The Labour party in Britain has just unleashed a series of free animated manifestos from the land of chalk drawings. They're awfully cute, and even rather funny. Will they tip the swing voters back? Meanwhile, Gordon Brown now claims to be a fan of Lady Gaga. I am trying to square that one with his circle, or rather, circle that with his squareness. On another bat channel, Cameron and Co. are offering a government we can all join (without the smell of the sedan leather, as one BBC pundit put it this morning) - which means WE get to set up the schools, run the fire departments, clean the wards, and fire bad cops - making Britain the first fully-functioning Fisher-Price kingdom. Very juvenile all this. What is Clegg offering - free candy-flavoured unmentionables?
THAT HANDSOME MAN A PERSONAL BRIEF REVIEW BY TODD SWIFT I could lie and claim Larkin, Yeats , or Dylan Thomas most excited me as a young poet, or even Pound or FT Prince - but the truth be told, it was Thom Gunn I first and most loved when I was young. Precisely, I fell in love with his first two collections, written under a formalist, Elizabethan ( Fulke Greville mainly), Yvor Winters triad of influences - uniquely fused with an interest in homerotica, pop culture ( Brando, Elvis , motorcycles). His best poem 'On The Move' is oddly presented here without the quote that began it usually - Man, you gotta go - which I loved. Gunn was - and remains - so thrilling, to me at least, because so odd. His elegance, poise, and intelligence is all about display, about surface - but the surface of a panther, who ripples with strength beneath the skin. With Gunn, you dressed to have sex. Or so I thought. Because I was queer (I maintain the right to lay claim to that
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