Letters to the editor
Remembering Steve Bentheim
Doug Henerson, Victoria
Volume 28 Issue 4, 5 & 6 | Posted: June 30, 2014
Editor:
It was very touching to read your memories of Steve Bentheim. I first got to know Steve about twenty years ago; I met him at poetry readings and later got to know him when he worked at my publisher’s Ecstasis Editions. We sort of had a family in-law connection through his wife who was of Icelandic extraction, as was the publisher himself, Richard Olafson.
Editor:
It was very touching to read your memories of Steve Bentheim. I first got to know Steve about twenty years ago; I met him at poetry readings and later got to know him when he worked at my publisher’s Ecstasis Editions. We sort of had a family in-law connection through his wife who was of Icelandic extraction, as was the publisher himself, Richard Olafson.
As to family, we soon had much to chuckle over. Steve told me that through some relatives of his in Odessa, he had a connection to the British Royal Family! As soon as he told me he was related to Oliver Messel the great British artist and stage designer, I was delighted to inform him that Oliver’s sister was the mother of Anthony Armstrong-Jones who was formerly married to Princess Margaret, the Queen’s sister! Steve promptly wrote Lord Snowden (”Cousin Tony” we started calling him) and got a very gracious reply. I think they corresponded a few times.
I shall miss Steve. He was quirky and not a little vexing at times, but a true “Victoria character.”
Doug Henerson, Victoria