I had this exact experience - reading Briggflatts and thinking "reality is
broken: it cannot have been possible for something this good to have existed
without someone having forced me to read it *ages* ago".
Dominic
----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas Barbour" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, June 14, 2003 9:54 PM
Subject: Re: Basil Bunting Archive
> o for sure Ken, give Bunting another try. THE great poet of the 20th
> century in Britain, even if the brits refused to notice him (okay, first
> 2/3rds anyway, & along with David Jones) (I'm not mentioning Pound or
Eliot
> here because in certain ways they are both USAmerican, no matter what
Eliot
> tried to become [& yes I've opened a can of large worms here which i won't
> try to keep the lid on, but...). earlier this year, a grad stduent, young
> poet, who is working on a lot of more contemporary poetry, finally took my
> adviuce & read Briggflatts & was just totally knocked out by it --
couldn't
> believe how great a poem it was. the rest of his work is also pretty
damned
> fine. the other mainstream/major Brit poets of the time don't belong in
the
> same room. Better late than never, Donald Davie finally made the point in
> his Under Briggflatts.
>
> doug
>
> Douglas Barbour
> Department of English
> University of Alberta
> Edmonton Alberta Canada T6G 2E5
> (h) [780] 436 3320 (b) [780] 492 0521
> http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/dbhome.htm
>
> in the rooms you live in
> people's books line your shelves
>
> the traces of their lives
> their minds
>
> too
> bpNichol
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