Selected Poems of Thom Gunn

Thom Gunn is a supremely paradoxical poet: a brilliant exponent of traditional forms who also wrote some of the best free verse of the late twentieth- and early twenty-first century; a deliberate un-confessional poet whose elegies for AIDS victims are unflinchingly direct and personal; a marvellous provider of particular instances who is also restlessly mobile. This selection from his work captures all these facets of his poetic personality, among many others, and proves beyond doubt that Gunn is one of the most free-spirited, intriguing, intelligent and emotionally engaging poets of his time - and ours. Andrew Motion