Anti-Basilisk

Middleton Christopher

In "The Anti-Basilisk" Christopher Middleton, in the spirit that impelled Shelley to write "The Masque of Anarchy", reveals as crooked the apparently straight and sees what's coming round corners with a clarity that dazzles. Bruno Schulz in 1937 made an observation that might stand as epigraph to this collection: "Thrones wilt when they are not fed with blood, their vitality grows with the mass of wrongs committed, with life-denials, with the crushing of all that is perpetually different and that has been ousted by them". Certain dilemmas in such a prospect are implicit in the shady figures of "Saul Pinkard" and "Doctor Dark". The Basilisk of the title is a sort of monster, all ego, atavistic and implacable. The poems fall into five sections, the first and fourth twenty-poem panoramas, the fifth a gathering of translations.

"It is my belief that Christopher Middleton is the finest poet writing today. It may take some time for this to be generally recognized, but why wait? Read him now, in this splendid collection" – Carolyn Kizer

About the Author

Christopher Middleton, born in Cornwall in 1926, is a poet and translator, especially of German literature. He studied at Merton College, Oxford and held academic positions at the University of Zurich and King's College London before becoming Professor of Germanic Languages at the University of Texas, Austin. He retired in 1998. His "Collected Poems" appeared in 2008.

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