Melancholy occurrence
Published on 18. May 2018
Book
Paperback/Softback
160 pages
978-1-84861-581-6 (ISBN)
Description
John Seed has pioneered a form of documentary poem using found texts - developing the model of Charles Reznikoff, and likewise concentrating on historical events. Previous volumes for Shearsman Books have included two volumes based on the reportage of Mayhew, and another based on the London Blitz. Here he uses reports of tragic deaths from nineteenth-century newspapers: melancholy occurrences, indeed.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Exeter
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 9 mm
Weight
240 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-84861-581-6 (9781848615816)
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Schweitzer Classification
Person
John Seed was born in 1950 and brought up in the North-East of England. He discovered a copy of Basil Bunting's Briggflatts in Ultima Thule bookshop in Newcastle-upon-Tyne one Saturday morning in 1968. It cost 10 shillings and sixpence. From this starting place he bought and read volume after volume of the Objectivists and the Black Mountain poets, one by one. And then Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams. He sat in the dark corners of many Morden Tower poetry readings and subsequently met Ric Caddel, who first encouraged and published his work. He also corresponded with Charles Reznikoff and met George Oppen on a couple of occasions.
A friend, a postgraduate student at Keele University, said he had a lecturer who talked about some of the same obscure American poets. And during the miner's strike of 1972, in a cold candle-lit pub in Newcastle-under-Lyne (or was it Hanley?), he met Andrew Crozier who pointed him to the work of some contemporary poets, especially those associated with Ferry Press and Grosseteste Review. He also found Nick Kimberley's poetry bookshop in Compendium Books in Camden Town - the best poetry library around at that time but expensive to visit.
He lived and worked in Yorkshire from 1972 to 1983 studying and working at the Universities of Hull and Leeds. He also played dominoes and drank many pints of Tetley's bitter with John Riley - with whom he disagreed radically on almost everything.
In 1983 he moved to London and taught History at Roehampton University until his retirement. Here for several years he was lucky enough to have Allen Fisher as a colleague. He was also lucky enough to find, in the mid-80s, moving through the shabby upstairs rooms of various West End London pubs, the Subvoicive readings - and to be part of a discussion group which met for several years at the Tooting house of Robert Sheppard and Patricia Farrell.
A friend, a postgraduate student at Keele University, said he had a lecturer who talked about some of the same obscure American poets. And during the miner's strike of 1972, in a cold candle-lit pub in Newcastle-under-Lyne (or was it Hanley?), he met Andrew Crozier who pointed him to the work of some contemporary poets, especially those associated with Ferry Press and Grosseteste Review. He also found Nick Kimberley's poetry bookshop in Compendium Books in Camden Town - the best poetry library around at that time but expensive to visit.
He lived and worked in Yorkshire from 1972 to 1983 studying and working at the Universities of Hull and Leeds. He also played dominoes and drank many pints of Tetley's bitter with John Riley - with whom he disagreed radically on almost everything.
In 1983 he moved to London and taught History at Roehampton University until his retirement. Here for several years he was lucky enough to have Allen Fisher as a colleague. He was also lucky enough to find, in the mid-80s, moving through the shabby upstairs rooms of various West End London pubs, the Subvoicive readings - and to be part of a discussion group which met for several years at the Tooting house of Robert Sheppard and Patricia Farrell.