Song of Love: The Letters of Rupert Brooke and Noel Olivier

English poet Rupert Brooke (1887-1915), famed for his WW I sonnets, began writing love letters to Noel Oliver (1883-1969) in 1909, when she was 15, and they exchanged missives until his war-related death. Both traveled in Bloomsbury circles, and their correspondence is peppered with references to Virginia (Woolf), Lytton (Strachey) and other prominent figures of the age. Since Brooke's love for Oliver was unrequited, many of the letters deal with his depression, threats of suicide and a love affair with Katherine Cox, whom he rejected as ``unclean'' when she responded to his sexual advances. Oliver's responses show an emotional maturity beyond her years as she attempts to be kind to her suitor while extricating herself from his obsessive devotion. Edited by Oliver's granddaughter, the correspondence will be of interest to Bloomsbury followers and social historians. Photos. (Aug.)