We are pleased to note that one consequence of the summit meeting in Reykjavik was the release of the Russian poet Irina Ratushinskaya. There had been vigorous campaigning on her behalf in the UK since the publication earlier this year of a collection of her poems, No, I Am Not Afraid (Bloodaxe).

The Italian novelist Goffredo Parise died in August. He was born in 1929 in Vicenza: his surrealistic novels include Il Ragazzo Morto e le Comete (1951); those in a more traditional style include Il Padrone (1965, translated as Boss), whose background is the contemporary industrial world. The most recent English translation of his work was a collection of short stories, Solitudes. When asked to respond to Libération's questionaire 'Why do you write?', he simply replied 'It's something I ask myself.'

The Chilean cultural magazine LA BICICLETA has been closed down by the Pinochet administration as part of a new wave of repression. Six other magazines identified with political opposition have been closed, along with the Chilean office of Reuters news agency, its subsidiary Latin-Reuter and the Italian news agency Ansa. Journalists working for these magazines are facing charges of 'insulting the armed forces' and the editor of the weekly Análisis was abducted and shot. General Pinochet is reported as saying 'Those people talking about human rights and all those things must be expelled from the country or locked up. The war against Marxism is on.' (Index)

A Philip Larkin Memorial Appeal Fund has been established to commemorate his life and work. The principal purposes of the fund are to buy, or subvent the purchase of, modern literary manuscripts for the libraries of the United Kingdom and Ireland, and to help the University of Hull house its collection of Larkin's books and papers. Philip Larkin did much himself to promote the preservation of literary manuscripts through his Chairmanship of the Arts Council's National Manuscript Committee from 1972 until the dissolution of the committee in 1984. The Secretary of the Memorial Fund is B. C. Bloomfield at 14 Store Street, London WC1E 7DG

In advance of the centennial celebrations of Fernando Pessoa due in 1988, once again the French are ordering these things rather well. Last year saw the Pompidou Centre exhibition and its fascinating catalogue. This year has provided a three-day 'Rencontre autour de Fernando Pessoa' at the Foundation Royaumont and a welter of new translations by Emmanuel Hocquard and others from Éditions Royaumont, Éditions Une and Éditions de la Différence. In the spring of 1987 Gallimard will issue Armand Guibert's translations of the poems of 'Albert Caeiro' and 'Alvaro de Campos' in their Poesie collection. Finally Christian Bourgeois plan a seven-volume edition of Pessoa's complete works, the first volume of which is also scheduled for next spring. Still, London had an illustrated lecture this October (Pessoa: the Shattered Mirror) to reflect British interest so far. (A.M.)

Two new literary magazines have emerged in Yorkshire. One THE WIDE SKIRT is a twice-yearly magazine of poetry, available from 8 Melbeck Court, Chapeltown, Sheffield. Its first issue includes work by Anne Cluysenaar, Ian McMillan, John Killick and Mick North (recently awarded a Gregory Prize). The new journal called THE NORTH includes poetry, prose and photographs in its first issue, with contributions from Jeffrey Wainwright, Harry Guest, Carol Ann Duffy, and Jon Silkin. THE NORTH comes from 63 Dalton Bank Road, Colne Bridge, Huddersfield. A valuable listing for such magazines is SMALL PRESSES & LITTLE MAGAZINES OF THE UK AND IRELAND. It's not a descriptive listing but it is updated regularly and seems to be the only one of its kind, now into its fourth printing. It can be ordered (£1 includes postage) from the Welsh Arts Council 'Oriel' bookshop at 53 Charles Street, Cardiff.

PNR is happy to publish the following note from one of the editors of a new poetry magazine. Like her three fellow-editors, she has been a contributor to our pages. We're assured the magazine will be different in kind from PNR. We welcome the first number of NUMBERS

NUMBERS, a new poetry magazine, is to be launched this autumn. The four editors, John Alexander, Alison Rimmer, Peter Robinson and Clive Wilmer have for several years, been concerned with many aspects of poetry; writing, translating, editing, publishing and selling it. All four have been associated with the organisation of successive Cambridge Poetry Festivals and between them have a comprehensive and critical knowledge of what has been developing - or nor developing - in contemporary poetry in the last decade and more. Although the magazine will be produced in Cambridge, its boundaries will be much wider and it is hoped that the eventual readership will be as international as the contributers.

The editors' tastes and interests naturally diverge but a common sympathy for the promotion of poetry and what is good and lasting in the work of new and established authors will result in a magazine which will be varied but harmonious. Readers will therefore be offered a comprehensive and stimulating selection of current writing.

The principal aim will be to publish poetry. The recent emphasis on criticism, in some journals, has meant, quite simply, that the space allowed to poets has diminished and that the balance has been tipped in favour of those who write about writing. Editorial policy in producing Numbers will be to publish several poems by contributing writers or to offer longer works either in their entirety or in substantial sections. It will also be policy to give due emphasis to writing in translation, and this will include contemporary translations of work from any literary period as well as work by living authors writing in languages other than English.

