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Barry Tebb has famously been called "a delightfully awkward old cuss - a stubborn survivor whose life is full of poetry", and that's as good a place as any to start. Unless you're very up on your British poets, you may well never have heard of him, but his has been a remarkable life of persistence in the face of overwhelming adversity and of the hard work needed to sustain a life in poetry. This ethos of Never Giving In, of course, is one of the cornerstones of the Monkey Kettle way, so it's a pleasure to be able to big up these three items available from Barry's very own Sixties Press books.

To sum up his life in one paragraph is tricky, but here goes. Born in Leeds in 1942 and growing up in a working class family living in industrial railwayhouse life, he trained as a teacher. Then, in the Sixties, he achieved some national success with poetry, his work appearing in The New Statesman and the highly-rated Children Of Albion compilation. After that, he very publicly admits that he suffered from a "twenty-five year writing block", from 1970 to 1995. Luckily, though, he's been writing again since then, and his powers seem greater than ever.

Much of this life, obviously, is described in much greater detail in The Fiddler And His Bow, Barry's autobiography, which deals with his childhood in Leeds, his embarkation on a life of poetry, his first loves and various muses, his marriage to the poet Brenda Williams and their son's breakdown. It is an overwhelmingly honest read, alternately funny, touching, heartbreaking and brave. Throughout is spread Barry's passion for poetry, particularly those writers he feels have been unfairly neglected by The Establishment (hence his own publication of the Sixties Press Anthology Of Gregory Fellow's Poetry, which aims to redress that balance). It also bubbles with his love of nature, his interest in psychoanalysis, and his continuing enthusiasm for his muses - on the whole women who have inspired him and continue to fascinate him.

His recent collection of poetry, Tranquillity Street, has all of these themes running through it, whether it's reminiscences of his first love, Margaret, who he still seems to pine for, fifty years on, or scathing odes to poetry magazine editors who he feels have betrayed their ideals (must remember to keep on his good side!). Barry's work is lit apparently almost entirely by the events of his own life, and in the hands of a lesser writer that probably wouldn't work at all. This collection, however, is excellent - inspiring stuff for those times when it occasionally doesn't seem worth carrying on in this lonesome industry.

Another source of inspiration is his unswerving enthusiasm in promoting the causes of poets who he thinks are not being given a chance to shine - he regularly publishes pamphlets containing their work and his own, and using Sixties Press is able to get these writers to a wider audience, something else I can both admire and personally relate to in my editorship of Ver Kettle.

Of course, as is so often the case, I have a personal bias here. Barry also happens to be one of the small handful of 'nationally known' poets to have appeared in Monkey Kettle, in both issue 10 and the forthcoming issue 23, and certainly one of the most talented. He also sends us nice letters encouraging us, and we're even thanked in the Small Press Acknowledgements section of Tranquillity Street. But kind words and encouragement are something that poets don't always have to give - it's brilliant that he takes the time, for us and others. It's also brilliant that he keeps up his lone voice of dissidence against The Establishment, again - for us and for others. Long may he deprecate.

http://www.sixtiespress.co.uk/

mmt.

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