Dancing in the Street: A Poetry Party

When will someone award Adrian Mitchell the Nobel Prize for Literature? Like his hero William Blake he has the conscience, the compassion, the joy and the soul which reaches out to everyone, both in his own poetry and in his anthologies.

Dancing in the Street is a desert island anthology for the 12-90+ age group. A collection of poems and songs for every emotion and every situation. Springsteen, Dylan and McCartney rub shoulders with Shakespeare, Blake, Dickinson and Duffy. Patten parties with John Donne and Brecht boogies with Chuck Berry. You will find the joys of the flesh, wine and song, inequality and injustice, love and loss. The difference with this anthology is that it is marked with Mitchell's humour and anger and his belief in peace and justice. As well as the light-hearted poems and songs there are long poems, brave poems, challenging subject matter. The 'Tears of Rage' section is testament to Mitchell's survival as a protest poet of the sixties who is still angry and still protesting in the nineties. Ross's illustrations (down to the spare corkscrew on the end page) perfectly complement the tone and capture Mitchell's celebration of life, love and the desire for a suit like Miles Davis in the poem 'Jake's Amazing Suit'. William Blake says in' Auguries of Innocence' - 'Joy and woe are woven fine,/ A clothing for the soul divine;/ Under every grief and pine/ Runs a joy with silken twine.'

Joy and woe dance together through the pages of this party and like all good parties, you will not want it to end.