“I met Ted Hughes in London for the last time on Thursday, 17 September 1998. He had said on the phone that he would be at the Connaught Hotel in London at 3:00, and there he was, sitting on the left-hand corner of the lounge on the left of the lobby, facing the entrance, when I arrived a few minutes late. Ted looked haggard but undefeated and quite unspoilt but a huge celebrity of Tales from Ovid and Birthday Letters. He complained of a chronic resurgence of shingles in the aftermath of a serious illness affecting, indeed almost blinding, his right, dominant eye with severe irritation in the eyelid, and resulting in itching all over his scalp and circles on his forehead. I had not noticed the sores because he was sitting with his back to the window, from which the glare made his face at times almost invisible.” (

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Scientists studying people with HIV have long been interested in why a small but distinct group of HIV infected individuals are able to successfully keep the virus in check and substantially delay or prevent progression to AIDS. It has been known for some time that the white blood cells of people with long term non-progressive HIV produce an unknown chemical or chemicals that inhibit viral replication. Researchers at Rockefeller University in New York have now …