Prose articles by poets on related topics or extracts from biographies by or about poets will also be included and it is hoped that in future issues the relationship between poetry and the visual arts will be explored.

The first issue of NUMBERS will include poems by R. L. Barth, Thom Gunn, Seamus Heaney, Attila Jozsef, Bill Manhire, Matthew Mead, Ken Smith and Timothy Steele. There will be prose works by Vittorio Sereni, Nicole Ward Jouve and three extracts from Elaine Feinstein's biography of Marina Tsvetayeva, A Captive Lion.

Copies of the October issue will be available from bookshops or directly from the editorial office at 6 Kingston Street, Cambridge CB1 2NU, price £3.95, plus 60p postage, inland, £1.95, overseas. A subscription for six issues is available at £20, post-free. The US rate will be $8.85 per issue, including postage or $30 for six issues, post free.
A.R.

Competitions again: the Yorkshire Open Poetry Competition advises us of its closing date (even open competitions have closing dates - or does 'open' refer to poetic structure?) as January 17th next year. The Arts Centre at Micklegate, York, is the source of information for competitors and it's there that George Macbeth will preside as 'the sole adjudicator' - for one must not be too open about these things.

PETERLOO POETS announces its second competition for new poetry with £1,350 of prizes, including a special prize for Afro-Caribbean and Asian writing, and publication in Poetry Matters, Peterloo Poets' house journal. The deadline for entries is February 2nd 1987 and details for entry may be had from Treovis Farm Cottage, Upton Cross, Liskeard, Cornwall. Harry Chambers - the founder, editor and moving force at Peterloo - is joined as judge for the competition by Fred D'Aguiar, John Mole and Vernon Scannell.

Two series of lectures which began this October will interest many PN REVIEW readers. The Poetry Society and the University of London's Extra-Mural Department are presenting a set of lectures on modern European poets: Michael Hamburger is lecturing on Paul Celan, John Pilling on Eugenio Montale, and there are lectures on Apollinaire, Brecht, Lorca, Holub and Mandelstam. Details are available from (01) 373 7861. The Institute of Contemporary Arts begins a series of lectures on 'Patterns in Contemporary Popular Literature' covering such topics as the narratives of fashion, sexual politics and science fiction, black writing, the popular Press and popular taste. (Regular readers of PNR will admire our resolve to mention both of these series in the same paragraph.)

A Dog's Nose is the title of Taxus Press's elegant booklet in the nature of a toast to Basil Bunting. Michael Farley has put together poems by fifteen writers to whom - as he suggests - 'Bunting's work matters as Pound's or Zukofsky's did to him' and who in very different ways celebrate Bunting's poetry. (Taxus is at 412 Hinckley Road, Leicester LE3 0WA.)

The Publishers' Association has provided a set of guidelines for British exhibitors at the Saudi Book Fair next January. Notes are offered about the sensitivity of the Saudi censorship authorities when it comes to books about religion, philosophy, sociology, art and sex. Particular warning is given about cook books with alcoholic beverages in their recipes, and chemistry books describing methods of distillation or ways of making bombs. Encyclopaedias referring to Israel as a recognised state will also prove problematic. Re-assuringly an arrangement has been made with the Dar Al-Kabas Publishing & Distribution company of Riyadh, whose proprietor is His Royal Highness Prince Khaled Bin Saad Bin Abdulaziz, through whose good offices 'trouble free clearance' with the authorities can be obtained.

'A new imprint on a book gathers character through the years, and it is our hope that readers will come to know ours and perhaps to feel a certain friendship for it.' This was a claim made in the first catalogue of Farrar, Straus and Giroux which is this year celebrating its fortieth year of publishing. By its tenth anniversary the catalogue listed Moravia, Graves, Carlo Levi, Max Brod, Gide, Pavese, Mauriac, Eliot, Berryman, Edmund Wilson, Jean Stafford, John Cheever. Distinguished then, the list has built a continuity of international stature. Perhaps it's churlish to note that a recent press release avers that 'with Sunburst, we will be aggressively selling children's books' - after all, children are a market and markets are to be targeted and targets are objects for aggression. . . Give or take a press release, however, PNR is only too glad to celebrate the anniversary, anniversary.

PNR is not the reactionary, monarchist organ so labelled by a recent contributor to NEW LEFT REVIEW, as a glance at the editorial mast-head should make clear. However, its position on the political spectrum doesn't yet encompass a joint editorship with the paper of the Revolutionary Communist Party. Mike Freeman the editor of THE NEXT STEP is not the co-editor of PNR. Despite recent changes, that's a step we haven't taken.

The readers of Robert Julian's report on ';BENJAMIN in Paris' (PNR 34) will be interested to know that the papers from the colloquium have now been published as Walter Benjamin et Paris, edited by Heinz Wismann (Editions du Cerf, 1, 033pp, 335F). A group at the CNRS is working on the subject of cultural connections between France and Germany: the fascination of Paris for German-speaking Jewish authors is notable - Heinrich Heine, Ludwig Börne (whose bicentenary is celebrated this year), and of course Paul Celan.

