Basil Bunting. 1970 Interview

On 4 November 1970, Peter Quartermain and Warren Tallman record an interview with Basil Bunting primarily about his involvement with Modernist writers in London, U.K. The discussion moves between an estimation of George Moore’s novel Esther Waters, narratives about meeting Ezra Pound and Ford Madox Ford, listening to T.S. Eliot lecture on a Jacobin playwright and read bawdy poems, and more.

Apart from anecdotes about the who’s who of the early to mid-twentieth century British writing scene, Bunting also alludes to historical events, to the devastation of the World Wars and to the turn to fascism that met with rallies and resistance.

The tone of this interview is very colloquial and the questions seem to prompt answers that the interviewers already know the answers too. There is a sense of wanting to get information on the record, that Bunting is privy to important intersections of networked literary community, and that these details are enjoyable and even lightly sensational to discuss.

The speed of the recording shifts right at the end.

Content warning for dated homosexual slurs.—Klara du Plessis