Oxford Poets S.
2 total works
This edition of Roy Fisher's poetry reproduces all the work collected in "Poems 1955-1980", with the addition of new work. Fisher is an established British poet and the author of "A Furnace". The subject matter of his poems is often concerned with England or "Englishness", but his experimental and formalist poetic techniques have strong affinities with European traditions.
Birmingham River is Roy Fisher's first book of poems since Poems 1955-1987 , published by OUP in 1988. Including a sequence of `Six Texts for a Film', which provided the basis for an Arts Council film made by Tom Pickard, the collection contains much varied work, and a warmer, more relaxed tone than previous collections. Beginning with the premise that `Birmingham's what I think with', the central group of poems describe `a slow petty river' - two, in fact, as they merged and sank out of sight beneath industrialized Birmingham. A contrasting group of poems commissioned for Ronald King's artist's book with puppets, Anansi Company , give continued evidence of Fisher's anarchic pleasure in identifying the absurd, the self-important, and the politically hypocritical - themes that recur throughout this original collection. This book is intended for readers of contemporary poetry.