Available in the collections, The Wild Girls Plus . . . and The Unreal and the Real.

Available in the collections, The Wild Girls Plus . . . and The Unreal and the Real.








A rather different way of saying the things that need to be said, containing a mixed bag of poetry, prose, vignettes, etc., detailing what it’s like to be perpetually on the receiving end of racism, from micro-agressions to extremely overt racism.
Maybe, instead of forcing children to read Shakespeare and Dickens at school, we should be encouraging them to read books like this and encouraging them to engage in constructive dialogue with each other about the issues raised and the experiences of those on the receiving end of racism and other bigotry. Racist is not something people are born, it’s something people are taught, and its very clearly up to schools and educators to start stepping up and making much more effort with the young minds in their care.
In the UK “Citizenship” and “Relationship” education is not on the curriculum until after 11 years of age: this is far, far too late. How our societies are peopled — our citizens — and how we relate to those other citizens within our societies should be permanently on the curriculum from the very first day of school, not be left in the hands of young people’s peers, bad television, bad websites, and ignorant parents who read nothing but vile, tabloid drivel. A child who has been nurtured badly up to the age of 11 is highly unlikely to respond to positive nuturing by over-worked, underpaid, stressed-out teachers after the age of 11.

Another early book of Aldous’ poems. I think this is the last of the poetry, which i’m quite glad about as i can say, without any doubt, that i much, much prefer Aldous’ prose.
Like the previous books of poetry by Aldous, not really my thing: other’s mileage may vary though, so don’t let me put you off if you enjoy this style of overly-done, Victorian-upper-class poetry.

And so continues my chronological journey through Aldous’ bibliography.
Although a fair few of the poems were as way beyond me as most were in The Burning Wheel, this did seem a little bit more accessible. I have no idea how much of that is me becoming used to the lexicon and style, or if Aldous has began to write a little more accessibly.
Anyway, another book of poetry that some of you may find enjoyable if you’re into early 1900’s poetry.
To be honest i’ll be glad to finally finish reading Aldous’ poetry and get onto things more enjoyable.

A delightful, long poem telling the full story of the Pied Piper. Great for reading out loud to children. And much, much better than the Brothers Grimm version.
Best of all, it’s free. So why not download and give it a read today.

Aldous started out writing as a poet and this is his first ever book.
While there were a couple of poems in this that i could get my head around, for the most part it was all a bit too much above my 21st century head: mostly not my kind of poetry. I would class Aldous’ early poetry as very much ringing the death knell of the Victorian upper classes.
For those of us who have been enamoured by Aldous’ later writing, it’s quite interesting to come back to the very beginning and do Aldous chronologically.
Final thoughts: not my cup of tea but you might enjoy it if you’re into pretentious poetry with lots of words that you have to look up.

When i set up this website i added my whole Kindle collection from Amazon. Amongst many books that i didn’t know i had was this one, and i’ve still no idea how it appeared on my account.
Although i don’t normally read poetry, i usually enjoy it when i do, and i was actually looking forward to reading through this collection.
But i have to say, i’m seriously disappointed. I made it 10% in, which i admit is not very far, but i really couldn’t take any more.
I have no idea when random babble written as bad prose that then gets chopped up randomly into lines that have no cadence, meter, rhythm, rhyme, structure or style got defined as poetry, but it seems that some people now claim it is.
I suppose its the same type that class Sewing Machine in Hessian Sack as modern art — utter bollox!

Here’s some modern poetry (apparently):
It may please the Sunday Times
cryptic crossword
crowd while drinking
Costa
coffee from a disposable cup
(see front cover), but
i very much doubt it
will please anyone
else.

