The Poems of Basil Bunting

Basil Bunting was born in Northumberland in 1900. He was imprisoned for six months during the First World War as a conscientious objector and, after a wandering existence in Europe, in 1923 met Ezra Pound, who published his early poetry in Active Anthology (1933). It wasn't until 1964 that he received widespread attention in Britain, with the publication of The Spoils, First Book of Odes and Loquitur. The publication of his most famous work, Briggflats (1966), led to an Arts Council Bursary and a Northern Arts Poetry Fellowship at the universities of Durham and Newcastle. He died in 1985.


Don Share is the editor of Poetrymagazine. His most recent books areWishbone(Black Sparrow, 2012), Union (Eyewear, 2013), and Bunting's Persia (Flood Editions, 2012). His translations of Miguel Hernández, awarded the Times Literary Supplement Translation Prize and Premio Valle Inclán, were published in a revised and expanded edition by New York Review Books (2013), and also appear in an edition from Bloodaxe Books (1997). He received a VIDA 'VIDO' Award in 2015 for his 'contributions to American literature and literary community.'"

Basil Bunting's work was published haphazardly throughout most of his life, and in many cases he did not oversee publication. He also examines Bunting's use of sources (including Persian literature and classical mythology), and explores the Northumbrian roots of Bunting's poetic vocabulary and use of dialect.