Word: betjeman
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...John Betjeman, 52, is a gentle, witty, rumpled Englishman who has been called "the greatest bad poet now living." It would be in character if he agreed with that estimate, although he can be called "bad" only in the sense that his rhymes sometimes jingle like a song writer's and that his subjects are often deliberately homely. Literary bookmakers predict that Betjeman (rhymes with fetch-a-man) will be England's next poet laureate. By last week, his Collected Poems had caused a rush on British bookstores probably unmatched by any newly published work of poetry since...
...cause of his success is not just his billing as "the poet the Princess reads" (Margaret does). It is simply that Britons of all classes think Betjeman one of the pleasantest men alive. He himself says that he cannot understand why people buy his verse ("I don't call it poetry"), and he describes himself as "a passionate observer of the second-rate." Actually, Betjeman observes a great deal more than the second-rate. He has a unique eye for the twilight of changing times, although he is one Englishman who looks neither back in anger nor forward...
...began with a letter to the Church Times, signed by four clergymen and four laymen, among them such prominent Anglican names as Deacon Hugh Ross Williamson, Church Architect J. Ninian Comper and Poet John Betjeman. The "proposed United Christian Rally," they wrote, "has filled us with misgiving . . . We . . . think that the participation of the Church of England may give the . . . impression that the Roman Catholics are the only religious body which defends the full Catholic faith. Whatever may be the intention of the organizers, the effect can hardly fail to be an emphasis on the 'churches' with...
...English country parson, with his kindly stoop, his dear old ladies and his teatime calls, was one of the comforting and comfortable pillars of the Empire. But no longer, according to Britain's sharp-eyed, sharp-tongued minor poet, John Betjeman...
Book reviewers, says Book Reviewer John Betjeman (rhymes with ketchman), write in a code-or doubletalk-of their own. In the London Daily Herald, he let the readers in on his idea of what the critics' literary lingo really means...