Heart on the Left: Poems 1953-1984

Adrian Mitchell's poetry’s simplicity, clarity, passion and humour show his allegiance to a vital, popular tradition embracing William Blake as well as the ballads and the blues. His most nakedly political poems – about war, Vietnam, prisons and racism – became part of the folklore of the Left, sung and recited at demonstrations and mass rallies. His childlike questioning was a constant reminder from the 60s onwards that poetry is first and foremost an assertion of the human spirit. A pacifist prophet who remained true to his heartfelt beliefs, Mitchell reported back for over half a century from a world blighted by war, compromise, double-talk and pragmatism without losing his innocence, integrity and impish sense of humour. Angela Carter described him as a ‘joyous, acrid and demotic tumbling lyricist Pied Piper determinedly singing us away from catastrophe’. Now out of print, all the poems in Heart on the Left are included in Mitchell's posthumous retrospective, Come On Everybody: Poems 1953-2008.

About the Author :
Adrian Mitchell (1932-2008) was a prolific poet, playwright and children's writer. His poetry's simplicity, clarity, passion and humour show his allegiance to a vital, popular tradition embracing William Blake as well as the Border Ballads and the blues. His most nakedly political poems - about nuclear war, Vietnam, prisons and racism - became part of the folklore of the Left, sung and recited at demonstrations and mass rallies. After Allison & Busby stopped publishing poetry, he brought his work to Bloodaxe. Adrian Mitchell's Greatest Hits: His 40 Golden Greats (1991) was followed by Heart on the Left: Poems 1953-1984 (1997), Blue Coffee: Poems 1985-1996 (1996), All Shook Up: Poems 1997-2000 (2000), The Shadow Knows: Poems 2000-2004 (2004) and the posthumous Tell Me Lies: Poems 2005-2008 (2009), and then by his retrospective Come On Everybody: Poems 1953-2008 (2012). His collected poems for children, Umpteen Poems (Orchard Books), and Shapeshifters, his versions of Ovid's Metamorphoses, illustrated by Alan Lee (Frances Lincoln), were both published in 2009. Born in London in 1932, Adrian Mitchell worked as a journalist from 1955 to 1966, when he became a full-time writer. He gave many hundreds of readings throughout the world in theatres, colleges, pubs, prisons, streets, public transport, cellars, clubs and schools of all kinds. Many of his plays and stage adaptations were performed at the National Theatre as well as by the Royal Shakespeare Company and other theatre companies. In 2002, the socialist magazine Red Pepper dubbed him Shadow Poet Laureate and asked him to write regular republican poems for their columns. In a National Poetry Day poll in 2005, his poem 'Human Beings' was voted the poem that most people would like to see launched into space.

Review :
'He has the innocence of his own experience…real inner freedom and the courage of his own music. Among all the voices of the Court, a voice as welcome as Lear's fool…Humour that can stick deep and stay funny' - Ted Hughes. 'Nobody else writes like him. And it is becoming more and more evident that his achievement endures…Nobody has ever departed with such language for such a destination' - John Berger. 'Explosive energy, well-directed rage, undimmed idealism, a tremendous sense of how poetry can speak directly, and an innocence which is believable because it is wise' - Andrew Motion. 'This is Adrian Mitchell, the British Mayakovsky' - Kenneth Tynan.