Friday 25 September 2009

J A Lindon

I have been spending half an eternity looking for references to J A Lindon on the web. I first became curious of his work after recalling, from many years ago, of a spoof of "Poem in October" called "Poem in Tubwater."

It appears that many of his poems were only published in newspapers. However, he is credited with creating the first vocabularyclept poem!! This is when a poet is given the words from a poem, in alphabetical order, a,a,a, an, and, etc. and given the task of creating a new poem. He also did this 'blind' as due to an oversight he did not know what the previous poem was.

Although accedited as from Weybridge, he contributed to the 'Word Ways' magazine of Butler University, Indianappolis, where he wrote acrostic poetry as well as articles on poetic problems.

He was also very 'into' palindromic poems (read forwards/backwards by letter, word or line.)


Here is a spooky example of his (line) palindrome poetry (to be read at halloween!)

DOPPELGANGER

Entering the lonely house with my wife
I saw him for the first time
Peering furtively from behind a bush -
Blackness that moved,
A shape amid the shadows,
A momentary glimpse of gleaming eyes
Revealed in the ragged moon.
A closer look (he seemed to turn) might have
Put him to flight forever-
I dared not
(For reasons that I failed to understand)
Though I knew I should act at once.

I puzzled over it, hiding alone,
Watching the woman as she neared the gate.
Night after night.
Night after night
He came, and I saw him crouching,
Watching the woman as she neared the gate.
I puzzled over it, hiding alone-
Though I knew I should act at once,
For reasons that I failed to understand
I dared not
Put him to flight forever.

A closer look (he seemed to turn) might have
Revealed in the ragged moon
A momentarty glimpse of gleaming eyes
A shape amid the shadows,
Blackness that moved.

Peering furtively from behind a bush,
I saw him for the first time,
Entering the lonely house with my wife.



PS Is the fear of palindromes really aibohphobia?

7 comments:

Barry Lindon Evans said...

J A Lindon was my fathers cousin. A brilliant scholar he graduated from Cambridge in the 1930s. He was a talented poet who specialised in comic and childrens verse.
He was also described as the major muse of the english palindrome and has a chapter dedicated to him in Palindromes and Anagrams by Bergerson.
He invented the Poetic and word unit palindrome.
He was also a mathematical and puzzle expert.and did did much of the pioneer work on Magic squares.
He was a friend of Martin Gardner and corresponded with him for many years.

thecybermuse said...

Thank you! I have already ordered the above book. I am curious to know why there is no collection of all of JA's writing published, as it would be a fascinating work? Any e-mails are welcome..

Barry Lindon Evans said...

I am currently gathering together as much material as i can find. With a view to publishing a book of JA lindons work.
Watch this space.

Jon Richfield said...

I assume you already know that several poems of J. A. Lindon appear in "Yet More Comic & Curious Verse" J.M.Cohen Penguin books 1959. In the unlikely event that you did not, you can email me at jonrichfield@gmail.com and I can scan them in for you. Sorry, I don't know offhand of any other sources.
Cheers,

Jon

Jon Richfield said...

I assume you already know that several poems of J. A. Lindon appear in "Yet More Comic & Curious Verse" J.M.Cohen Penguin books 1959. In the unlikely event that you did not, you can email me at jonrichfield@gmail.com and I can scan them in for you. Sorry, I don't know offhand of any other sources.
Cheers,

Jon

Jon Richfield said...

Sorry! The system fooled me...
Again!
Put it down to a cyberstutter...

Jon

Mark Saltveit said...

To Barry Lindon Evans, thecybermuse, &c:

I'm the editor of The Palindromist magazine, and I'm working on an article about JA Lindon, Howard Bergerson and Leigh Mercer titled "The Greatest Generation." They were the 3 best palindromists ever and close (virtual, via mail) friends.

I am interested in Barry's book, any other writings by these men, and especially in information about them as people. For example, work. Howard told me (before he died) that Lindon ran a shop or grocery store with his sister for a living until a lorry smashed into it. Did he marry? Etc. About Mercer, we know almost nothing.

You can reach me via the web site below, or at info@palindromist.org.

Also, Howard gave me what he thought was a previously unpublished palindromic poem by JAL that you might be interested in.

Thanks!