'If Dunstan Thompson had died young, a few more people might recognize his name today. I’d like to think I might have pulled one of his early books -- Poems (1943) or Lament for the Sleepwalker (1947) -- from a dusty library shelf in my teen years, when, eager to understand my gay poetic heritage, I first fell in love with the work of iconic writers like Walt Whitman, W.H. Auden, and Frank O’Hara. ...
'Born in 1918 to pair of devout Catholics in New London, Connecticut, Thompson grew up in Washington, DC, and Annapolis, Maryland, later going on to study English Literature at Harvard. Just shy of graduating, Thompson left the school, apparently disappointed (and unimpressed) by the department. He was, by all accounts, a confident man, though he seems, in the poems and critical essays collected here, to have struggled throughout his life with his own strong sense of disillusionment.
'The early poems are fantastic — almost uniformly homoerotic, both subtle and bold in turn, often sad (“Death is a soldier and afraid/ like you. If he could talk, he’d tell/ the world how he was hurt.”) Both Poems and Lament for the Sleepwalker received favorable reviews from a number of publications, including Poetry (though Thompson had derided the magazine in Vice-Versa, his own short-lived literary journal). The self-indulgence of which The Nation accuses him is certainly evident in his sometimes heavy-handed conceits, but the “private symbols” (could the reviewer have meant queer?) and unceasingly self-aware wit strike me as incredibly modern. Thompson, a proud formalist, knows when he is being clever. ...
'With his return to Catholicism, Thompson’s work underwent an abrupt change in subject and style, the daring eroticism gone, the distinct voice flattened. Though he continued to write prolifically throughout his life, his reignited sense of religious obligation spelled the end of his literary stardom. His poems stopped being accepted for publication, only a few new ones finding their way into print. In the house he and Philip Trower, Thompson’s literary executor, former lover, and lifelong companion, shared on the English seaside, Dunstan Thompson retreated into the annals of literary obscurity a changed man.
'I’m a young, gay writer, and because of this, I want history to remember Dunstan Thompson a certain way—not, in this case, the way he wanted. I prefer the image of him swishing about some upscale Manhattan cocktail party, rubbing elbows with T.S. Eliot and whomever else he was eager to impress, drinking a little too much and flirting with the cutest boy in the place.
'It pains me to think of this brilliant, groundbreaking poet grown old and irrelevant, cloistered in a cottage by the sea and denying himself physical intimacy with the man he’d loved for thirty years. It breaks my heart, too, that he insisted Trower never allow his first two books to be republished, that he wanted, more than anything, for his later work to be remembered as his one truly important literary contribution.' -- Jameson Fitzpatrick
_____
Gallery
D.T. with his parents on liner to Europe, circa 1929
D.T. front row, far left. Canterbury School, Conn. c. 1934
The Poet, circa 1942. Drawing by Alfonso Ossorio
D.T., London 1943-4. Photograph by Vogue, shortly after the publication of his first book.
The Rocket House, Cley-next-the-Sea. D.T.'s home 1948-51
D.T. Grand Canal, Venice. November 1950
______________
from Word Portrait
by Philip Trower
I don’t know whether [Dunstan's] birth was in any way difficult, but it left him with birth marks at the back of his neck and down one leg and a slight tremor in one hand - the right, I think. The tremor was not a serious affliction, and it was not there all the time. But it became noticeable if he was nervous or upset, and he was always self-conscious about it, at least during the years I knew him. If he was meeting new people, for instance, and they offered him a drink the tremor might start and he would sometimes spill the drink as he was handed it leaving his host or hostess with the impression that this was not the first drink he had had that day. Since there came a time when he drank quite a lot this embarrassed him all the more.
His physical appearance was another cause of embarrassment to him, at least as a youth and young adult. It was not that he was ill-looking. As he approached middle-age, and his face and body filled out, he was even positively good-looking, as you can see from the photographs taken by Vogue when his first volume of poems appeared, and there is a nobility in the drawing by Alfonso Ossorio, which although done when he was in his twenties, anticipates in a remarkable way what he looked like when he was dying and immediately after death. But up to his mid-twenties, he was certainly unusual looking.
It would have been difficult for anyone seeing him for the first time not to notice and be struck by the large slightly protruberant eyes with heavy lids coupled with a rather prominent nose above full lips and a slightly receding chin. As a young man he was also exceptionally thin with long loosely knit limbs and long expressive thin-fingered hands. The immediate impression was of a nervous highly intelligent antelope whose movements were not fully under its control. Throughout his life he had difficulty in co-ordinating his legs and arms, something which made playing games next to impossible. He was equally bad at catching balls and aiming straight, and the nuns who taught him to write seem never to have managed to get him to hold a pen properly. His handwriting remained strangely awkward and crabbed until he tried to improve it after he had been at Cley for some time.
