He doesn't need my recommendation, of course, and for me to recommend or critique him in any way would be - well, preposterous.
I found a book of his collected verse - I've not been enjoying my current read very much (more on that if and when ever I finish) - but this I thought I'd share. I don't like anthologies - generally, but this gets me back into the poetry habit. Probably you know it already, I thought you would, still it brings back memories...
The Hollow Men
A penny for the Old Guy
I
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us-if at all-not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.
II
Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer-
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom
III
This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.
IV
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.
V
Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long
Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
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I found a couple of his in the thrift shop - "The Illustrated Man" and "The October Country", and as I hadn't read him since I was about 13 years old I picked them up and tried him again.
As a kid I loved him. And as an adult? I remembered the ends of the stories as I read them. The stories - the endings, especially, formulaic, occasionally predictable, twist endings, ironic, surprising (not often) - the plotting, the themes, that's not the main thing with him. 13 was the right age to fall under his spell for sure. But what's impressive is his use of adjectives, his evocations of mood, his descriptions, his intonation of charms, whispered, spoken, sung, the rhythm of his words, poetry almost, yet managing no meaning above the fantasies, images and moods he creates...
Surprisingly well written kids books I'd say, filled with imagination. But for adults, well...tastes change.
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Which reads well, and points you off in a thousand other directions - excellent sources and references. Scott could write - although a little out of fashion, and his take on the paranormal is done with all the credulity the age of reason could afford - more reason and compassion 200 years ago than you'll find now by a long shot now anywhere in the world. I liked, but it's an idiosyncratic little read, the pinch of salt that should be taken with Aleister Crowley and Montague Summers.
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A long read in many voices, a relief, after so many years of the internet, an abundance of stories, interpretations, many voices, very good.
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