Ivor Gurney - New Book

[TullochArd]

Spectator (3 July 2021) has a review of a new book "Dweller in Shadows: A life of Ivor Gurney" by Kate Kennedy (Princeton University Press. £30. pp.488).  The review is by Andrew Morton and entitled "Tortured Genius" in which he "describes the inner turmoil of the neglected poet"

I'm not a Great War poetry fan but I suspect I will give this one a try......and judging by the number of posts on GWF Ivor Gurney is not at all neglected on this site.  

Specatator is a subscription magazine so If anyone wants a copy of the review prior to coughing up £30 for the book please feel free to pm me. 

Edited 9 July , 2021 by TullochArd

[Martin Bennitt]

A review you can read without charge, in The New Yorker

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/07/12/the-strange-case-of-ivor-gurney

And the publisher's blurb

https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691212784/dweller-in-shadows

And a Guardian story from May, quoting the author

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/02/silenced-voice-ivor-gurney-great-war-poet

I will also look out for this one. I remember reading an earlier biography, 'The Ordeal of Ivor Gurney' by Michael Hurd, but it dates from 1978.

Cheers Martin B

 

 

 

[Fred van Woerkom]

Martin,

 

Thank you so much for sharing the reviews of Kate Kennedy's book. What an interesting composer and poet Gurney was and what a sad and complicated life.

 

Fred

[Bernard_Lewis]

Thanks Martin. That's one Hell of a review!

Bernard

 

[Fred van Woerkom]

I remember seeing a notice in a Cotswolde bookshop of a concert by the Ivor Gurney Choral Society. I don't know if this society still exists, but at least it shows that, then, he hadn't been forgotten.

 

Fred