Selected Poems

A reissue of revolutionary poems from the last three decades by cultural icon Linton Kwesi Johnson—a dub poet and activist, and only the second living poet to be published in the Penguin Modern Classics series

A selection of Linton Kwesi Johnson's best poems over three decades. Ranging from protests against police brutality to eulogies for departed friends and playful celebrations of urban life, Johnson's use of Jamaican dialect to tackle distinctly British subjects contributed to a revolution in the notion of literary English. This Selected Poems charts the unique literary talent of one of Britain's most influential poets and social critics.

Linton Kwesi Johnson is known and revered as the world's first dub poet. Born in Chapelton, a small town in the parish of Clarendon, Jamaica, he moved to England in 1963. He gained a sociology degree in the mid-1970s from Goldsmiths' College, London, and had poems, inspired by politics and the Black movement, published in the journal Race Today. He is an Associate Fellow of Warwick University, an Honorary Fellow of Wolverhampton Polytechnic and received an award at the 13th Premo Internazionale Ultimo Novecento for his contribution to poetry and popular music. He has toured the world from Japan to South Africa, Europe to Brazil, and is only the second living poet to have been published by Penguin Classics.