The 1986 John Florio Prize for the translation of a work of contemporary Italian literature into English has been awarded to AVRIL BARDONI for her translation of The Wine-Dark Sea by Leonardo Sciascia, published by Carcanet Press The award was presented by the Italian Ambassador Bruno Bottai at the Italian Institute on October 7th. This book represents Avril Bardoni's first essay in full-scale literary translation. Prior to this, her work had lain primarily in the field of vocal music: she has translated some 40 opera libretti, many Lieder and song recitals and a number of texts from the Renaissance period. A free-lance translator, her most recent work was the translation of two novellas by Natalia Ginzburg, also to be published by Carcanet. The John Florio Prize is awarded every two years on the advice of a panel of distinguished judges. This country's longest-established translation prize, it was set up in 1963 by the joint offices of the Translators Association, the Italian Institute and the British-Italian Society.

The editors apologise for the transposition of lines in John Ash's essay 'Reading Music', PNR 51, p.35, column one. The correct Version is printed below.

Like Mahler, Henze is unwilling to reject anything, and in his Tristan - a visionary 'prelude' for piano, tapes and orchestra - we encounter a dance of the Florentine Renaissance, a deafeningly distorted version of Chopin's funeral march, pianistic evocations of Trakl, the bells of Venice, the opening of Brahms' First Symphony (twice), a suite of dances somewhat after the manner of Schoenberg, and a child narrating (on tape) the death of Isolde to the sound of an amplified heartbeat. The work is, thus, a grandiose attempt to sum up the whole German romantic tradition and a prime example of Mahlerian 'symbolic organization'. And, of course, it is the product of an intensely allusive, literary way of thinking.

The 'new tonality' that has caused such a stir in recent years is already present in Henze's music of the early 1960s. His use of tonality in Cantata della fiaba estrema of 1963 is no simple reversion: it owes nothing to conservative, academic prescription and it involves no rejection of the Second Viennese School.

The Wales Anti-Apartheid Movement has published an anthology POETS AGAINST APARTHEID. Among the writers who took up the invitation to contribute were John Ormond, John Tripp, R. S. Thomas, Dannie Abse and Robert Minhinnick. Many of the poems are polemical or satirical, and appropriately so, but the campaigning statements take a variety of forms. The book is available from 43 Glenroy Street, Roath, Cardiff, and - as about half of the poems are in Welsh - translations are also available from that address.

Laura (Riding) Jackson has now sent us a full and corrected version of her letter in PNR 51, which we are pleased to print as follows:
 
SIR: It interested me to find myself referred to in a review-article published in your issue number 49 (the parentheses removed from the 'Riding' part of the name I have used authorially since the early 'forties) 'as having criticized this journal for not being selective enough'. I have, indeed, communicated, as one friendly to the Review, my disheartenment over the poems-presentations abounding in it, issue on issue. But I did not intend to be understood as criticizing Editor and Staff for not being 'selective enough'. I regard the poetic production of the present period as exemplifying how a point was reached in human responsibility, as language embraces it, at which poetry revealed that it stopped short in itself of what was linguistically envisioned in it. Poetry now, as written, which is as masculinist or feminist attitudizing in the role of a private self as of some spectacularly public interest, not only opposes itself to itself: it blocks the trail of hope of fulfilment that was built with its aspiring theatricalities. It has been bent against its direction of human expectancy to stop the human short in itself with faded flourishes of last and last word sent resounding back upon a stasis of the human, a stasis neither glad, bad, mad, sad - just stasis.

And the making and circulating of all this static poems-production does not stop. It is self-perpetuating, a spell upon itself who would dare meddle with? - what if, the stasis stopped, the stoppage broken off, language took hold of human speaking hostage thus to this din of protective saying something?

I have friends who are poets. Sometimes they send me poems of theirs. I would rather respond by commenting on poetry than, specifically, on the poems, and I do so as I feel equal to the general attempt. I quote what I wrote to a friend who had sent me two poems, with a variant of one, a little before my writing of this letter.

My 'position' about poetry becomes intensifiedly same with my sense of a Crisis, in human being and being, of language-loyalty to human being and being. Poetry I regard as no longer on the side of the essential language-aim - there are no more sides, but only the unmet necessity. Argument about the necessity that language gathers in for meeting has been superseded by the actuality of necessity - which throws its light on the superfluous mere anticipatory, promissory, character of poetry, especially now, when there is no forward-looking impetus left in the human vision, the human vision now staring into itself with closed eyes, bent on seeing, not a necessitous next, only a fictitious self-repetitive all-immediate.

I do not, then, complain of what is presented in PN Review of poems as not having been subjected to enough selectivity. I feel as I have described here about the entire poems-production and poems-presentation record of this period. I do not expect anyone to 'agree' with me. I understand the predicament of those who prefer something to nothing. But when the make-up of a something preferred to nothing is extensively nothing, a preference for nothing may leave the door open for the advent of the excluded necessary.

With assurance that I applaud PN Review for being especially concerned with poetry, which presaged what could be hoped for from our having language to hope with, I am
Laura (Riding) Jackson