Alan Sillitoe (1928-2010) was an English writer and poet known for his depictions of working-class life. His novels include Saturday Night and Sunday Morning and The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner. Ruth Fainlight is one of Britain's foremost poets. She has published more than sixteen books of poetry, including New and Collected Poems and Somewhere Else Entirely. She was married to Alan Sillitoe for over fifty years.

"The poems of a well-travelled man, a reader of maps in many senses, who ranged widely, restlessly, in his life and in his mind; poems that, whether brief lyric or extended parable, all speak to Alan Sillitoe's flintily individual grasp of the world, in all his voices, authentic, humorous, sardonic and compassionate." Alan Jenkins; "It is when he engages the novelist's eye for incident that he is most successful. "Car fights Cat" relates how a cat faced down a Daimler, tumbled beneath its wheels, then "shot out with limbs still solid, / Bolted, spitting fire and gravel / At unjust God who built such massive / Catproof motorcars in his graven image". There is a fine poem about a map of the Somme (one of several war-related pieces) and there are some welcome lighter moments in different voices - the rather brilliant duologue "Full Moon's Tongue" and the jaunty monologue "Derelict Bathing Cabins at Seaford"."; John Greening, The TLS, May 15, 2020

Alan Sillitoe (1928-2010) was an English writer and poet known for his depictions of working-class life. His novels include Saturday Night and Sunday Morning and The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner. Ruth Fainlight is one of Britain's foremost poets. She has published more than sixteen books of poetry, including New and Collected Poems and Somewhere Else Entirely. She was married to Alan Sillitoe for over fifty years.

"The poems of a well-travelled man, a reader of maps in many senses, who ranged widely, restlessly, in his life and in his mind; poems that, whether brief lyric or extended parable, all speak to Alan Sillitoe's flintily individual grasp of the world, in all his voices, authentic, humorous, sardonic and compassionate." Alan Jenkins; "It is when he engages the novelist's eye for incident that he is most successful. "Car fights Cat" relates how a cat faced down a Daimler, tumbled beneath its wheels, then "shot out with limbs still solid, / Bolted, spitting fire and gravel / At unjust God who built such massive / Catproof motorcars in his graven image". There is a fine poem about a map of the Somme (one of several war-related pieces) and there are some welcome lighter moments in different voices - the rather brilliant duologue "Full Moon's Tongue" and the jaunty monologue "Derelict Bathing Cabins at Seaford"."; John Greening, The TLS, May 15, 2020

Alan Sillitoe (1928-2010) was an English writer and poet known for his depictions of working-class life. His novels include Saturday Night and Sunday Morning and The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner. Ruth Fainlight is one of Britain's foremost poets. She has published more than sixteen books of poetry, including New and Collected Poems and Somewhere Else Entirely. She was married to Alan Sillitoe for over fifty years.

"The poems of a well-travelled man, a reader of maps in many senses, who ranged widely, restlessly, in his life and in his mind; poems that, whether brief lyric or extended parable, all speak to Alan Sillitoe's flintily individual grasp of the world, in all his voices, authentic, humorous, sardonic and compassionate." Alan Jenkins; "It is when he engages the novelist's eye for incident that he is most successful. "Car fights Cat" relates how a cat faced down a Daimler, tumbled beneath its wheels, then "shot out with limbs still solid, / Bolted, spitting fire and gravel / At unjust God who built such massive / Catproof motorcars in his graven image". There is a fine poem about a map of the Somme (one of several war-related pieces) and there are some welcome lighter moments in different voices - the rather brilliant duologue "Full Moon's Tongue" and the jaunty monologue "Derelict Bathing Cabins at Seaford"."; John Greening, The TLS, May 15, 2020