The front cover, the index of poets and a partial spine are still with the book, though not
attached. The back cover vanished long ago. The pages are a deep sepia, darker round
the edges and liable to crack. Perhaps the book was printed on the inferior paper used
in World War II. It is The Penguin Book of English Verse, introduced and edited by
John Hayward. It was published in paperback by Penguin Books in 1956 and a cloth-
bound edition was promised for later under the imprint of Faber and Faber Ltd. I don’t
know whether the latter ever appeared but my much-loved paperback—well, most of it--
has survived until 2020.
The first poem in the book is Thomas Wyatt’s "The lover sheweth how he is forsaken of
such as he somtime enjoyed.” The last poem is Dylan Thomas’s “Fern Hill.” Pressed in
next to the title page is a print of Samuel Daniel’s “Care-charmer Sleepe” on paper as
sepia as the rest. I once tried to learn that sonnet by heart and failed. Once, once . . . in
the context of this book that is an evocative word indeed.
Given its publication date, I may have bought it as a student at Oxford with part of a
prize of 10 pounds I won for a summer essay. I spent that treasure on two-shillings-
and-sixpenny paperbacks, so this book, at four shillings and sixpence, was an
extravagance. Today when I look at its pages and the well-remembered lines on so
many of them, I can feel the damp cool air of my college garden and the river beyond. I
now have the time to read all of the long poems, not just the first few lines. So the book,
that cherished acquisition of my English youth, is now the delight of my American old
age.
by Yoma Ullman
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