After some reflection, I think listing "100 living poets" as the best is currently unhelpful. There are arguably more than one hundred British poets, born since 1993 (as a benchmark), worth reading, and being concerned about. However, Eyewear stands by its original list, such as it was shaping up to be, and will begin converting these over to the new label: THE EYEWEAR CANON. The Eyewear Canon will be a celebration of the very best living contemporary poets resident in Great Britain, as of 2013.
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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