My own accusation of Little Englandism was in reference to Conquest's introduction to the New Lines anthology. As he was half-American, and had, I assume, apart from excellent French, a good knowledge of Russian as well as Bulgarian, in most respects (though he hated the EU) that might also be a reductive and inaccurate description of him. Well it would need some qualification - like he made himself serviceable to Thatcher's anti-Europeanism and from his Stanford eyrie wanted a fortified UK-US partnership
   Strange how the poets of that and the slightly younger generation too were often far less parochial in their experience than are most of the British poets of my own and the following generation. Thwaite for instance taught for two years in Japan, and Enright in Japan, Egypt, Thailand and Singapore (where he got into trouble). I guess those were the halcyon days when the British Council thought poetry might be worth supporting/'exporting'...
  It may be my ignorance but, despite the notoriety it persists in having, I can't really see the Movement as a 'movement' at all. A few anti-modernist tenets assembled piece-meal by Amis and Conquest, with the blessing of Larkin, a reactive dislike of emotional exuberance etc. The association of poets such as Thom Gunn and, the even more unlikely Ted Hughes with their second New Lines, makes it a church so broad it's hardly a church at all, more like a vague atmosphere. I'm always perplexed as to why something that barely exists has been assigned such a persistent hegemony.
Jamie


> On 30 Jul 2016, at 18:31, Jamie McKendrick <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> 
> ....But as for the rest of the Movement, you seem to have missed the irony of my remarks about a revival. I thought I'd made clear in the preceding post my distaste for Conquest and Amis.
> Buone vacanze,
> Jamie
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad
> 
>> On 30 Jul 2016, at 17:22, GOODBY JOHN <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> But the Movement was never Thomas' problem (and Jamie's argument that we should
>> read them therefore is rather a red herring; life is too short for anyone to be
>> wading through Robert Conquest, DJ Enright and Anthony Thwaite). Thomas survived
>> them, easily enough...

>> John
>> 
>>> On 29 July 2016 at 20:48 Jamie McKendrick <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Perhaps this will herald a Movement revival, and people will start actually 
>>> reading them instead of just using them as a weapon against the mainstream, 
>>> or it might be the beginning of a Prynne & Amis partnership revival of US 
>>> interest in British poetry. Somehow neither seems over likely.
>>> Jamie
>>> 
>>> -----Original Message----- 
>>> From: Jeremy F Green
>>> Sent: Friday, July 29, 2016 6:27 PM
>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>> Subject: Re: a bit ofresearch
>>> 
>>> Weirdly, NYRB Books just published Amis’s _Collected Poems_ complete w/ 
>>> intro by Clive James.  A bit bewildering after other recent volumes in the 
>>> series - e.g. J.H.Prynne _The White Stones_.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>>> On Jul 29, 2016, at 12:25 PM, Jamie McKendrick <[log in to unmask]> 
>>>> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> Hi Jeremy,
>>>> The other 'fallacious assumption' I mentioned was that 'this grouping' 
>>>> (i.e. the supposed mainstream) disapproves of Thomas. The first - to my 
>>>> mind - fallacious assumption, and tedious to boot, is that the present 
>>>> mainstream is continuous with the aesthetics of the Movement.
>>>> I said in my first post that the Movement's animosity towards Thomas was 
>>>> well documented. I'm familiar with Conquest's little-englandish and prissy 
>>>> New Lines introduction - who, by the way, reads Conquest these days, or 
>>>> more than one or two humorous anthology pieces by Amis? - but I also noted 
>>>> Larkin's affection for him.
>>>> You're right though that since the late sixties/early seventies (?) 
>>>> Thomas has been more or less ignored by the academy, loved as he is 
>>>> outside of it. I think there's an element of literary snobbery about this, 
>>>> and alongside of that signs of readers repudiating their own youthful 
>>>> enthusiasms...
>>>> Jamie
>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> The Movement's reaction against the perceived emotionalism of his work 
>>>>>> has been documented, but the only reference I've found from admittedly 
>>>>>> early Larkin is one expressing delight and admiration. The tedious 
>>>>>> assumption, much repeated on this list, that the Movement's aesthetics 
>>>>>> flow seamlessly into what's called the contemporary 'mainstream' 
>>>>>> (including Northern Irish poetry) leads to another fallacious assumption 
>>>>>> that this grouping disapproves of Thomas.
>>>>>> Jamie
>>>>>