Sir – Ruth W. Cupp is to be commended for coming to the defence of Richard Burton’s involvement with Oxford and of Elizabeth Taylor’s. The 18-year-old Burton was directed as Angelo in an Oxford University Dramatic Society (OUDS) Measure for Measure by Nevill Coghill, when Burton was on an RAF six-month student cadetship at Exeter College .

The young Burton’s performance was greatly admired by, among others, John Gielgud and sealed a life-long friendship with Coghill, who in 1957 succeeded J.R.R. Tolkien as Oxford’s Merton Professor of English. Coghill recognised in Burton an actor of both sharp intellect and deep passion and the two had always hoped they would have an opportunity to work together again with OUDS. This opportunity came famously in January 1966, when Burton played Marlowe’s Doktor Faustus, directed by Coghill for OUDS, with Elizabeth Taylor in her stage debut as Helen of Troy. I was lucky enough to have attended one of the nine performances of that OUDS Doktor Faustus and still thrill at the memory of Burton’s rendering of: Was this the face that launch’d a thousand ships,/And burnt the topless towers of Illium?/Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss. And there she was, Helen to perfection. That significant box office takings from the stage production and then from the 1967 film, the last directed by Burton and Coghill, went to the Oxford Playhouse , for the creation of what is now called the Burton Taylor Studio , as well as to support the parent theatre, tells us all we need to know about Richard Burton’s commitment to Oxford.

Bruce Ross-Smith, Headington