Editorial
It’s very late, but I’d like to join the queue and pay my respects to the shade of R.S. Thomas. He never got any high position in the Church in Wales which he served, not without doubts, throughout his working life; he did not win the Nobel Prize and was not a household name. None of that matters, because until his death on 25th September he was, as I and others believe, the finest poet living in this island. He and the great Cumbrian, Norman Nicholson, who was also underestimated in his lifetime, towered over the often bleak literary landscape like Snowdon and Scafell. But while Nicholson left only a slim volume of his best work, R.S. went on writing into old age and his good poems run into hundreds. I am proud to say that one of them was published in The Interpreter’s House.
I wrote to him back in 1996, enclosing a copy of the first issue and hinting that I would like a poem. I didn’t really expect to get one, because most big names keep away from little magazines until they are firmly established. However, he sent a courteous reply and the poem ‘Metrics’, which is reproduced in this issue. Later I got a note from him wishing the magazine success.
‘Ask no rhyme of a poem, only that it keep faith with life’s rhythm’. In a western world dominated by glitz and trivia, he reminded us that it is possible to head for the heights. I think of man/ on his mountain; he has paused/ now for lack of the oxygen/ of the spirit; the easier options/ surround him, the complacencies of being/ half-way up. He needs some breath/ from the summit’ (‘Relay’). Translated; in no area of life should we be content with the second-rate.
You can read more of my thoughts on R.S. and the poetry scene in the Contemporary Poetry Review, www.cprw.com
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