Black Marigolds & Coloured Stars

E. Powys Mathers (1892'1939) is the not-quite-forgotten man of modern English poetry. He is best known for his translation of The Thousand Nights and One Night, and as his alter ego, Torquemada, inventor of the cryptic crossword. His poetry, especially Black Marigolds, has long been admired; for many, his versions from Oriental poetry are unparalleled. His first two books are here introduced by best-selling English poet Tony Harrison, who concludes: "Mathers, erotic aesthete, cocktail-shaking Chinese-American, honorary Arab nomad, bhang-chewer, Turkish bisexual, tormenting puzzle-setter, was a true if minor poet whose assimilation of Eastern modes should rank with Arthur Waley or Ezra Pound, and whose name and achievement should be much better known than they are."

E. Powys Mathers (1892-1939) is the not-quite-forgotten man of modern English poetry. Despite appearing in Yeats' Oxford Book of Modern Verse he is best known for his translation of the Thousand Nights and One Night, and as his alter ego, Torquemada of the Observer - a name to conjure with in the history of the cryptic crossword puzzle. Tony Harrison is one of Britain's best-known contemporary poets.