Also part of this section of the sale was a lot offering 12pp of autograph and typescript drafts by Seamus Heaney. These were verses on the subject of the exhumed body of a young girl buried in ancient times that would eventually be consolidated into the 14-line poem 'Strange Fruit' in the award winning volume, North of 1975. The lot sold at £8500 to a New York dealer.
Parrot and poet support the Arvon Foundation
The Parrot Pen-man, an ink and watercolour drawing by Quentin Blake that sold for £1200, was among 40 lots offered at Sotheby’s on July 8 on behalf of the Arvon Foundation, a literary charity that provides residential creative writing courses.