Letters of Basil Bunting

An edition of the letters of the poet Basil Bunting (1900-1985). This is a long-awaited first selected edition of the letters of Basil Bunting, one of the major modernist poets of the twentieth century. It includes a large portion of Bunting's correspondence (around 200 letters) to recipients including Ezra Pound, T. S. Eliot, Harriet Monroe, William Carlos Williams, Louis Zukofsky, Ted Hughes, George Oppen, Allen Ginsberg, Donald Davie, and Tom Pickard. Following Bunting from his first encounters with major literary figures in London and Paris in the 1920s to his death in Northumberland in 1985, this selection showcases a narrative that is crucial to the history of modernism and modern poetry in English. Highlights include a long and detailed dialogue with Ezra Pound in the 1930s on political, economic, and literary subjects, a rich, ruminative exchange with the American poet Louis Zukoksfy lasting over four decades, and various accounts of the excitements and controversies of the Anglo-American poetry scene of the 60s and 70s. Whether Bunting is writing from New York at the height of the Depression, Iran in the aftermath of World War II, or the north of England during preparation of his masterpiece Briggflatts (1966), his prose is unfailingly sharp, eloquent, entertaining, and caustic. This edition contains detailed annotations of Bunting's letters, a critical introduction, glossary of names, and an editorial commentary.

Table of Contents:
Introduction Letters Late Spring (1920-1938) Midway (1939-1963) Revival (1964-1985) Glossary of Names

About the Author :
Alex Niven is Lecturer in English Literature at Newcastle University and his books include Folk Opposition (2011) and New Model Island (2019).

Review :
Bunting was an extraordinary letter writer... Niven has gathered an important collection... Nothing is wasted and he is always careful... The selection bears witness not only to modern poetry's principal issues from the point of view of a very acute and opinionated observer, but also takes us away from the arts bureaucrats and into that heroic world of small publishers and hard-pressed editors without which there would be no poetry in the first place. Letters of Basil Bunting is the essential record of everything that made the masterpiece of Briggflatts possible. What a pleasure to read these letters...In a variety of registers, from the high-minded to the demotic, the letters consider (literary material aside) travel, food, restaurants, waiters ("the true glory of Paris"), incarceration, elevators in New York, marriage and war Niven's editorship is tactful and unobtrusive. The letters are allowed to sing their own songs, whether plaintive, joyous, droll... The academic and poet Alex Niven - one of the UK's rather more interesting younger cultural critics - now adds to [Bunting's] history with a selected edition of Basil Bunting's letters...In both Bunting's letters and the poetry there are years of billowing nothing. But what is there is remarkable and certainly deserves to be added to the alt. Eng. Lit. canon... What is truly notable here is the correspondence with Ezra Pound - and later with fellow poet Louis Zukofsky. An exemplary collection and a gold-standard example of how to put together a volume of letters; the amount of work which has gone into what is a major work of scholarship (as well as being incredibly readable) is, frankly, epic... Bunting is a fascinating correspondent and Niven is to be applauded for bringing these letters to a wider audience. I stopped everything and read them all. The letters are even more fascinating than I imagined. An important contribution to Bunting's legacy but also sheds a fascinating light on all sorts of things, especially Pound. This well-judged selection of Bunting's fascinating letters takes us on a lively tour of twentieth-century poetry, conducting us from the high modernism of the 1920s and 1930s to the British Poetry Revival half a century later. In his comprehensive introduction and intelligent editing, Alex Niven proves himself the ideal guide to the career of one of our most important modern poets. Basil Bunting-poet, journalist, sailor, soldier, diplomat, spy-was for much of his life a "struggler in the desert" (Ezra Pound's phrase) on the margins of the English literary scene. This expansive and beautifully edited selection of Bunting's correspondence follows Bunting around the world, from Northumberland to London, Paris, Italy, the Canaries, Iran, the United States, and points between. The letters-cantankerous, thoughtful, exasperated, eloquent-are rich with literary, historical, and personal insights whose value goes far beyond their commentary on Bunting's own magnificent poetry.