Alistair Noon's review of Gael Turnbull's Collected is now up on Litter. Turnbull is a good example of how a good, perhaps great, poet, can slip through the net. He's from the same mould as Roy Fisher and Charles Tomlinson; indeed, regarded by both as a mentor and trailblazer, but was less well-known than either during his lifetime. In fact, his work, until recently, was unknown outside samizdat circles, despite the 'accessibility' of much of it. I'm not sure why this is - maybe he was too various a writer to fit into a marketing or academic category. Maybe he confused people by living in more than one country, or offended them by taking an interest in American and French poetry. Whatever the reasons for Turnbull's lack of visibilty, his career certainly proves that writing very good poetry is no guarantee of recognition.

Some nice new work is about to appear on Litter: an intimate memoir of WS Graham by Geoffrey Godbert, and an extensive review of Gael Turnbull's Collected by Alistair Noon. There are some astute observations in Alistair's piece. I like this summary of British history:

"What for the Romans were the Tin Islands became the command centre of a maritime empire, has become Airstrip One, and may end up as a supply node for East Asia."

and I also like this comment:

"...there are simply more resources for a poet to draw on than previously. Under such circumstances, synthesis of influence is likely to be ongoing, and perhaps piecemeal, rather than reaching some notional endpoint at which the poet 'finds a voice'."

Why indeed should a poet "find a voice" - why not have many voices, or voices which sounds like other people's voices? I've always admired poets like Edwin Morgan who sometimes sound like other poets, or who have different styles for different types of poetry. It's possible to get hung up on the individualist notion of "voice".