What were these peotry books and where could I buy them?
May 8, 2014 4:16 PM Subscribe
When I was a child, my uncle gave me four books which were anthologies of all sorts of poetry illustrated with collages, sketches, and other artworks. They were hardback books with a square format roughly 10" x 10". From the style of the illustrations I'd say they were published in the 70s.
My mum threw them away after she had a fight with my uncle - now that I've finally forgiven her for that, can you help me identify the books and buy them?
Here is what I remember about the books:
- I don't think they were aimed at children - some of the poems were pretty full-on about war and death and love and the illustrations were not childish.
- the poems ranged from medieval and Shakespeare through the Romantics and modern poetry.
- one of them had a burnt orange cover
- one of them had the Dylan Thomas poem "Fern Hill" in it, accompanied by a B&W photo of bracken.
- one of them had a Japanese poem in it that went "I may be silent / But I'm thinking / I may not speak / But don't mistake me for a wall"
- one of them had a poem in it which I think was called "ways to kill a man", the last line of which was something like "the most effective way to kill a man is to put him in the middle of the 20th century and leave him there".
I really loved thoe books and it would be great to at least identify them and hopefully pick up second hand copies somewhere.
Here is what I remember about the books:
- I don't think they were aimed at children - some of the poems were pretty full-on about war and death and love and the illustrations were not childish.
- the poems ranged from medieval and Shakespeare through the Romantics and modern poetry.
- one of them had a burnt orange cover
- one of them had the Dylan Thomas poem "Fern Hill" in it, accompanied by a B&W photo of bracken.
- one of them had a Japanese poem in it that went "I may be silent / But I'm thinking / I may not speak / But don't mistake me for a wall"
- one of them had a poem in it which I think was called "ways to kill a man", the last line of which was something like "the most effective way to kill a man is to put him in the middle of the 20th century and leave him there".
I really loved thoe books and it would be great to at least identify them and hopefully pick up second hand copies somewhere.
And your Japanese poem is "Silent, but…" by Shigeji Tsuboi.
posted by mumkin at 5:40 PM on May 8, 2014
posted by mumkin at 5:40 PM on May 8, 2014
I'm betting they're Summerfields' Voices anthologies - covers are here. If they are, they're out of print but you can get reasonably priced ones online. There are six in total. They were UK school anthologies and amazing. If you liked them, look for their prose companion, Stories.
posted by viggorlijah at 6:26 PM on May 8, 2014
posted by viggorlijah at 6:26 PM on May 8, 2014
Response by poster: Sorry viggorlijah, those look amazing but I don't think they are the ones I'm looking for. Mine were large square hardback books, and they had more illustrations and collages than photographs. None of the covers had photos on them.
posted by girlgenius at 6:32 PM on May 8, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by girlgenius at 6:32 PM on May 8, 2014 [1 favorite]
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posted by MonkeyToes at 5:38 PM on May 8, 2014