Burra Alphabet

ABC of the Theatre
Humbert Wolfe
Illustrated by Edward Burra
The Cresset Press, London, 1930

Surreal Thing

Poems 1937-1942
David Gascoyne
Poetry London, 1943
Illustrated by Graham Sutherland

Smells Like Brahman Spirit

Nirvana
Vijay Raghav Rao
Mumbai (Bombay), India, 1977

Forget about the eponymous noisome Seattle longhairs and put away the Fender Jaguar, we're talking ragas not grunge. Pandit Vijay Raghav Rao (1925-2011) was a revered Indian composer and master of the bamboo flute, and like his friend and collaborator Ravi Shankar he spent much of his career touring and in America. 

Rao also wrote fiction and recently I was lucky enough to pick up one of his poetry books in my local charity shop. The cover design and illustrations are by the artist Badri Narayan, who also illustrated editions of the Ramayana and Mahabharata.

There is a sense of space and time in this music, words and images that gently shifts one onto a different plane of thought.

Words within Worlds Pt.2

In his brief introduction to the poetry anthology Worlds, editor Geoffrey Summerfield describes the images that accompany the text as follows:

"The photographs aim either to show the poets in their various worlds or to offer representations of local facts, particular places, particular people which at some time or other have provided these poets with pleasure or significant memory.

They are not 'illustrations', but a reminder that poems, like poets, come out of the world we know, and that that is where they belong".

Fay Godwin's photographs capture something of the two sides of West Yorkshire that Hughes describes: the "slightly unpleasant" world of man, where "nothing ever quite escapes into happiness", and the "exultant" mood of the Moors.

Semina

Semina
Wallace Berman (ed.)
Originally 1955-1964.
This anthology published by Boo-Hooray, NYC, 2013

Wallace Berman, beat artist and one of the originators of assemblage art, published Semina as a limited edition art and poetry periodical between 1955 and 1964, containing the work of Berman and friends such as William S. Burroughs, Alexander Trocchi, Michael McClure, Charles Bukowski and Jean Cocteau.

Obviously original editions are rare, collectable and very expensive, so this anthology (produced to coincide with an exhibition last year) is a welcome publication.

Words Within Worlds Pt.1

Worlds
Geoffrey Summerfield (ed.)
Penguin Education
Harmondsworth, Middx. 1974

This is a great photopoetry book, combining seven poets with specially commissioned photography. I'm going to post a few of these sets in due course, beginning with Cornish poet Charles Causley (1917-2003) and photographer Fay Godwin (1931-2005).

"Just giving the cat a quick polish"

The Focus Group sample recordings of Causley poems to great affect on several tracks: 'Keats at Teignmouth - Spring 1818' on Salty Sun Tales, from the album Hey Let Loose Your Love (Ghostbox Records, 2005), and 'I Am The Great Sun' on You Do Not See Me, from the album We Are All Pan's People (Ghostbox Records, 2007).

A Nice Wee Present from Scotland

A Nice Wee Present from Scotland is a very small collection of poetry, the title of which could also apply to its author, a Glaswegian who spent most of his life in England.

I used to live in North London not far from Ivor, who lived in a slightly nicer area up the hill near Hamstead Heath, while I was living in a grotty flat above an even grottier Irish pub (police tape and puke were regular greetings at our front door). I used to see him around from time to time, always distinguished by eccentric hat and badges. He might say a few words and hand out some stickers. He always wore earplugs because he couldn't stand the traffic noise.

I only saw him perform live once, in April 1989 at the Hackney Empire, the same month as John Martyn and Michelle Shocked played there. I was just about to take my A level exams, listening to the John Peel show and had heard a couple of Cutler sessions. As my friend's big brother drove us across London, we were unsure about the performance. Would it be poetry or music? Could one shout out requests for poems?

Ivor simply did his thing and was great. The flyer (A5 size) in the photo remained on my bedroom wall for some time afterwards until it was scooped into a folder during a house move, where it remained forgotten for many years until I rediscovered it this spring. It is now in a cheap frame and receiving slightly more attention.

I now live in Scotland. I don't think I could ever be described as A Nice Wee Present from England, but one tries...

This Was Tomorrow

Chris Stephens and Katherine Stout (eds.), Art and the 60s - This Was Tomorrow, Tate, London, 2004.

Yes, you've noticed there's a barcode sticker obscuring part of the book cover. I bring home a lot of books from my univeristy library, where the cataloguing staff appear to be aesthetic vandals who take perverse pleasure in positioning stickers on book jackets so as to ruin their design wherever possible. I like good design and often judge a book by its cover, so this irritates me but it's not going to get in the way of this blog. No, sir.

Art & The 60s was a survey show at the Tate Britain gallery, looking at mostly London based artists from that revolutionary decade.

Allen Ginsberg at the Royal Albert Hall Poetry reeading (1965)

David Hockney, The Third Love Painting (1960)

Trellick Tower, Ladbroke Grove, Ernő Goldfinger (architect), 1968

Joe Tilson, Vox Box (1963)

Beyond the Fringe - Bennett, Cook, Miller, Moore (photo Lewis Morley) 1961

Up against it - Joe Orton (photo Lewis Morley) 1965

 

Alexandra Road Estate, Camden. Neave Brown (architect)

Peter Phillips, The Entertainment Machine (1961)

I like a bit of Pop Art but a personal highlight was a small essay on artist William Green, a figure who rose to notoriety in the late 1950s and by the end of the 60s had all but disappeared.

William Green and infamous bicycle

William Green, Untitled (1958)