Basil Bunting’s Birthday

March 1, 2018Simon Pettet

[“Basil Bunting and Allen Ginsberg in Tom and Connie Pickard’s flat, Jesmond, Newcastle upon Tyne, 22 May, 1965.]

Today is Basil Bunting‘s birthday.

We feature a guest posting today from poet and Bunting editor and scholar, Don Share

On Thursday, March 1, 1900, Basil Bunting was born in Scotswood-on-Tyne in the north of England. Bunting’s life extended through a large part of the twentieth century, beginning just as Queen Victoria’s long reign was nearing its end, and ending in 1985, the year the first mobile phone network in the UK was established and the internet Domain Name System was … Read More

Ginsberg-Taylor-Orlovsky-Pickard 1979 Warwick continued

January 21, 2017Simon Pettet

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[Allen Ginsberg and Steven Taylor, 1979]

Allen Ginsberg, Steven Taylor, Peter Orlovsky and Tom Pickard reading at Warwick University, November,  1979  continues from here

AG: Steven Taylor, please favor us with a song (Steven Taylor being a poet as well as being a musician)

ST: I’m going to sing a song that I wrote after first reading the poetry of Anna Akhmatova, the Russian woman poet who was banned by (Joseph) Stalin’s government in 1929 and was not published after that time. She identified with the wife of Lot in the Bible, who was turned … Read More

Warwick 1979 (Ginsberg-Orlovsky-Taylor-Pickard)

January 14, 2017Simon Pettet

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[Steven Taylor, Allen Ginsberg & Peter Orlovsky. Photo: Saul Shapiro]

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[Tom Pickard]

Last week, we featured a 1979 reading (November 6 1979) by Allen Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky (and Steven Taylor) in Warwick, England. This week a further concert from that same visit (this time at the University and featuring the active participation of the English poet Tom Pickard)

Audio for this occasion may be accessed here

Student/Organizer: We welcome to Warwick, Allen Ginsberg, Steven Taylor, Peter Orlovsky and Tom Pickard

AG: We’ll begin with music from a book called Mind Breaths, Poems 1972-1977, by myself, Allen … Read More

March 1 Birthdays – Lucien Carr & Basil Bunting

March 1, 2014admin

Basil Bunting

[Basil Bunting (1900-1985)]

[Lucien Carr (1925-2005)]

Two strangely contrasting birthdays, celebrated today (strangely contrasting? – or maybe not). We’ll draw your attention to fairly comprehensive initial postings on each of our two subjects of study – Basil Bunting – here  and Lucien Carr – here First, the latter. Due to the success of Kill Your Darlings, (out in America on DVD later this month), from a quiet unassuming back-seat, Lucien, (at least in the Dane DeHaan version), has been catapaulted to, clearly unwanted and unsought for, global notoriety, slandered (the movies can do this, even if it is just … Read More