I, of all people: An autobiography of youth

by James Kirkup

Art, Poetry, Biography, Literary Criticism

Genres: Nonfiction

262 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 1988

About the author

James Falconer Kirkup, FRSL was a prolific English poet, translator and travel writer. He was brought up in South Shields, and educated at South Shields Secondary School and Durham University. He wrote over 30 books, including autobiographies, novels and plays. He became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1962.

Reviews

[Andrew H · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kirkup (if he is remembered today) was the poet whose poem on a gay Christ caused the 1976 Gay News blasphemy trial. This volume deals with his life in the 1950s when he was the first ever UK poet-in-residence at the University of Leeds. There are some interesting moments, but Kirkup comes across as an arrogant and misogynistic figure. (His time at Leeds was largely a waste of time, in his view, as the female students showed a "surplus" of uselessness). His tenure was cut short and here the matter is left hanging: was it because he showed little interest in teaching his students or because he showed little interest in sleeping with Professor Bonamy Dobree? Kirkup writes with delicious horror at this drunken seduction and great delight in exposing the secret side of the famous, stuffy professor who knew Pound and Eliot, and was the Colonel in charge of the Leeds Officers' Training Corp). A line of self-righteous bitchiness runs through I, of All people, which wears thin quickly.