204x126mm. Single sheet, one sided. Dated April 23rd 1954. On Egan’s illustrated writing paper, typed in red and black ink. Signed by Egan in black ink, with a postscript also in his hand. It reads: ‘Dear Mr. Mortlake, | This is to confirm our arrangement of | yesterday with regard to POLLEN and Baudelaire’s | FLEURS DU MAL. I will let you have all the in- | formation you want early next week. By the look | of things, I possess more of the BAUDELAIRE illus- | trations than I imagined and I believe I know |when I can lay my hands on the two-colour (black | and green) end piece. I will also see what relics I can find of | POLICEMAN OF THE LORD and THE SINK OF SOLITUDE. | All good wishes, | Yours sincerely | Beresford Egan. […] | Please tell Mrs Mortlake that I | am thinking to sample her coffee. | B. E.’. An insightful letter from Egan the artist to Mortlake the antiquarian. In it, Egan discusses some of his most known works, notably Baudelaire’s ‘Fleurs du Mal’ and specific illustrated work such as ‘Policeman of the Lord’ and ‘The Sink of Solitude’. He signs his striking signature, with additional manuscript notes. This is excellent content. Egan correspondence is scarce. Beresford Egan (1905–1984) was a British artist, illustrator, writer, and film director best known for his strikingly decadent and erotic graphic work of the 1920s and 1930s. Closely associated with the bohemian circles of interwar London, he collaborated with publisher Elkin Mathews and others on a series of avant-garde illustrated books whose stylised, often grotesque imagery blended Art Deco elegance with elements of the macabre. Egan also wrote and illustrated satirical and fantastical works of his own, and later moved into cinema, directing several low-budget British horror and exploitation films in the 1950s. His work remains a distinctive expression of interwar aestheticism and outsider modernism.