Anxious Spring, An

An Anxious Spring gathers together a selection of poems written and published by John Levett over the last forty years. It includes work from all of his Shoestring and Peterloo volumes as well as a section of new material previously unpublished in book form.

Described in the Times Literary Supplement as “an accomplished formalist…with a wry wit used to illuminate deeper truths”, his work was summed up by Eddie Waimwright in Envoi as “what glittering fragments… poetry to savour, to read slowly and mull over many times… as rewarding as it is demanding.”

From reviews of John Levett’s previous collections:

“…humane and disenchanted…. he handles rhythm and rhyme with considerable virtuosity… a lyrical talent..” – Peter Porter, The Observer

“….it is Levett’s wit and control that sharpen the pain and intesify the moments of joy… .a note of pure English song.” – Andrew McCulloch, Times Literary Supplement

“…there are real pleasures here, in Levett’s technical resource, wry humour and successful assemblages of telling detail..” – Alan Brownjohn, The Sunday Times

“Enhanced perceptions cohabit with paradoxes… in that slight, quiet, quirky, metaphysical, fanciful, minute perception of reality that is not quite reality.” – Herbert Lomas, London Magazine

“Levett can write and any one of the poems from this collection could bear witness to that talent…” – Simon Armitage, Orbis