Introduction

Thomas Wilberforce Arnold Trowell, the twin brother of Garnet Trowell, was born in Wellington, New Zealand, into a thriving immigrant population. He was an eminent and successful musician in the United Kingdom from 1907 until his death in 1966. Notwithstanding a large number of pedagogical compositions that are still played by young cellists, he has virtually been forgotten since. However, some of his chamber works, notably those written during World War One and including the Piano Quintet Opus 45, are worthy of revival.

KM – who fictionalised her relationship with ‘Tom’ in her unfinished novel Juliet – probably met her idol between April and September 1900 in Wellington, at which time she began cello lessons (or continued piano lessons) at the home of her classmate Esme Dean. As the older and more advanced musician, Tom was largely oblivious to the schoolgirl crush that KM had on him and, as eldest child-designate, studiously worked towards a music career, only really establishing a friendship with KM once they were abroad.

Assisted by mother Kate and sister Dolly Trowell – who visited the brothers in Germany early in May 1904 – and possibly with KM as their guest, the family travelled from Germany to Brussels. KM recalled events years later: ‘There is a little child opposite me in a red cloak sleeping; she shakes her hair just as Dolly did when she was a girl in Brussels so many years ago.’ During this sojourn KM’s songs Love’s Entreaty and Night – a copy of which is inscribed ‘To Tom from Kathleen’, dated 13 August 1904, and survives today – were published in Germany.

KM’s diary entry for New Year’s Eve, 1904 (see CW4, pp. 13–14), which might be addressed to Tom, possibly demonstrates an ongoing friendship sustained by intense but infrequent meetings abroad. Whereas the construction of the letter is conventional, the stream-of-consciousness ramble of the next surviving draft letter, dated 11 August 1907, suggests the influence of Oscar Wilde. Another letter to Tom, written late in January 1908, acts to vent the frustration of the moment for KM (When can I go to England?). Despite, or because of, the German text, the tone of the letter – which was probably both sent and received – seems genuine.