23 JULY 1983, Page 18

Margaret Kennedy

Sir: In her review of Violet Powell's The Constant Novelist: A Study of Margaret Kennedy (2 July), Joanna Richardson complains of overemphasis on the subject's defects. 'One sees the unmaternal mother, the social snob, the antisemite ...' Since such a catalogue does nothing at all to put matters straight, I feel compelled, as Margaret Kennedy's daughter, to point out that the verdict 'unmaternal' is based on her diary written to amuse one childless friend, and on letters to another. Those written to her own (partly semitic) husband of course tell a different story. And if she was a snob, then so was Jane Austen, neither more or less.

Julia Birley

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