Dick Davis

  • This material is held at
  • Reference
      GB 133 CPA/2/2/26
  • Former Reference
      GB 133 Sequence 2, Box 21 [73]
  • Dates of Creation
      9 Jan-23 Dec 1977
  • Physical Description
      12 pieces; 26 sheets

Scope and Content

Letters from English poet and Persian scholar Dick Davis. Topics include: Schmidt's comments on Davis's poems (/1); Donald Davie's thoughts about Davis's work; Davis's thoughts on PN Review 2 (/2) and 5 (/7); plans for a selected edition of Thomas Traherne to be edited by Davis [published by Carcanet in 1980] (/2, /4 and /8); Carcanet's financial difficulties; poems submitted by Davis to PN Review; a review of Carcanet's edition of Edgar Bowers (Living together: new and collected poems) written by Davis for the magazine (a typescript of this is included at /9); his fellow poet and friend Rob[ert Wells], who took over Val Warner's role of copy-editing for Carcanet during this period; his problems with writing poetry during 1977; a short story of his published in a Persian newspaper; plans to return to England from Iran; and his plan to write a book on [Yvor] Winters.

The file includes typescript poems by Davis as follows: 'The Summer Sun' and 'Metaphor' (/10); 'Pascal' and 'Dying' (/11). /12 is a typescript essay by Davis entitled 'The Poetry of Cesare Pavese' which is marked up for printing [in PN Review 10].

Dated at: Tehran, Iran.

Typescript with autograph and manuscript annotations.