Selected Poems and Letters

Isaac Rosenberg

ISBN 10: 1900564890 / ISBN 13: 9781900564892

Published by Enitharmon Press, GB, 2003

About this Item

'Death could drop from the dark as easily as song - But song only dropped, Like a blind man's dreams on the sand, By dangerous tides, Like a girl's dark hair for she dreams no ruin lies there, Or her kisses where a serpent hides' - from "Returning, We Hear the Larks' Selected Poems and Letters". Isaac Rosenberg's poems, such as "Dead Man's Dump" and "Break of Day in the Trenches", have been included in every significant war anthology and have earned him a place in Poets' Corner.He studied at the Slade School of Art at the same time as Stanley Spencer and Mark Gertler, showing great promise as a painter. His poverty, education and background made him an outsider, yet it was just that experience which equipped him to cope with the horror of war in the trenches: 'I am determined that this war, with all its powers for devastation, shall not master my poeting.' Inexplicably for such a major figure, Rosenberg's work has been out of print for many years. In this "Selected Poems and Letters", his biographer Jean Liddiard has made a substantial selection of his finest poems and most revealing letters, providing also an authoritative introduction and a detailed chronology.

Seller Inventory # LU-9781900564892

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Selected Poems and Letters
• Publisher: Enitharmon Press, GB
• Publication Date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1900564890
• ISBN 13: 9781900564892
• Binding: Hardback
• Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

Isaac Rosenberg has long been regarded as one of the most important artistic figures of the First World War. Poems such as ‘Dead Man’s Dump’ and ‘Break of Day in the Trenches’ have been included in every significant war anthology and have earned him a place in Poets’ Corner. He studied at the Slade School of Art at the same time as Stanley Spencer and Mark Gertler, showing promise as a painter. His poverty, education and background made him an outsider, yet it was just that experience which equipped him to cope with the unforeseen horror of war in the trenches: ‘I am determined that this war, with all its powers for devastation, shall not master my poeting.’ Inexplicably for such a major figure, Rosenberg’s work has been out of print for many years. In this Selected Poems and Letters, his biographer Jean Liddiard has made a substantial selection of his finest poems and most revealing letters, providing also an authoritative introduction and a detailed chronology.

About the Author

Isaac Rosenberg was born in Bristol in 1890 to Jewish immigrant parents from Lithuania. His family moved to the East End of London in 1897, and after a rudimentary education Rosenberg at 14 was apprenticed to an engraver. Wealthy patrons enabled him to study at the Slade School of Art (1911-14) at the same time as Stanley Spencer and Mark Gertler, and for nine months in 1914-15 he lived in South Africa. The only poems to be collected in his lifetime were self-published in a pamphlet form – Night and Day (1912), Youth (1915) and Moses (1916). Enlisting in the Army in October 1915 he served on the Western Front until his death on night patrol on 1 April 1918.