New in July 2015: Michael Gibson article from ‘Eagle Times’. Work in progress: dissenting poets in the First World War

New Upload:
Eagle Art Editor’:  Michael Gibson’s 1998 illustrated account of his time working for Eagle and associated comics and annuals in the nineteen-fifties.

My previous upload of Michael Gibson’s unfinished memoir of his time at Eagle in the nineteen-fifties has been attracting interest from comics fans, so I’m pleased to have located and got permission to upload this earlier piece which includes some of his own artwork for Eagle and its associated comics and annuals.  At present I’ve just  uploaded image scans of the article (kindly provided by Will Grenham of Eagle Times) but hope in future to provide a  fully searchable and accessible version. Many thanks to Will, and to the Michael Gibson estate.

Work in Progress:
‘”War is a business of innumerable personal tragedies”: Wilfrid Gibson, Elizabeth Gibson Cheyne and the First World War’.

I’m currently revising this talk comparing the impact of the First World War on  Wilfrid Gibson and his sister, fellow poet Elizabeth Gibson Cheyne. In 1915, Wilfrid published ‘Battle’, his influential collection of war poems. That same year, he invited the recently widowed Elizabeth to share his home at the ‘Poets’ Colony’ in Dymock. But she and her brother became increasingly estranged as their attitudes to the war began to diverge. The loss of their once close and supportive relationship became just one more of the personal tragedies of war.

Originally given at the ‘New Numbers, New Approaches’ conference at the University of Gloucestershire in June, the revised paper is to be published in a special conference issue of Dymock Poets and Friends.  I will also upload a longer version to my website, together with a selection of the poems discussed.