“Introspection, I hate it,” was the watchword of Ethel Kennedy, the widow of Robert F.  Kennedy, who spent her life looking forward and died last week.

She was 96 and suffered a stroke in her sleep, dying on 10 October. Born in Chicago to a self-made coal and coke trader, Ethel Skakel’s family was as star-crossed and ill-fated as the Kennedys. Her parents died in a plane crash when she was in her twenties. Ten years later she lost her brother George in another plane crash.

After moving East, she was educated at the Convent of the Sacred Heart in New York and later at Manhattanville College, where she became friends with one of the Kennedy girls.  Introduced to the family, she first developed a crush on John F. Kennedy, also known as Jack and JFK, but when he evinced no interest in her she turned to his brother, the more seriously religious Bobby.