In addition to being physically far from robust, he was emotionally and nervously highly strung. This too could have been partly due to problems at birth. ... After his death, more than one person, including one of his closest friends, admitted to me that there were moments when they were frightened of him. It is a not unusual reaction of average people, like you and me, confronted with a powerful intelligence linked to strong convictions. The paradox is that physically, as he would himself have admitted, he was for the most part, or except when on an emotional or spiritual “high”, anything but a model of fortitude. ...
I don’t want to exaggerate the degree of his gifts. If I say that I sometimes had the bewildering impression of at one moment listening to Burke or Dr Johnson, at another to Sydney Smith, Wilde or Horace Walpole, at yet another to Newman, or Keats, I am not trying to suggest that he was some kind of world genius, or that he was necessarily on a level with any of these famous names. I believe he was a poet of exceptional talent and insight. But Parnassus has many “mansions” and they are of all shapes and sizes. What I am trying to do is convey the particular combination of qualities, often startlingly contradictory and sometimes at war with each other, that made him the person he was.
D.T. and Philip Trower outside the front door of The Lodge, c. 1949
___
Book
Pleiades/Unsung Masters Series
'Largely unknown today, Dunstan Thompson was once one of the most celebrated young poets in America. Published during and shortly after WWII, his often harrowing, homoerotic poems—many set on the battlefields and in the hospitals of the European Theater—were compared favorably to the work of W. H. Auden, Hart Crane, and Dylan Thomas. Then, as far as the general public was concerned, Dunstan Thompson disappeared. In a series of essays, interviews, letters, and clippings, this book traces Thompson's journey from a wildly successful literary enfant terrible, through his strong Catholic reawakening, and into his later years as a writer of mature, meditative, largely unpublished poetry. The first volume in the Unsung Masters Series, this book also includes a generous selection of Thompson’s very best poetry.' -- Pleiades
Excerpts
This Loneliness for You is Like the Wound
This loneliness for you is like the wound
That keeps the soldier patient in his bed,
Smiling to soothe the general on his round
Of visits to the somehow not yet dead;
Who, after he has pinned a cross above
The bullet-bearing heart, when told that this
Is one who held the hill, bends down to give
Folly a diffident embarrassed kiss.
But once that medaled moment passes, O,
Disaster, charging on the fever chart,
Wins the last battle, takes the heights, and he
Succumbs before his reinforcements start.
Yet now, when death is not a metaphor,
Who dares to say that love is like the war?
Introspection
My eye aches, and I
Am too tired not to care,
As the dust glitters by
In the reflective air.
Poems unknown
Are hard to bear.
My eye aches - the eye
Is a mirror where
Self-deceptions try
Vainly to disappear.
Things I have done
Are no longer sure.
My eye aches, but I
Must see through the tear,
Take trouble to spy
Out light from the glare.
Youth has gone:
But age is not here.
This Tall Horseman, My Young Man of Mars
This tall horseman, my young man of Mars,
Scatters the gold dust from his hair, and takes
Me to pieces like a gun. The myth forsakes
Him slowly. Almost mortal, he shows the scars
Where medals of honor, cut-steel stars,
Pin death above the heart. But bends, but breaks
In his hand, my love, whose wrecked machinery makes
Time, the inventor, weep through a world of wars.
Guilt like a rust enamels me. I breed
A poison not this murdering youth may dare
In one drop of blood to battle. No delight
Is possible. Only at parting do we need
Each other; together, we are not there
At all. Love, I farewell you out of sight.
Youth
Only the old are grateful. Not the young,
Who snatch their present like wild birds that feed
In winter; thankless, bear it off. Among
Those avid mutes, sometimes the wounded cede
Some gratitude, for they are old too soon.
Not so the-strong-winged ones, whose jewel-like eyes
Glitter with instant fame, perpetual noon;
Who lavish on themselves a lifetime’s prize.
Yet see them now as what they are - in flight
From childhood, eager, frightened, soaring off
To lonely falls, travail with traps, and night
Ambuscades. Those cygnets, swanned by grief,
Will be so grateful, it will frighten you,
Remembering yourself as thankless too.
