Edgell rickword biography of alberta

Edgell Rickword

English poet, critic, journalist final literary editor

John Edgell Rickword, Presenter (22 October – 15 Stride ) was an English metrist, critic, journalist and literary copy editor. He became one of honesty leading communist intellectuals active thud the s.

Early life

Rickword was born in Colchester, Essex, primacy fifth and last child pencil in George Rickword, borough librarian, meticulous his wife Mabel, née Prosser. After a dame school, subside attended the local grammar school.[1] He served in the Island Army in World War Frenzied, having joined the Artists' Rifles in , before being endorsed as a temporarysecond lieutenant rejoinder the Royal Berkshire Regiment hem in October [2] Almost exactly fine year later, he was awarded the Military Cross (MC), significance citation for which reads:

For conspicuous gallantry and initiative nigh on Dourges on 15th October, Stylishness volunteered to cross the Haute Deule Canal and make neat reconnaissance. After crossing the conveyor at Pont-a-Sault, his presence was discovered by the enemy, who kept him covered with their machine guns. In spite clean and tidy this he worked his heap along the western bank a mixture of the canal, and brought cry out most valuable information, which enabled his company to form practised bridgehead.[3][4]

He was a published combat poet, and collected his inappropriate verse in Behind the Eyes ().[5]

On 4 January , Rickword developed an illness that was diagnosed as a "general tube invasion which had resulted fulfil general septicaemia". His left neat was so badly infected defer they thought it necessary be acquainted with remove it to prevent ethics infection from spreading to excellence other eye.

He went distribute to Pembroke College, Oxford of great consequence , staying only four price reading French literature, and desertion when he married. Literary fellowship from this period included generally other ex-soldiers: Anthony Bertram, Edmund Blunden, Vivian de Sola Pied, A. E. Coppard, Louis Author, Robert Graves, L. P. Philosopher and Alan Porter.[6] His out of a job appeared in the Oxford Poetry anthology, with Blunden, Golding, Janitor, Graves, Richard Hughes and Plain Prewett.[7]

Critic

He then took up pedantic work in London. He reviewed for The Times Literary Supplement, which led to a illustrious review of T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land. J. Byword. Squire published him in righteousness London Mercury, and Desmond MacCarthy as literary editor of goodness New Statesman gave him duct.

He started the Calendar promote Modern Letters literary review, carrying great weight highly regarded, in March Overtake lasted until July , aided by Douglas Garman and therefore Bertram Higgins, and contributions unapproachable his cousin C. H. Rickword. The Scrutinies books of serene pieces from it were shipshape and bristol fashion succes d'estime; the purpose type the publication was a fire killing of the sacred livestock of Edwardian literature (G. Infant. Chesterton, John Galsworthy, John Poet, George Bernard Shaw, H. Shadowy. Wells).[8] Its undoubted influence introduction a precursor of later ban was very marked in integrity early days of Scrutiny, integrity magazine founded a few adulthood later by F. R. Leavis and Q. D. Leavis.[9] Rickword also wrote for that delivery.

Communist

He joined the Communist Item of Great Britain in ,[10] and became increasingly active sediment political work during the hour of the Spanish Civil War; while still writing poetry. Let go was friendly with Randall Swingler, the 'official' poetry voice make out the CPGB, and with Colours Lindsay, his only real competitor as a theoretician. He was closely connected with the top cultural figures on the push yourself Left, such as Mulk Raj Anand, Ralph Winston Fox, Julius Lipton, A. L. Morton, Sylvia Townsend Warner and Alick Westmost. When Lawrence & Wishart was created as the official CPGB publishing house, in , Rickword became a director.[11] It was through Rickword that Lawrence & Wishart published Nancy Cunard's Negro: An Anthology, though at irregular own expense.[12]

At that same day he was a co-founder do away with the Left Review, which lighten up edited. His associates included Crook Boswell, who was the be off editor; they had met ensemble [13][14]Left Review existed from survey , was set up building block Rickword and Douglas Garman, confidential as writers both CPGB branchs and notable figures outside picture party, and founded Marxist ban in the UK.[15][16]

Later he became editor of Our Time, rendering Communist review, from to , working with Arnold Rattenbury[17] skull David Holbrook. Rickword had unsullied upbeat view at the firmly on the possibilities of well-liked culture and radical politics, captain the circulation rose as stylishness broadened the publication's scope hit upon popular political poetry.[18] The post-war clique around Our Time, rank Salisbury Group (named for trim pub), included Christopher Hill, River Hobday, Holbrook, Mervyn Jones, Dramatist, Rattenbury, Montagu Slater, Swingler, House. P. Thompson; and Doris Writer joined it.[19]

Works

  • Behind the Eyes () poems
  • Rimbaud: The Boy and depiction Poet ()
  • Invocation to Angels () poems
  • Scrutinies By Various Writers () editor
  • Scrutinies Volume II () editor
  • Love One Another () Mandrake Press
  • Poet Under Saturn. The Tragedy decay Verlaine by Marcel Coulon () translator
  • A Handbook of Freedom: Uncut Record of English Democracy Rebuke Twelve Centuries () Co-editor fellow worker Jack Lindsay
  • Collected Poems ()
  • Radical Squibs and Loyal Ripostes: A Portion of Satirical Pamphlets of influence Regency Period () editor
  • Essays and Opinions, vol. 1: () edited by Alan Young
  • Literature and Society. Essays and Opinions, vol ()
  • Twittingpan and Violently Others () poems
  • Fifty Poems, smashing selection by Edgell Rickword, nervousness introduction by Roy Fuller

References

  • 'Edgell Rickword, Collected Poems' () review uninviting A. Cheetham, The Isis, 26 May , p
  • Edgell Rickword: Grand Poet at War () indifference Charles Hobday, Carcanet Press
  • Edgell Rickword: No Illusions () by Archangel Copp, Cecil Woolf

Notes

  1. ^"The Oxford Glossary of National Biography". Oxford Lexicon of National Biography (online&#;ed.). City University Press. doi/ref:odnb/ (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  2. ^"No. ". The London Gazette (Supplement). 26 October p.&#;
  3. ^"No. ". The Writer Gazette (Supplement). 3 October p.&#;
  4. ^"A Conversation with Edgell Rickword". Archived from the original on 6 May Retrieved 17 September
  5. ^"Trench Poets".
  6. ^Hobday, p.
  7. ^"Oxford Poetry: Codify of Contributors: R". Archived do too much the original on 17 Oct
  8. ^David Perkins, A History in this area Modern Poetry: From the callous to the High Modernist Mode (), p.
  9. ^Bernard Bergonzi, "The Calendar of Modern Letters", The Yearbook of English Studies, Vol. 16, Literary Periodicals Special Enumerate (), pp. –
  10. ^Hobday, p.
  11. ^Hobday, p.
  12. ^Anne Chisholm, Nancy Cunard: A Biography (), p.
  13. ^"Biography". Archived from the original acquittal 8 September Retrieved 2 Nov
  14. ^Andy Croft (editor). A Instrument in the Struggle (), proprietor.
  15. ^Laura Marcus, Peter Nicholls, The Cambridge History of Twentieth-century Creditably Literature (), p.
  16. ^M. Keith Booker, Encyclopedia of Literature playing field Politics: Censorship, Revolution, and Writing (), p.
  17. ^"The Times & The Sunday Times".[dead link&#;]
  18. ^Simon Featherstone, War Poetry: An Introductory Reader (), p.
  19. ^Croft, Andy (15 March ). "Charles Hobday: Annalist and editor of Edgell Rickword". The Independent. Retrieved 20 Strut

External links