But it might be time for the line to be re-used, not quite as such a back-handed compliment because Stanley Middleton certainly was a novelist whereas it's starting to look unlikely that I will be.
There is nothing wrong with being amateur. It means 'doing it for the love of it' and amateur poets are for the most part sincere and not hostage to their poetic techniques, agendas or manifestos. If Stanley produced 45 novels of immaculately thoughtful, understated, provincial humanity as not even the 'day job', which was Head of English at High Pavement Grammar School, Nottingham, the poems were his respite from doing that, like the piano or organ-playing and so he's no more a candidate for the poetry anthologies of the period than he is for musicianship prizes, none of which means that for a specific audience of those who care, this is not a valuable book to complete their insight into a worthy and worthwhile artist.
Modesty becomes him, almost to a fault. In These poems are like nail clippings, he instinctively retreats from star status,
These should be of themselves, author forgotten,
Shine, meaning accomplished, for how they're said.
His self-effacing approach is often his theme.
Philip Davis was a pupil, became a friend and eventually editor of these poems that weren't necessarily written with publication in mind. The selection is not chronological and includes extracts from two novels that feature poetry, Two Brothers and Old Age and Poetry, one published and one not. There is a suggestion that accomplishment in one area only makes one want to be something else. How many cricketers can't wait to escape their round of batting, bowling and fielding in favour of the golf course. Novelists want to be poets; poets want to be musicians; classical musicians want to be pop stars. And some poets want to be novelists but it's just too hard to do.
In In Mem E.T. Died 4 July 1994, Stan offers a glimpse of the lines he might have written more often, with Larkin's formal elegance as a template, had he concentrated more on the poems,
God
knows my friend has died, dull
with narcotics, sharp brain flat
Though those who watched more full
of pain than she who could
estimate the exact variety of the world
which extends beyond his usual remit of art appreciation, sympathetic observance of his suburban environment and intimations of mortality. God is there as much as his music, friends and humanity are, which is where he parts company with Larkin but that's his business.
We can be grateful to John Lucas at Shoestring Press, and Philip Davis, for providing this labour of love and remembrance, for those who wanted to know.