Songs of the Soldier
Death is a soldier and afraid
Like you. If he could talk, he’d tell
The world how he was hurt. This sad
Faced, grave eyed, beautiful as steel
Young man, his sex a star, has pride
That sharp, unshadowed, surgeon’s light
By which heroes are turned inside
Out, their flamboyant guts put straight
Or lopped off.
Poem
Eros, his plumes bedraggled by the snow,
Came on me walking through the frozen park.
‘Well met,’ he said, ‘the day is dying now,
So we shall talk together in the dark.’
But there was light enough to see his face,
Those eyes of ice, that mouth impassioned stone,
The whole expressionless, as though a place
Where happiness and suffering were not known.
An Incident during the War
There in the crumbling gaunt Red Cross hotel,
Its race-track grandeur spurned by Army feet,
I lingered in the lounge among the few
Sad soldiers there, and fell asleep.
I woke at ten and found myself in hell -
My time was overstayed: I would not get
Away to London, but would have to keep
To barracks: ‘No more week-end pass for you!’
I ran the whole way back, along that street
Of sleazy stucco villas to the gate;
In darkness met the guard I never knew.
He shone his flashlight on my pass: ‘You’re late,
Soldier, and I’ll have to turn this in.’
His voice was low: we might have been two friends
Together in the same mistake. ‘I’m due
To go to London, and it matters. Can
You help me?’ Even now that minute tends
From him to me, from me to him. He shone
The flashlight on my face, then clicked it off.
‘I shouldn’t do this, pal, but, okay, you’re
On time. Now get the hell in there. Be sure
To have a drink for me in London.’ Safe
Again, I said: ‘Thanks, thanks a lot.’ And softly
Walked away. I never knew his face.
I never knew his name. What he had done,
An unguarded kindness, made me feel the grace
Of being brothers. And that war he won.
Sceptic
The truth, he thought, was what he thought about,
While he declined, he thought, to nothingness.
This thought, he feared, might somehow lead to doubt,
And he, when dying thoughtlessly profess
Belief in something other than this truth.
Temptation stalked him like the dog he took
On walks to ease his restlessness. In youth
He had denied; in youth had dared a book.
A second. And a third. Then more. They lined
His past as they had lined his anguished brow,
Which had become a mappa mundi, where
The curious could plot his searchings, find
How he had fought his first belief, who now,
Almost apostate, breathed a childhood air.
Portrait Busts
Hard men - you see their faces everywhere:
Across those desolate desks, or, masklike, at
Some rostrum: lines and furrows, marble eyes;
Old faces, seamed and pitted like the moon.
And these were children, graceful, debonair,
Who fed their rabbit, hugged a clinging cat;
Later were boys, with poems like kites, and wise
With a young wisdom, whistling a small tune.
All gone, with even memories twisted round
To show them now as always - artful, shrewd,
Quick at the means to do another down.
Lost, lost that innocence, and lost the sound
Of gaiety in voices cracked and crude
From lying. Gone. Lost. Instead that iron frown.
*
p.s. Hey. ** Squeaky, Hi, D! I'm very happy to hear that all is good and vice versa. Lovely Antonio memory and ritual. Thank you, pal. Lots of love. ** L@rstonovich, Loganberry, nice. Super paragraph, man. International and interstellar hugs. ** Chris Goode, Hi, Chris! Oh, my pleasure, thank you, and a blush for your stack props too. Amazing to think of you thinking so deeply about Bresson and to be able to share in the evidence. And your thoughts are very commiserate with mine, of course, I guess, but with a grace that may happen in the thoughts themselves, I'm not sure, but does a disappearing act rather than be transcribed. Bresson's ideas on 'models' vs. actors influenced my characters in pretty much every way possible. I suspect that's where his huge influence on me is most manifest. Trying to translate his collaboration with the people who become models in his films into a collaboration between me and my, I don't know, devised personas (?), is tough, although I think I've metabolized a workable strategy after all these years, and I guess it involves a kind of responsibility I feel towards the people in my life who are at the centers of my fictions, and who may or may not be represented as characters therein, and that responsibility ends up being about me being responsible towards myself necessarily. I don't know. It's very hard to parse and talk about. And you're right about the fount of the necessary event, absolutely. It's very useful to think of the event as the inventor for me. Another Bresson influence has to do with 'amateurism', with the 'unskilled' and the 'unprepared', and the idea of characters who are technically ill-suited to be characters in the traditional sense, who are charismatic rather than manipulative or something. I don't know if that makes a lot of sense. Bresson really tongue ties me, which is why I've never moved on from his work, I guess. Anyway, it's a joy to read your thinking on him, it really is. Abramovic, yikes. I don't envy