About the Book
This will be the first major collection of poems by Bernard Kops for more than 20 years. He is one of Britain's most celebrated writers, with seven previous volumes of poetry, 40 plays for stage and radio, nine novels, and two autobiographies, making him one of Britain's most prolific and versatile authors. Earlier this year, in recognition of his literary work, he had the rare honour of a Civil List pension being conferred on him by the Queen. Awarded for life, it puts him in the exalted company of poets such as Lord Byron and William Wordsworth. This collection contains many new poems and also his most celebrated poems from his exceptional and varied body of work, such as "Shalom Bomb", an unofficial anthem for the CND movement in the 1960's and his more recent "Whitechapel Library, Aldgate East" which, mourns the passing of the old library in the East End of London, where he grew up.
Events include: December 29 Limmud Festival, Warwick University; Feb 17 Housman's Bookshop, London; Feb 28 Jewish Book Week reading with George Szirtes and Michele Wandor, 11 am March Josephs Bookstore; April 1 Whitechapel Art Gallery (free admission) 20-50 expected; and, Aug 12 Lauderdale House (Thursday).
About the Author :
Bernard Kops was born in 1926. He was brought up in the East End. His seven previous volumes of poetry, include Barricades in West Hampstead and Grandchildren and Other Poems. Hia poetry has appeared in many anthologies, including Penguin's Children of Albion, Poetry of the Underground in Britain in 1969 and in Markings (No.23) in 2006 - a special 80th birthday tribute to him with contributions from many of Britain's leading poets and authors. He came to public prominence with his first play, The Hamlet of Stepney Green (1956),considered to be one of the keystones of the "New Wave" in British Drama, the first of more than 20 stage plays, which include Ezra, an evocation of the controversial life of Ezra Pound, The Dream of Peter Mann, Enter Solly Gold and Playing Sinatra. His Children's play, Dreams of Anne Frank, won the Time Out Award for best Fringe Play in 1992/3. His BBC Radio play Sailing with Homer won the Writer's Guild award in 1995. Among his nine novels, is Yes From No Man's Land, about the uncertainty of religious faith in a changing world His two autobiographies, The World is a Wedding (1973) and Shalom Bomb (2000)were widely acclaimed. Selected Bibliography Awake for Mourning (MacGibbon and Kee, 1958) Motorbike (New English Library, 1962 The World is a Wedding (MacGibbon & Kee, 1963) Yes from No-Man's Land (MacGibbon and Kee, 1965) The Dissent of Dominick Shapiro (MacGibbon and Kee, 1966) By the Waters of Whitechapel (Bodley Head, 1969) The Passionate Past of Gloria Gaye (Secker and Warburg, 1971) Settle Down Simon Katz (Secker and Warburg) Partners (Secker and Warburg, 1975) On Margate Sands (Secker and Warburg, 1978) Neither Your Honey nor Your Sting: An Offbeat History of the Jews (Robson, 1985) Plays One (Playing Sinatra, The Hamlet of Stepney Green, Ezra) (Oberon Books, 1999) Plays Two (Dreams of Anne Frank, Cafe Zeitgeist, Call in the Night) (Oberon Books, 2000) Plays Three (The Dream of Peter Mann, Enter Solly Gold, Who Shall I Be Tomorrow?) (Oberon Books, 2001) Shalom Bomb: The Autobiography of Bernard Kops (Oberon Books, 2000) Bernard Kops East End (Five Leaves Publications, 2006)
Review :
Kops evokes the real world - the world as we know and live and breathe it." Mike Leigh The poem, Shalom Bomb was powerful, ecstatic... incomparably imaginative, committed and aware writing.A" Michael Horovitz His poems about nuclear war, about the Holocaust (in which many of his family perished) and more recently about his love for his wife Erica and his immediate family will be remembered for their shapely form and their personal force. He is a worthy literary descendant of the First World War poet Isaac Rosenberg.A" Michael Kustow "As a poet, he ranks with the other great European poet/playwright,Federico Garcia Lorca: the same passion, directness and lyrical intensity. His poems about nuclear war, about the Holocaust (in which many of his family perished) and more recently about his love for his wife Erica and his immediate family, will be remembered for their shapely form and their personal force. He is a worthy literary descendant of the First World War poet Isaac Rosenberg." Michael Kustow "Bernard Kops is the great unsung poet of escape. Few writers, and even fewer dramatists have managed to explore so fully our inexhaustable capacity to escape that endless series of traps called life. But Kops's landscape is no rarefied existential metaphor where the characters pine for some abstract void that lies beyond oblivion. "True flavour. Fresh and affecting. The poetic force of the Stations of the Cross" Alan Ross, The Observer.
