The Craft of Poetry by Lucy Newlyn
Reviewed by Rob Spence Lucy Newlyn is a intriguing literary figure. She had a career as an Oxford don, publishing well-regarded studies of Romantic poets as well as collections of…
A Little History of Poetry by John Carey
Review by Rob Spence In 1935, the doyen of art critics, Ernst Gombrich, was a young, unemployed former student with a PhD in art history. He was commissioned by an…
Somewhere Becoming Rain: Collected Writings on Philip Larkin by Clive James
Review by Karen Langley My love of the poetry of Philip Larkin is no secret; I’ve written about him numerous times on my own blog, and most recently my encounter…
So Brightly at the Last by Ian Shircore
Review by Rob Spence In one important respect, this book was outdated at the moment it was published: its subject, Clive James, having endured a terminal illness for ten years,…
David Jones: Engraver, Soldier, Painter, Poet by Thomas Dilworth
Review by Rob Spence Ask a reasonably well-educated person to name some Anglophone modernist poets, and you are sure to hear the names of T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound. Mention…