Born Southampton 1928; Army (Education Corps) England and Germany 1946-49; King’s London (English degree 49-52); teacher Hampshire, Uganda, Shropshire 53-72; Word And Action 72-03 (retired on 75th birthday). Six children (one dead) from two long relationships; married again June 2006. Have lived in Dorset since 1972. Moving to Market Drayton Shropshire end of August 2006.
Teacher (English /Drama) 52-72; Founder/Member of Word And Action (Dorset) – Language-Arts organisation - 72-03; Poet (haiku to book-length poems); Director/Actor/Playwright,Theatre-in-the-Round since 59; Inventor of Instant Theatre (participatory performances for all-ages); Polemical books/articles (education/theatre); Early short-stories / late novels; Word-art productions.
Poems over the years in many small magazines. Publications include Glimpses of Dorset (1996); Imperfect Eden – over 9-hour recording of 10,000 line poem in rhyme royal about childhood in Southampton in the 1930s. (2001).
Collections of poems: The Simple Stream; Heart’s Fangs, The Desiring Discus (3 anthologies of poems 1945-1989). Poems from the Year of the Metal Horse (1990-91). Towards Jerusalem (1989-93). Beyond Jerusalem (1993-95). Bee-attitudes (1995-97). Bluefish (1998-1999). The Millennial Edge (2000-01). Flower Power (2002). Herod’s Legacy (2003-04). The Rescue Package (2005).
Sequences: Crossing the Line (1966). Proverbs of Hell (1971). Thirteeners* (1978). Imperfect Eden (2001).
(* In 1978 invented the THIRTEENER, a kind of rough sonnet, limited to three rhymed endings. Have practised the form since over 200 times. )
Book-length single poems: My Cuttings (poem plus 58 collages – photo-play - 1972). The Ansty Experience (1993).
Themed Collections: Action Poems. Growing-Up Poems. Enigmas and Obsessions. Long Poems. Potpourri for Christmas. A Tipple of Shorts.
Poem-graphics: computer graphics – over 500 at A6, A5 and A4 sizes – using short and shortish poems of my own).
Other: Over twenty verse plays for school, youth and adult groups (all written for performance in the round). Ten Chapbooks on literary, dramatic and educational themes.
Much non-published work – inc The Group Dream – a commentary on 130 stories from Instant Theatre (over 600 pages long; 8 years to write).
Have worked as playwright, director, actor, with school, youth and adult groups – always in the round since 1959. Much poetry in performance. Now give “animated readings” of my work – reading from text performances in the round. Have run many courses in the making of plays and poems; in the philosophy and practice of Instant Theatre.
Believe prose and poetry have different functions. In prose use all punctuation devices meticulously. In poetry have graduated to using lower case, brackets, dashes and apostrophes. The movement of my poems strongly affected by this deliberate style.
