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Thanks Andrew. It was very much a hand-drawn sketch map. I do recall, very vividly, a sense of things about to happen in British poetry at the end of the 60s/ the early 70s. If you look at Edward-Lucie Smith's 1970 anthology there's a lot of different, varied voices (it isn't perfect, no anthology is) so you have a lot of people like Tom Raworth, Barry MacSweeney, Tom Pickard, Lee Harwood, Paul Evans coming through (there were other relatively young writers of promise about too not included, like a certain Jeremy Prynne). At the same time some of the established voices seemed to taking risks: although I'm not a great fan of Hughes' Crow it certainly has a punch, Hill's Mercian Hymns appeared about 1972 and to me it looked like his +nest+ book might be something extraordinary. Instead there was the disappointment of 'Tenebrae' from 78, by which time we were about to become shadows! David Jones last great book 'The Sleeping Lord' came out in '74, although it was backward-looking the exuberance of its language and technique weren't. And then it all went phht, in a sense. I certainly lost interest largely in what was going on in current Brit poetry during the 80s: I only had to look at the stuff people like Anthony Thwaite praised in the reviews to feel no, not for me. There were things going on in Scotland: Alasdair Gray's great novels came into circulation and there were poets like Tom Leonard. But other than the resistance in Scotland, where Thatcher 'experimented' with the Poll-tax first, the sense of the literary scene in poetry that came across was very much a middle-class one, Seamus Heaney's 'responsible tristia' etc. and with their 'fine, literary despairs'. Of course people like Raworth were still writing but they weren't easy to come across, certainly not if you working six or seven days a week for no appreciable gain as one of the none-winners in Thatcher's new anti-Jerusalem. For me it was a time when a sense of not only individual but communal aspiration was negated. The Unions began their long decline. I got back into things from the early 90s on, and we are now, wherever that is! Best Dave Best 2008/6/5 andrew burke <[log in to unmask]>: > Nice encapsulation of recent Brit history, David - thank you. Yes, I like > Tom Raworth's work too - perhaps I'm 60s/70s myself. > > Andrew > > 2008/6/5 David Bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]>: > >> I like Tom Raworth's stuff, he's so late 60s, early 70s. Cool, man. >> The times went really out of joint thereafter though, pun intended, >> the psychologically primitive personae in Peter Reading are very much >> the new brutality of Thatcher's England, as Tom Paulin spotted. then >> with the 90s we get the New Consumer, like Armitage or Duffy, very >> jokey in a strangely humourless way. Nature poetry's back again here, >> environmentally, as in Alice Oswald. I have noticed though how much >> Larkin still gets about: I keep finding high-cultural-status pundits, >> like Ian MacEwan or Clive James, quoting him reverentially while >> pondering on law and society and the role of Islam in Britain etc. I >> guess that Larkin remains The Voice for the upper administrative types >> of a certain disposition. >> Lots of quarrelsome dissenters arguing among themselves to no avail of >> course (like me!) rather in the manner of a decades long meeting of >> the Socialist Workers Party that still hasn't fully absorbed the fact >> that it's no longer 1974 outside. >> Thinking back to 1970, does anyone know much about Paul Evans' poetry >> after then till his untimely death? I liked his early stuff a lot but >> have never seen the 3 or so books I think he produced thereafter. >> >> Best >> >> dave >> >> Best >> >> Dave >> >> 2008/6/4 Stephen Vincent <[log in to unmask]>: >> > Without looking up on my shelf, there is a Tom Raworth title, Tottering >> States. The defininition here of a Totter is so appropriate for Tom's >> technique of picking up all matter of refuse (and refusal) to build a >> 'tottering state". (Of course, the title is also a pun on the condition of >> 'states' (political and/or personal) in general, that they be 'tottering' - >> that be barelay balanced, and about to fall. >> > >> > "Tattle Tale" - I wonder with out going OED - if that is a story told >> by a Tot (a young kid) snitching on an older sibling?? (McClellan on Bush >> et al, as well?) >> > >> > Stephen V >> > http://stephenvincent.net/blog/ >> > >> > The = >> > For TOTTER n2, the OED simply has, "See TOT n5. >> > >> > TOT n5 >> > >> > [Origin unascertained: cf. TAT n.5, v.3] >> > >> > A dust-heap picker's name for a bone; whence by extension, anything >> > worth picking from a refuse-heap or elsewhere. Hence totter, a >> > rag-and-bone >> > collector; totting, dust-heap picking. >> > >> > 1873 Slang Dict. s.v., 'Tot' is a bone, but chiffoniers and >> > cinder-hunters >> > generally are called Tot-pickers nowadays. Totting also has its >> > votaries on >> > the banks of the Thames, where all kinds of flotsam and jetsam, from >> > coals >> > to carrion, are known as tots. 1880 Law Rep., 5 Q.B.D. 369 The contents >> > of >> > the dust-bins consisted chiefly of cinders and ashes and the sweepings >> > of >> > the houses, but they also contained a number of articles thrown into >> > them as >> > refuse by the occupiers of the houses, and known as 'tots'. 1891 Daily >> > News >> > 11 Mar. 3/3 Costermongers, wood-cutters, and 'totters', men who lounged >> > about areas in the hope of getting old bottles and things from >> > servants. >> > 1910 Lond. City Mission Mag. May 85/2 The Totters. Up betimes, these >> > queer >> > people set out by the dozen, with sack or barrow, in quest of rags and >> > bones, rubber, and bottles, scrap iron and cast-off clothing. Ibid., >> > When >> > all else fails, and one can stoop so low, a day's totting is bound to >> > yield >> > the cost of a night's lodging. >> > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> >> >> >> -- >> David Bircumshaw >> Website and A Chide's Alphabet >> http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/ >> The Animal Subsides http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/books/animal.html >> Leicester Poetry Society: http://www.poetryleicester.co.uk >> > > > > -- > Andrew > http://hispirits.blogspot.com/ > http://www.flickr.com/photos/aburke/ > -- David Bircumshaw Website and A Chide's Alphabet http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/ The Animal Subsides http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/books/animal.html Leicester Poetry Society: http://www.poetryleicester.co.uk