Come On Everybody brings together poems from a dozen collections published by Adrian Mitchell over five decades, from Poems (1964) to Tell Me Lies (2008). His poetry’s simplicity, clarity, passion and humour show his allegiance to a vital, popular tradition embracing William Blake as well as the ballads and the blues. His most nakedly political poems -about war, Vietnam, prisons and racism -became part of the folklore of the Left, sung and recited at demonstrations and mass rallies. His childlike questioning was a constant reminder from the 60s onwards that poetry is first and foremost an assertion of the human spirit. A pacifist prophet who remained true to his heartfelt beliefs, Mitchell reported back for over half a century from a world blighted by war, compromise, double-talk and pragmatism without losing his innocence, integrity and impish sense of humour. Angela Carter described him as a ‘joyous, acrid and demotic tumbling lyricist Pied Piper determinedly singing us away from catastrophe’. ‘He has the innocence of his own experience…real inner freedom and the courage of his own music. Among all the voices of the Court, a voice as welcome as Lear’s fool…Humour that can stick deep and stay funny’ -Ted Hughes. ‘Nobody else writes like him. And it is becoming more and more evident that his achievement endures…Nobody has ever departed with such language for such a destination’ -John Berger. ‘Explosive energy, well-directed rage, undimmed idealism, a tremendous sense of how poetry can speak directly, and an innocence which is believable because it is wise’ -Andrew Motion. ‘This is Adrian Mitchell, the British Mayakovsky’ – Kenneth Tynan.
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