that infiltration, but I would be super interested to hear what you come up with about her. Likable unfamiliar patterns sounds great. Other than weird, ongoing bad sleep issues, I'm doing pretty well, thank you. New novel happening, a few collabs in progress, summer is over, a few trips/adventures coming soon. Ha ha, the Smiths/Peanuts thing, great. Everyone, the majestic Chris Goode kindly links any of us who might be intrigued to Smiths plus Peanuts aka 'This Charming Charlie'. Big love to you, man. ** HyeMin, Hi. I understand about Davis. I always think that not connecting with a writer or artist of obvious talent is maybe even more interesting and telling than the connections. Like my not getting or being interested in Pasolini, for instance. The disconnections feel very alive. That was a lot of reading you had to do. I hope it went pleasantly or productively. I'll try not to get sick. I'm generally pretty good at not getting sick so far. ** Gary gray, That does make sense. I looked up 'DoaC', and, yeah, sure, I was just spacing out. Okay, that story sounds really, really interesting. Is that what you showed to the workshop? Really great to heat that it worked out so very well, and if you're headlong into working on your story, it was the best it could have been, obviously. Awesome. Lurk productively, and I'll look forward to seeing you on the other side. My weekend was quiet but fine, basically. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben. Ah, a persona, I see. I've never been good with personas. I guess that's why my few months-long flirtation with becoming an actor when I was a kid ended disastrously. Yeah, getting on with it. What the fuck else is there, I guess? ** James, Hi, James. Yeah, I'm still struggling with sleep. I have better and worse sleeps, but not good ones. I really think the only cure would be going to some other time zone and confusing my body clock by getting jet lag, but I won't be doing that until about a month from now, unfortunately. Oh, man, that's awful and ridiculous that you still haven't gotten that California job. Jesus. Obviously, I hope there's some solution, and there must be, but I don't what what it would be. Wild Turkey is a killer. I can't drink dark liquors. They destroy me, even a few sips, for some reason. I hope things get infinitely better for you instantaneously somehow, man. Much love to you too. ** Misanthrope, Errol Flynn? Weird. Continued huge ugh on poor LS's situation. I think that need must be primal and intuitive and all, yeah. Makes sense. I feel like most people I've talked to about that issue admit that they'd like to produce a genetically similar being. LS is sharp. He has always seemed so in your tellings. He seems to be absenting FB these days unless his posts are getting lost in my news feed. ** David Ehrenstein, Hi. You don't like Morris's work because he was a bit of a control freak in one interview you did with him and because he was a 'troublesome' audience member? It doesn't take much. You simplify what happened between Morris and Herzog. They're old friends and comrades with a very complicated history, and the shoe eating thing was inspired by a whole lot of longstanding interpersonal issues. There are plenty of recountings of their friendship, fallings out, and why the shoe eating thing happened, etc. out there to read. I was relieved to read that John Greyson is safe this morning, and hopefully he'll be released very quickly. That was quite scary. ** Ken Baumann, Ken! Glad you dug the Morris Day. Those frames from EarthBound that you posted on FB made me really excited. I'd play it if I could, and, since that's unlikely for numerous reasons, I'm more dying than ever for your book. Other than endless sleep problems, I'm doing quite well, thank you. And you? Writing? Progress on the school entry thing? Fun? Food? ** Steevee, Hi. I'm really pleased that you're a fellow lover of 'Fast, Cheap and Out of Control'. Such a great film, and very undervalued. Herzog and Morris are friends, quite old if complicated friends. No, I've read about that Kendrick Lamar verse, but I haven't heard it. I'll go find it. Thanks! ** Rewritedept, Blogger seemed to have been particularly hungry and heartless yesterday. My weekend was okay, pretty low-key. It seems weird to me that a lad your age would even know who Errol Flynn is. I'm mega-older than you, and I barely know who he is/was. I love avocados like every sane person does. I read somewhere once that, statistically, people who worry that they'll never have a relationship and will die alone tend to more often get married and have lots of kids than people who have relationships in their plans. P-Funk, or what's left of them, are still touring? Oh, right, I think they played here a while back. I saw them a couple of times back when. They were, duh, incredible, but that was, gosh, decades ago. Good luck in the studio. That sounds sweet. ** Sypha, I apologize profusely on behalf of Blogger. ** Right. There's a movement afoot to resurrect the work of Dunstan Thompson, and I thought I would do my part today. See you tomorrow.