stopping this Eastern European beauty, armed with plenty of family chutzpah; all the way to haute couture runways in Milan, Paris, New York, LA. And of course Studio 54. Then, in 1992, her father died.

He left a legacy of literary might, celebrated to this day. A year later we met and after true Pride’n Prejudice toing and froing, a glorious wedding marked the beginning of 15 years ‘Shopping-Girl’ (me included). Until now.

Consequences forced us back to her roots, right into the very house where she was born. If ever there was a STC ‘All-Is-Lost’ moment, complete with ‘Dark-Night-of-the-Soul’ ahead…

And then there is this love and heartfelt welcome pouring forth. The unconditional embrace from family and friends, cracking and finally braking down a mighty fortress of unresolved emotions; the kind it takes 38 years to cement; the kind erected only on a solid foundation laid by a confused and hurt little girl. Not one of her father’s 24 fiction and 23 non-fiction books did she ever read; not one of his 21 theater plays did she ever see.

Throughout the 90ies champagne fizzed and flowed in London’s Annabel’s, whilst family and friends either relived or in complete astonishment experienced anew economic hardship not felt since 1945.

It mattered to him what people thought of his work. Of course it did. But family was everything, especially cherishing the opinion from two out of the three most important women in his life, his mother and wife. Yet never a cross word. Instead, his encouragement was a constant: “Your best, is always good enough for me,” always filled my wife with confidence.

She always adored him, her gentle, soft-spoken, towering-tall father, her Hero. But she missed him.

What must he have felt. How sad he must have been. Never will she share her belated, yet immediate and deep appreciation of his work. Never will he feel the blissful joy when talent is passed on. Did he ever know how alike she is? Unbearable thoughts. What a tragic loss.

Thank you again for sharing with us your cherished, wonderfully rich and outrageously colorful memories, too many to list, but all ever-present, ever-enriching, yet to generate so many more reminiscing smiles.

Like so many, I only knew Blake from the books and a few e-mail exchanges.

He told me that I made his day when I wrote to him, raving about STC.

Anyone who has read STC knows how much he disliked “Memento” and, unfortunately, nobody will ever get to hear about how much more he disliked it after I shared some of my criticism of it, pointing out faults that even he missed.

HE will be missed.