Europe is on the brink. When a leader of Germany predicts that potential economic ruin could lead to future lack of peace in Europe, as Merkel did today, it is time to take notice. Greece, then Italy, and Spain, may default soon, if nothing is done. It seems an extraordinary failure of nerve and imagination, a bit like the period before World War One, or Two, when leaders dithered, afraid to act, thus ensuring worse was to come. However, there is another danger, one of too-great union - should the EU become a two or three tier organisation, with some nations fiscally joined at the hip, they may all find it more easy to stumble over the cliff together. In this way, some British caution makes sense; yet the more sidelined the Tories demand we remain, in the UK, the less control we will have over the deals ahead. These deals will be trying. Facing Europe is possible recession, or the meltdown of the Euro, or worse chaos. One must hope for the best, but hedge bets.
THAT HANDSOME MAN A PERSONAL BRIEF REVIEW BY TODD SWIFT I could lie and claim Larkin, Yeats , or Dylan Thomas most excited me as a young poet, or even Pound or FT Prince - but the truth be told, it was Thom Gunn I first and most loved when I was young. Precisely, I fell in love with his first two collections, written under a formalist, Elizabethan ( Fulke Greville mainly), Yvor Winters triad of influences - uniquely fused with an interest in homerotica, pop culture ( Brando, Elvis , motorcycles). His best poem 'On The Move' is oddly presented here without the quote that began it usually - Man, you gotta go - which I loved. Gunn was - and remains - so thrilling, to me at least, because so odd. His elegance, poise, and intelligence is all about display, about surface - but the surface of a panther, who ripples with strength beneath the skin. With Gunn, you dressed to have sex. Or so I thought. Because I was queer (I maintain the right to lay claim to that
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