Risking Peter Riley's wrath I will make a brief comment.
I think only `Epistles to Eva Hess' has ever impressed me out
of Donald Davie's work. For the rest of the time I find it hard
to believe he is a poet at all. But I have enjoyed his
critical books.
But to the meat: my view of Dylan Thomas is that he has a small
number of great poems and a masterpiece in `Under Milk Wood'.
A Swedish friend sent me a tape of him reading UMW shortly before
his death in New York and it is fabulous. He was a marvellous
performer. My view of his limited oeuvre seems to be a minority
view these days as more and more of his poems are becoming
fashionable. But not for me.
I should say that my mind is hyperactive at the moment and I am
nervously `high' hence making too many posts but I get my shot
of sedatives on Thursday and should be ok after that.
And as a postscript I have been wanting to mention Ian Patterson's
participation in the Radio 3 discussion on Auden and my agreement
with him that Auden's first ten years in America were fruitful
before the rot set in.
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