Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Whether a dove or a seagull


I thought I'd pop out a quick post, to test your knowledge (/actually I have no idea, and hoped someone else would.) I've been reading a bit about Sylvia Townsend Warner of late, mostly letters, and footnotes in a couple of different volumes have mentioned Whether a Dove or a Seagull. It's a poetry collection she published in 1934 with her partner Valentine Ackland - a joint-collection, but none of the poems were signed, so the authorship of each was left unknown. Which is an intriguing thought - and a brilliant title.

But in the footnotes it has simply said 'This experiment was not a success'. And no more info. Does anybody know any more about the collection, and in what manner it failed to succeed? Simply in terms of sales? Or was it critically panned? Or was one poet so evidently inferior to the other that anonymity was pointless? Anybody in the know, do shout!

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