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Visit www.penguin.co.uk
or www.fsgbooks.com
for more information or to order.
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William Blake -- Selected Poems
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James Fenton has edited a new
edition of William Blake's poems for Faber and Faber. To purchase
the collection, please visit the publisher's website at www.faber.co.uk.
It is also available from Amazon.co.uk.
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Ian McEwan on James Fenton
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"There is a strong case to be made that James Fenton is the
finest poet writing in English. His technical virtuosity is beyond
doubt; his long experience as war correspondent, journalist and
traveller has given him an unmatched range of subject matter -
war and revolution, the dementia of collective passions, reflections
on fate, and love - he has written some of the most beautiful
love poems of our times. He is a poet of great emotional depth
and wisdom. Increasingly, his work has a strong connection with
song. He also has a taste for light verse of exquisite charm and
humour. He is a modern master."
-- Ian McEwan, responding to a question from the National
Book Critics Circle
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James Fenton was born in Lincoln in 1949 and educated at Magdalen College,
Oxford where he won the Newdigate Prize for poetry. He has worked as political
journalist, drama critic, book reviewer, war correspondent, foreign correspondent
and columnist. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and was
Oxford Professor of Poetry for the period 1994-99. In 2007, Fenton was
awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry.
Fenton's Selected
Poems is published by Penguin
and Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
He is also the editor of The New
Faber Book of Love Poems and D.
H. Lawrence's Selected Poems (Penguin).
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James Fenton: View from America
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James Fenton takes a close look at the issues facing America in
this series of articles for The Evening Standard.
'The
Constitution Is a Thorn in Many Americans Sides.'
London Evening Standard (27 August 2010) [Fenton discusses
U.S. immigration policy and the Fourteenth Amendment].
'Sarah
Palin Is One Screwball Who Could Upset the US Apple Cart.'
London Evening Standard (20 August 2010) [Fenton on Alaska's
former Governor].
'When Will Barack Obama Come Out in Favour
of Gay Marriage?.' London Evening Standard (13 August
2010) [Fenton on California's Prop 8 and President Obama's position
on gay marriage].
'The
Ground Zero Mosque Would Heal Old Wounds.' London Evening
Standard (6 August 2010) [Fenton on building a place of
worship for Muslims near the World Trade Center].
'John
McCain Is in Thrall to the Monster He Has Created.' London
Evening Standard (30 July 2010) [Fenton on Arizona's Senator].
For additional articles in this series, please
visit the Articles
& Essays page.
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John Fuller & the Sycamore Press
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James
Fenton's earliest poetry was published by John Fuller in his garage
in Oxford. John Fuller & the Sycamore Press: A Bibliographic
History includes over twenty author contributions recalling
John Fuller, his press, and the poetry he published. Fuller provides
a foreword and an interview, and each of the publications he produced
is featured in a descriptive bibliography. (Order direct from
the Bodleian
Library, Oak
Knoll Press, Amazon.co.uk,
or Amazon.com)
From the Publisher:
Established in 1968, John Fuller's
Sycamore Press published some of the most influential and critically
acclaimed writers of the past half-century. In addition to publishing
established authors, such as W.H. Auden, Philip Larkin, and
Peter Porter, the press sought to promote young poets, many
of whom have gone on to achieve great success.
The Sycamore Press ceased operations
in 1992, but it remains an excellent example of the unique qualities
associated with the small press movement in England. In addition
to a full descriptive bibliography, the book includes an interview
with John Fuller and numerous personal reflections by Sycamore
Press authors about John Fuller, the press, and the works it
produced.
View
a promotional flyer from Oak Knoll Press.
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The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini
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James
Fenton provides a new introduction to the Everyman's Library edition
of The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini. (Order direct
from Everyman's
Library, Amazon.co.uk,
or Amazon.com)
From the Publisher:
Here is the most important autobiography
from Renaissance Italy and one of the most spirited and colorful
from any time or place, in a translation widely recognized as
the most faithful to the energy and spirit of the original.
Benvenuto Cellini was both a beloved artist
in sixteenth-century Florence and a passionate and temperamental
man of action who was capable of brawling, theft, and murder.
He counted popes, cardinals, kings, and dukes among his patrons
and was the adoring friend ofas he described themthe
divine Michelangelo and the marvelous
Titian, but was as well known for his violent feuds. At age
twenty-seven he helped defend the Castel SantAngelo in
Rome, and his account of his imprisonment there (under a mad
castellan who thought he was a bat), his escape, recapture,
and confinement in a cell of tarantulas and venomous worms
is an adventure equal to any other in fact or fiction. But it
is only one in a long life lived on a grand scale.
Cellinis autobiography is not merely
the record of an extraordinary life but also a dramatic and
evocative account of daily life in Renaissance Italy, from its
lowest taverns to its highest royal courts.
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Fenton on Kingsley Amis
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'Kingsley
Amis: Against Fakery.' In The Movement Reconsidered: Essays
on Larkin, Amis, Gunn, Davie, and Their Contemporaries. Ed.
Zachary Leader. Oxford University Press, 2009. 106-122. (Order
from OUP in the UK,
US,
or Canada)
From the Publisher:
The Movement Reconsidered, a collection
of original essays by distinguished poets, critics, and scholars
from Britain and America, sets out to show not only that relations
between Movement and other post-war British writers were more
complex and nuanced than is usually suggested, but that the
role these relations played in shaping the current literary
scene is important and complicated. Other topics it examines
include the origins of the grouping; the role of mediating figures
such as Auden, Empson, and Orwell; the part the writers themselves
played in promoting the grouping; the interlocking network of
academics, journalists, and editors who aided them; and analogous
developments in other fields, notably philosophy, politics,
and language. The book's ultimate aim is to encourage readers
to come to Movement writing with fresh eyes and to gain a fairer
sense of its range and power.
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