Beethoven's parentage
Sir: I was sorry to see that in his 'Spectator's Notebook' (November 9) Rupert Croft-Cooke was ready to circulate once again an old canard about Beethoven's parents even if he chose to share the blame with Maurice Baring and a Catholic doctor "who knew the facts of the birth he was quoting."
I suppose it is too much to expect that Beethoven's perinatal circumstances will cease to be the object of fantasy so long as they provide good debatingpoints for those not over-concerned with the truth. Meanwhile, since we seem to be dealing with sources of information unknown to the rest of Beethoven scholarship, I should like to ask: what evidence is there that Beethoven's father had congenital syphilis? What evidence is there that Beethoven's mother had congenital syphilis? What evidence is there that their first son who lived for only six days was born blind?
Alan Tyson All Souls College, Oxford
Public lending right . Sir: Jon Elliott's grounds for calling public lending right 'wrong' (NoVerriber 9)are an invention. He says there will be a 'levy' on local authorities, who as a result "may well find themselves drastically curtailing their book funds." le fact tr iht er se wwi till pabye pnpothilnegvyt.owLoarcdasi PLR. Book funds will not be affected, Mr Elliott writes indignantly about 3 hypothetical author who -pushes free copies" of his books -to the public libraries" and then draws PLR. In fact. PLR by the loans sample method Will pay authors only in return for anY service their books may do the public at cthheoopsuesblitco's bcohror oi cwe tUb nu less n o t itoh ne a ipt fbr el ec copy', its author will get nothing.
According to Mr Elliott, -everY
rational bookman will tell you" that it "a load of tissue" to argue that extensive book-borrowing reduces book: buying and thus reduces authors incomes from sales. In fact, ever"' instructed bookrnan will tell you the figures that demonstrate the point. Book-borrowing is more extensive in Britain than anywhere else in the western world. The USA borrows public-library books at a rate of lost under two a year for each citizen. Borrowings from British public libraries are at a rate of nine a year per citizen. The results on book-buying of .ttle British habit of intensive book-borrow' ing are clear from this comparison: in the USA, the public buys roughly one book for each book it borrows; in Britain the public buys only one book for each nine-and-a-half books it borrows.
theWhfaa et tas pity b before oMr reElliott writing El I i o ttti odidn'tg a o find out seeking to deprive authors in Britaaritn payment for the service the pub"c chooses to take from them.
B Maureen .011flYa ri3glid18B5roopILY
Writers Action Group, Brompton Road, London SW5
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