Dampier's Monkey by Adrian Mitchell

Dampier's Monkey by Adrian Mitchell

William Dampier, the 'devil's mariner' as he has been called, a far voyager and traveller extraordinaire, lived in an era when, more truly than in other periods of history, the past was being put behind the present, and everything was new - a new world discovered by the first stirrings of the new science, under a new political and economic formation.

Dampier's Monkey examines the late-17th century ways of comprehending an expanding world by re-evaluating the travel narratives of the buccaneer William Dampier. Included in this book is Dampier's journal of his voyage in the South Seas from 1681 to 1691, complete with his annotations and illustrations, published here for the first time.

Adrian Mitchell (1932-2008) was a prolific poet, playwright and children's writer. His poetry's simplicity, clarity, passion and humour show his allegiance to a vital, popular tradition embracing William Blake as well as the Border Ballads and the blues. His most nakedly political poems - about nuclear war, Vietnam, prisons and racism - became part of the folklore of the Left, sung and recited at demonstrations and mass rallies. After Allison & Busby stopped publishing poetry, he brought his work to Bloodaxe. Adrian Mitchell's Greatest Hits: His 40 Golden Greats (1991) was followed by Heart on the Left: Poems 1953-1984 (1997), Blue Coffee: Poems 1985-1996 (1996), All Shook Up: Poems 1997-2000 (2000), The Shadow Knows: Poems 2000-2004 (2004) and the posthumous Tell Me Lies: Poems 2005-2008 (2009), and then by his retrospective Come On Everybody: Poems 1953-2008 (2012). His collected poems for children, Umpteen Poems (Orchard Books), and Shapeshifters, his versions of Ovid's Metamorphoses, illustrated by Alan Lee (Frances Lincoln), were both published in 2009. Born in London in 1932, Adrian Mitchell worked as a journalist from 1955 to 1966, when he became a full-time writer. He gave many hundreds of readings throughout the world in theatres, colleges, pubs, prisons, streets, public transport, cellars, clubs and schools of all kinds. Many of his plays and stage adaptations were performed at the National Theatre as well as by the Royal Shakespeare Company and other theatre companies. In 2002, the socialist magazine Red Pepper dubbed him Shadow Poet Laureate and asked him to write regular republican poems for their columns. In a National Poetry Day poll in 2005, his poem 'Human Beings' was voted the poem that most people would like to see launched into space.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781743056301
ISBN 10	1743056303
Title	Dampier's Monkey
Author	Adrian Mitchell
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Wakefield Press
Year published	2018-12-07
Number of pages	570
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.