Articles – The Poetician

Two Books Concerning Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

In his handwritten book "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight A Translation" Michael Gibson has achieved what he thinks may be the ‘closest’ version yet of this fourteenth century masterpiece. Then, in a companion book that is also handwritten and is called "Truth, Dare, Kiss… Cheat!" he tells how he addressed aspects of the tale that had long baffled him, and of ‘falling into’ a surprising new ‘perspective’ on it.

Some News

In 2007 Simon Armitage published a translation of the fourteenth century poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. In 2018 he published a Revised Edition. In a “NOTE” on this new version he says: There are no radical changes, particularly in the tone and attitude of the translation and its emphasis on alliteration;

Wanted for Literary Deception

Gawain Matters

It is almost fifty years ago that I first gained some acquaintance with the wonderful 14th century poem called ‘Sir Gawain and the Green Knight’. Since that time I have grown to love and respect its wonderful wit and craftsmanship more deeply.

Why did the Chair of The Poetry Society cheat?

It was in 2004 that I took a more active interest in The Poetry Society of which I had been a member for some years. It had long seemed to me that most of the new pieces that were published as ‘poetry’ in the Society’s quarterly Newsletter and in its magazine Poetry Review were not truly poetry at all.

How mad was Ted Hughes?

I ask the question because I found the process of learning a poem of his for the purpose of recitation somewhat maddening. I am used to memorising poetry. the better to perform it; and sometimes I can master a poem in a day, but it took me months to memorise ‘The Hawk in the Rain’, the title poem of Ted Hughes’

Such “False and Unruly Stuff”

or "babble and balderdash"

Ruth Padel has been ‘Chair’ of The Poetry Society, and is an authoress of note. I present here an analysis of some of her recent writing about English poetry. *** Ms Padel published a book in 2002 called 52 WAYS OF LOOKING AT A POEM.

“Then There’s Rhythm”

(If you can keep your ancient Greek FEET)

In her book 52 WAYS OF LOOKING AT A POEM published by Chatto and Windus in 2002 Ms Ruth Padel chooses as her first poem a piece called ‘Mrs Noah: Taken After the Flood’ by Jo Shapcott. Here it is: I can’t sit still these days.

On English Poetry and Poems

Some Further Thoughts

I have a great interest in English poetry, as I am sure do many if not all members of The Queen’s English Society. I think that ‘the world of English poetry’, if it may be called that, is in considerable confusion in some respects.

How Lyrically Principled is Paterson, Poetical Prestidigitator?

Part 1: The ‘Feel’ of Nonsense?

Don Paterson’s essay in Poetry Review, Volume 97:2 is entitled The Lyric Principle
Part 1: The Sound of Sense and has this introduction:- These are the first two sections of an essay the concluding instalment of which will appear in the next issue of Poetry Review, 97:3.