Correspondence

Letters of Oliver Mayo including a copy of letter to George Fraser suggesting the Festschrift, 8 August 2003, copies of letters sent to contributors to the volume (invitations and instructions), and a copy of the foreword from Fifty Years of Human Genetics: A Festschrift and Liber Amicorum to Celebrate the Life and Work of George Robert Fraser by Mayo recounting the circumstances behind it.

2003-2007

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Mayo, in the introduction to the Festschrift, ‘The origin and purpose of this book’ (pp ix-xi) records,

‘This book has come about as a result of a dinner conversation among a small group of people who happened to be friends, colleagues and former students of George Fraser. All those present agreed that he met Dr Johnson’s description of Edmund Burke: ‘If a man were to go by chance at the same time with Burke under a shed, to shun a shower, he would say - “this is an extraordinary man”’. Furthermore, ‘Burke is an extraordinary man. His stream of mind is perpetual.’ (Boswell, 1791)

Thinking further about George, we also agreed that, though his work is well known and influential, he has had perhaps less personal recognition that one would ordinarily have expected. In consequence, it would be a fitting mark of respect and affection if we were able to organise a Festschrift for his 75th birthday, 3 March 2007. Accordingly, I wrote to him with our tentative suggestion, he responded enthusiastically, and we began work’.

Fraser records,

‘I am most grateful to Oliver and to his colleague, Carolyn Leach, for the very considerable time and effort which they devoted to editing the book. I served as their assistant; it was a most enjoyable interlude and was responsible for more than a thousand emails during the four years that it lasted between 2003 and 2007. A few specimen emails are to be found here under PP/GRF/A.6.

The interlude was also responsible for a very satisfying, albeit lamentably brief, post-retirement career as an international lecturer, invited by contributors to the Festschrift. Thus, I was invited to lecture in Rome in November 2005 by Angelo Serra (see PP/GRF/H.31), in Foz do Iguaçú, Brazil, in September 2006 by Francisco Salzano (see PP/GRF/H.32-33), in Montreal in October 2007 by Will Foulkes (see PP/GRF/H.35-37), and in Geneva in March 2008 by Stylianos Antonarakis (see PP/GRF/H.38).

In addition to my deep debt of gratitude to Oliver and to Carolyn, I am most thankful to all those who accepted their invitation to write a contribution to the Festschrift, in particular the four who invited me to lecture, thus permitting me to share their professional life for a short space of time. During a period of almost five years, contacts with these 65 friends, whether by email or, in a few cases, through personal encounters, dispelled to a substantial extent the profound sense of isolation which has pervaded my life since my retirement more than thirteen years ago'.