Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Poet and doctor from South Wales, known for his poetry and medical career.
On the island
Eight records
Piano Sonata in D major, Op. 10 No. 3
Well, I I've come to like piano music a great deal since, so I'd like uh Beethoven's Piano Sonata in D major, if I may.
String Quintet in C major, D. 956
Amadeus Quartet, William Pleeth
Well, uh it was really in the late forties that I knew a friend called Jack Ashman and uh people came into his studio in Saint John's Wood, uh among them the Amadeus Quartet, and uh I was introduced to chamber music there, and I think there was the first piece of chamber music that I really enjoyed.
Well, I I like the tune, I like uh Kurt Wahl's uh music and uh I like Brecht's lyrics, though uh I must say uh the fact that she sings in German, a language I can't just to it, as it were.
Piano Concerto No. 9 in E-flat major, K. 271 (second movement)
I do like the Second movement in particular.
Violin Concerto in E major, BWV 1042
I went to a film once in the Academie Cinema. of a Polish film by Monk, and it was the first time I really heard uh the double concerto and then I bought the record and found on the same record this particular concerto and I've loved it ever since.
String Quintet in G minor, K. 516Favourite
Amadeus Quartet, Cecil Aronowitz
Well, since you call me a second movement man, can we have the beginning in this case? There was no element of criticism in that. Who would you like to play it? Well why not uh the Amadeus Quartet, since I uh know some of them and play chess occasionally with uh Ziggy Nistle, if that's not name-dropping.
String Quartet No. 12 in E-flat major, Op. 127
Beethoven's quartet in E flat major, that's uh one, two, seven, uh probably the most accessible of the late Beethoven quartets.
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:36Have you ever daydreamed about being a Robinson Crusoe?
No, never. I you know, I think it was Dunn who said, uh, each man is an island, so I dreamt I'm a whole man, so I suppose I'm in Ireland in that sense.
Presenter asks
5:48Your family is Jewish, but you went to a Catholic school. How did that work out?
It worked out okay. It it it in fact um it had greater number of advantages. For instance, uh when people went into uh prayers in the first lesson of the day, uh I was uh left on my own to um to do anything I liked.
Presenter asks
11:15Can your poetic muse be summoned at will, or is the urge likely to crop up at inconvenient moments?
No, alas, I I don't know how to write the next poem. I wish I did. I have to wait for that old fashioned word inspiration.
Presenter asks
12:21How would you describe your verse?
The keepsakes
The book
The Collected Poems of W.H. Auden
W.H. Auden
I'd like to know that I'm in the twentieth century and I'd like to take somebody who is various.
Well, it's it's more conversational than lyric, especially in in latter years, and I have said that I would like my poetry to be lucid, or apparently lucid, to be a deception in fact, to be as translucent as water, but when you got into the water you couldn't, as it were, quite touch bottom.
Presenter asks
16:00Do you find as a Welsh poet that there's sometimes someone looking over your shoulder, that every Welsh poet must be either a disciple of or behave like Dylan Thomas?
Yes, I I suppose so, but uh though I think that Dillon Thomas's reputation is gradually receding. I think this was so at one time, so that uh indeed the first time I went to the United States of America, which was in nineteen sixty four, I was invited to go thereby John Malcolm Brynnan, who in fact was responsible for Dylan Thomas's tours, and I think he asked me because he was Ten years after Dylan Thomas's death, as it were. … People said you look like Dylan Thomas and I don't. They said I read like Dylan Thomas, which I certainly don't. And they said, you write like Dylan Thomas, which I certainly don't.
Presenter asks
19:16How are you with open air pursuits? How are you going to manage on this island? Can you look after yourself?
No, not really. I don't think so. But I'm an optimist. I I think uh somebody would uh look after me up there. … My father used to fish. I used to fish with him and uh I I suppose I could um force myself to to do these sort of things, but uh I I'm quite sure I would be rescued after uh quite a brief time.
“No, never. I you know, I think it was Dunn who said, uh, each man is an island, so I dreamt I'm a whole man, so I suppose I'm in Ireland in that sense.”
“Simply that it transports me.”
“I would like my poetry to be lucid, or apparently lucid, to be a deception in fact, to be as translucent as water, but when you got into the water you couldn't, as it were, quite touch bottom.”
“People said you look like Dylan Thomas and I don't. They said I read like Dylan Thomas, which I certainly don't. And they said, you write like Dylan Thomas, which I certainly don't.”