Forever Young
But for Tony Frazer, I would not be a poet.
There are a couple of others, among the many good, kind and supportive people I’ve met in the poetry world of whom that is true – specifically Tony Baker and the late, very much lamented Richard Caddel. [Who says poets are egotistical, competitive and foul to one another? Most I know are calumniated by that view.] Without those two good friends, my involvement with poetry would have faded out some time around 1980; without Tony Frazer it would certainly not have revived in the present century.
It was Tony who, in Shearsman 54 (spring 2003), published the first three poems of mine to see print for 16 or 17 years. He may not even have known, when he received that tentative submission from me, that I had ever been published before – although, knowing how encyclopaedic is his knowledge of poetry’s most obscure corners, he probably did.
It was Tony who, seven years and several magazine appearances later, undertook to publish my first book, A Stone Dog. He too who staged my first public reading for something like 20 years to launch that title.
Shortly after that, he said ‘yes’ instantly, and apparently enthusiastically, to my suggestion of a Suffolk poetry anthology, admitting only after it was in print that he’d done so having no idea whether it would be any good or not. I hope he still thinks all the help he gave me with that was worth it.
As a one-man operation, the sheer number of books Tony produces is inspiring, of awe among other qualities. And still more than their number is the consistency of their quality. Almost every contemporary poet whose work I want to read appears on the Shearsman list. I know of no other press whose imprint tells me – as the words ‘Shearsman Books’ on a spine tell me – that what’s inside will be worth the time. If only one had time for them all – as surely only the indefatigable Mr Frazer has.
I was accompanied to the Stone Dog launch by a friend with no previous experience of modern poetry. Driving home afterwards, he asked me: ‘Who was that very nice young man who introduced the reading?’ My friend was then 40; the very nice young man was Tony, then approaching his 60th birthday. May you stay, Tony, forever young.
But for Tony Frazer, I would not be a poet.
There are a couple of others, among the many good, kind and supportive people I’ve met in the poetry world of whom that is true – specifically Tony Baker and the late, very much lamented Richard Caddel. [Who says poets are egotistical, competitive and foul to one another? Most I know are calumniated by that view.] Without those two good friends, my involvement with poetry would have faded out some time around 1980; without Tony Frazer it would certainly not have revived in the present century.
It was Tony who, in Shearsman 54 (spring 2003), published the first three poems of mine to see print for 16 or 17 years. He may not even have known, when he received that tentative submission from me, that I had ever been published before – although, knowing how encyclopaedic is his knowledge of poetry’s most obscure corners, he probably did.
It was Tony who, seven years and several magazine appearances later, undertook to publish my first book, A Stone Dog. He too who staged my first public reading for something like 20 years to launch that title.
Shortly after that, he said ‘yes’ instantly, and apparently enthusiastically, to my suggestion of a Suffolk poetry anthology, admitting only after it was in print that he’d done so having no idea whether it would be any good or not. I hope he still thinks all the help he gave me with that was worth it.
As a one-man operation, the sheer number of books Tony produces is inspiring, of awe among other qualities. And still more than their number is the consistency of their quality. Almost every contemporary poet whose work I want to read appears on the Shearsman list. I know of no other press whose imprint tells me – as the words ‘Shearsman Books’ on a spine tell me – that what’s inside will be worth the time. If only one had time for them all – as surely only the indefatigable Mr Frazer has.
I was accompanied to the Stone Dog launch by a friend with no previous experience of modern poetry. Driving home afterwards, he asked me: ‘Who was that very nice young man who introduced the reading?’ My friend was then 40; the very nice young man was Tony, then approaching his 60th birthday. May you stay, Tony, forever young.