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Synopsis
Kenneth Allott was born in Glamorgan and educated in Newcastle and Oxford. Widely regarded as one of the most promising poets of the late Thirties, he published just two volumes in his lifetime, Poems (Hogarth Press, 1938) and The Ventriloquist’s Doll (The Cresset Press, 1942). A posthumous Collected Poems (Secker & Warburg, 1975) gathered his earlier publications with a selection of unpublished work, edited by Miriam Allott and Roy Fuller. In Michael Murphy’s new annotated edition of the Collected Poems all Allot’s previously published work is combined with eighteen new poems, some of which have only recently come to light, the whole collection is introduced and annotated by Murphy and now represents the most complete picture of one of the UK’s most compelling war time poets.
Allott held a position at Liverpool University from 1948 until the time of his death in 1973. Allott’s wife succeeded him as Chair in Modern English, and in 1978 established the Kenneth Allott Lecture in Poetry. This Collected Poems is published in 2008, the thirtieth anniversary of the Lecture and the year in which Liverpool is designated the European Capital of Culture.
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About the Authors
Kenneth Allott (1912-1973) was a leading poet of the Thirties generation, publishing two collections of poetry: Poems (1938) and The Ventriloquist's Doll (1943). He was also the editor of the highly influential Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse (1950, rev. 1962). His Collected Poems has been out of print for a number of years, and this updated and revised new edition includes a significant number of poems either previously unpublished or not reprinted.
Michael Murphy is the author of three collections of poetry, most recently Allottments (2008), and his poems are included in The New Irish Poets. He is the author of a number of critical studies, including Writing Liverpool?:?Essays and Interviews (edited with Deryn Rees-Jones, 2007) and Proust and America (2007). He teaches at Nottingham Trent University and lives in Liverpool. He died in 2009.
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Lament for a Cricket Eleven
For S. T.
Beyond the edge of the sepia
Rises the weak photographer
With the moist moustaches and the made-up tie.
He looked with his mechanical eye,
And the upshot was that they had to die.
Portrait of the Eleven nineteen-o-five
To show when these missing persons were last alive.
Two sit in Threadneedle Street like gnomes.
One is a careless schoolmaster
Busy with carved desks, honour and lines.
He is eaten by a wicked cancer.
They have detectives to watch their homes.
From the camera hood he looks at the faces
Like the spectral pose of the praying mantis.
Watch for the dicky-bird. But, O my dear,
That bird will not migrate this year.
Oh for a parasol, oh for a fan
To hide my weak chin from the little man.
One climbs mountains in a storm of fear,
Begs to be unroped and left alone.
One went mad by a tape-machine.
One laughed for a fortnight and went to sea.
Like a sun one follows the jeunesse doree.
With his hand on the bulb he looks at them.
The smiles on their faces are upside down.
‘I’ll turn my head and spoil the plate.’
‘Thank you, gentlemen.’ Too late. Too late.
One greyhead was beaten in a prison riot.
He needs injections to keep him quiet.
Another was a handsome clergyman,
But mortification has long set in.
One keeps six dogs in an unlit cellar.
The last is a randy bachelor.
The photographer in the norfolk jacket
Sits upstairs in his darkroom attic.
His hand is expert at scissors and pin.
The shadows lengthen, the days draw in,
And the mice come out round the iron stove.
‘What I am doing, I am doing for love.
When shall I burn this negative
And hang the receiver up on grief?’
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Collected Poems (Salt Modern Poets S.) [Paperback] [Jun 05, 2009] Allott, Kenneth and Murphy, Michael
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