R. S. THOMAS

Charity's Scarecrow

Die Vogelscheuche Nächstenliebe

A bilingual volume of 31 poems by R. S. Thomas (1913-2000), the third selection to appear in book form in German, contains work from the last six decades, including four uncollected poems and one that has never appeared in print in English - and none from BABEL's earlier collections, Das helle Feld / The Bright Field and Laubbaum Sprache / Deciduous Language (which planet called "... a handsome tribute to the poet... the translations are impressive and reveal Perryman's concern not simply with accuracy but also with the nuances of poetic utterance."

Readers in the UK might well find that this selection, published on what would have been the poet's 90th birthday, presents a rather different R. S. Thomas from the figure they think they know.

The text was set in Monotype Bodoni and printed by letterpress at Martino Mardersteig's Stamperia Valdonega on off-white deckle-edged Magnani mould-made acid-free rag paper; the front matter and the initials were set by hand, the title page printed in grey-green and black; 24.5 x 16.6 cm, 88 pp., sewn. 90 numbered copies have been bound by hand in half black buckram over light grey-green boards; backstrip gilt lettered, front cover blocked in black. 1000 unnumbered copies are softbound, with a light grey Fabriano wrap-around jacket printed in grey-green and black.

R. S. Thomas,  DIE VOGELSCHEUCHE NÄCHSTENLIEBE (bilingual)    soft-bound    ISBN 978-3-931798-21-5    £ 18

DIE VOGELSCHEUCHE NÄCHSTENLIEBE   special: half buckram, numbered (1-90)    ISBN 978-3-931798-22-2    £ 79

cf.   The Bright Field / Das helle Feld,   Frieze,   Decidious Language / Laubbaum Sprache,   With Claws of Fire / Mit Fängen aus Feuer,   Das Kreuz,   The Cross,   The Sky-Rhyming Child / Das himmelreimende Kind,   In Delicate Nooses / In zierlichen Schlingen,   Stone Twittering / Steinzwitschern   and   Dove-Marks on Stone