J. H. Prynne


Jeremy Halvard Prynne is a British poet closely associated with the British Poetry Revival.
Prynne grew up in Kent and was educated at St Dunstan's College, Catford, and Jesus College, Cambridge. He is a Life Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He retired in October 2005 from his posts teaching English Literature as a Lecturer and University Reader in English Poetry for the University of Cambridge and as Director of Studies in English for Gonville and Caius College; in September 2006 he retired from his position as Librarian of the College.
Prynne's early influences include Donald Davie and Charles Olson. He was one of the key figures in the Cambridge group among the British Poetry Revival poets and a major contributor to The English Intelligencer. His first book, Force of Circumstance and Other Poems, was published in 1962, but Prynne has excluded it from his canon. His Poems collected all the work he wanted to keep in print, beginning with Kitchen Poems, with expanded and updated editions appearing in 1999, 2005, and 2015. 2020 to 2022 has seen an unprecedented burst of productivity, during which he has had published two dozen small press chapbooks and several substantial collections, including book-length poems, sequences and a poetic novel.

In addition to his poetry, Prynne writes literary criticism. A transcription of a 1971 lecture on Olson's Maximus Poems at Simon Fraser University has circuled widely. His longer works include a monograph on Ferdinand de Saussure, Stars, Tigers and the Shape of Words, and self-published erudite book-length commentaries on individual poems by Shakespeare, George Herbert and Wordsworth. His longstanding and passionate interest in China is reflected in an essay on New Songs from a Jade Terrace, an anthology of early Chinese love poetry, which was included in Penguin's second edition of that book. His collected poetry includes a poem composed in classical Chinese under the name Pu Ling-en, reproduced in his own calligraphy. In 2016, a lengthy interview with Prynne about his poetic practice appeared in The Paris Review.

Poetry

  • Force of Circumstance and Other Poems
  • Kitchen Poems
  • Aristeas
  • Day Light Songs
  • The White Stones
  • Fire Lizard
  • Brass
  • A Night Square
  • Into The Day
  • Wound Response
  • High Pink on Chrome
  • News of Warring Clans
  • Down Where Changed
  • The Oval Window
  • Marzipan
  • Bands Around the Throat
  • Word Order
  • Jie ban mi Shi Hu
  • Not-You
  • Her Weasels Wild Returning
  • For the Monogram
  • Red D Gypsum
  • Pearls That Were
  • Triodes
  • Unanswering Rational Shore
  • Acrylic Tips
  • Biting the Air
  • Blue Slides At Rest
  • To Pollen
  • STREAK〜〜〜WILLING〜〜〜ENTOURAGE / ARTESIAN
  • Sub Songs
  • Kazoo Dreamboats; or, On What There Is
  • Al-Dente
  • Each to Each
  • OF · THE · ABYSS
  • Or Scissel
  • The Oval Window: A New Annotated Edition
  • Of Better Scrap
  • None Yet More Willing Told
  • Parkland
  • Bitter Honey
  • Squeezed White Noise
  • Enchanter's Nightshade
  • Memory Working: Impromptus
  • Her Air Fallen
  • The Fever's End
  • Passing Grass Parnassus
  • Memory Working: Impromptus
  • Aquatic Hocquets
  • Kernels in Vernal Silence
  • Torrid Auspicious Quartz
  • See By So
  • Duets Infer Duty
  • Orchard
  • Presume Catkins
  • Otherhood Imminent Profusion
  • Athwart Apron Snaps
  • Efflux Reference
  • Dune Quail Eggs
  • Lay Them Straight
  • Snooty Tipoffs
  • Memory Working: Impromptus
  • At Raucous Purposeful
  • Sea Shells Told
  • Shade Furnace
  • Latency of the Conditional
  • Not Ice Novice
  • At the Monument
  • Foremost Wayleave
  • Hadn't Yet Bitten
  • Timepiece in Total
  • Alembic Forest
  • Front Obsidian Cobalt
  • ''Doric Plumage''

Collected poetry

  • Poems
  • Poems
  • Poems
  • Poems
  • ''Poems 2016–2024''

Prose

  • "China Figures," Modern Asian Studies 17, 671-704; Rpt. rev. as a "Postscript" to New Songs from a Jade Terrace: An Anthology of Early Chinese Love Poetry, trans. Anne Birrell, Penguin Classics, 1986.
  • "English Poetry and Emphatical Language," Proceedings of the British Academy, 74, 135-69.
  • Stars, Tigers and the Shape of Words.
  • "A Discourse on Willem de Kooning's Rosy-Fingered Dawn at Louse Point," Act 2, 34-73.
  • They That Haue Powre to Hurt; A Specimen of a Commentary on Shake-speares Sonnets, 94.
  • Field Notes: 'The Solitary Reaper' and Others.
  • George Herbert, 'Love ': A Discursive Commentary.
  • Certain Prose of the English Intelligencer, eds. Neil Pattison, Reitha Pattison & Luke Roberts. Includes early correspondence and essays by Prynne and others.
  • Concepts and Conception in Poetry.
  • Graft and Corruption: Shakespeare's Sonnet 15.
  • .
  • Apophthegms.
  • Whitman and Truth.

Correspondence

  • The Collected Letters of Charles Olson and J.H. Prynne, ed. Ryan Dobran.
  • The Letters of Douglas Oliver and J. H. Prynne 1967-2000, ed. Joe Luna.

Translations of works by Prynne

Chinese

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French

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German

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Norwegian

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Works

The Park 4-5.
  • On the Periphery ; Rpt. Jacket 20.Perfect Bound 5 ; Rpt. Jacket 20. Proceedings of the British Academy 74.
  • dated 1989 . The Gig 7.
  • . Parataxis Press, 1995; Rpt. Jacket 20.
  • Barque Press, 2006.
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About Prynne

  • , ed. Michael Tencer.
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  • , Quid 17.
  • . Ed. Ryan Dobran. Glossator 2. Complete volume dedicated to Prynne.
  • , poem by J.H.Prynne, with commentary by John Kinsella. Jacket # 6.
  • by Rod Mengham and John Kinsella. Jacket # 7
  • by Patrick McGuinness. London Review of Books.
  • by Forrest Gander in The Chicago Review.
  • by Matt Hall. Cordite Poetry Review.
  • by Matt Hall. Cordite Poetry Review.
  • by Simon Eales. Cordite Poetry Review.
  • by Luke Roberts, Chicago Review.
  • by M.A. King. Jacket 2.
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