Three modern experimental poets

17 February 2025

To begin with what is experimentalist poetry and how did this genre of poetry come about? Experimentalism is one part of modernist and postmodernist poetry and literature. The writer takes risks by using words in a different context and conveying something unique, both about the written piece and the poet’s view and how he feels at the time of writing. It is taking a risk by trying new techniques that have never been seen before. Above all, the writers want to give the discerning reader a new point of view and to raise new discussions.

Jeremy Adler: scholar and poet

_{Image: note by Jeremy Adler addressed to Brian Murphy, Queen Mary Librarian, inside Triplets Jeremy Adler 1980}

Jeremy Adler is a Londoner, born in 1947, whose father was poet and Holocaust survivor, H.G. Adler. His formal education was firstly at Solomon Wolfson Jewish School from 1952-1959 and then at St Marylebone Grammar School between 1959-1966; he later went on to read German and English at Queen Mary College, graduating with a first-class degree. While he was a student at Queen Mary College, he was very interested in climbing and joined the Mountaineering Society and with his love of acting he became the publicity officer for the drama society and designed a poster for their Christmas Revue in 1968. He also performed in some of their productions such as The Relapses and The Unknown Woman Arras.

He continued with his studies at Westfield College obtaining a degree on the German poet Goethe. Adler worked under Claus Victor Bock, the Professor of German Studies.

During the early 1970s Adler became a member of the Council of the Poetry Society as well as a member of the Bielefeld Colloquium fur Neue Poesie. Through his connections with the poetry Society he met other poets, Bob Cobbing, Brian William Bransom Griffiths, better known as Bill Griffiths, who like himself wanted to experiment with the “word”. Over a number of years, they have produced pamphlets and books of art and poetry combined. We have in our Rare Book Collection several of their works.

Jeremy Adler continues with his writing in various national newspapers and his works are translated into French, German, Swedish, Russian, Turkish and Japanese.  

Bob Cobbing: poet

_{Image: Tu To Ratu alto nimbu very little cul earth beat Bob Cobbing 1977 (ref. PR6053.O3 COB)}

Bob Cobbing was born in Enfield on 30 July 1920 where he attended the local grammar school. His parents were in the Low church as non-conformist Christians, and Bob spent his formative years within the Plymouth Brethren community. The church dates to the mid to late 1820s when the first brethren arrived from Ireland’s capital, Dublin and settled in England. After leaving school he became an accountant and finding this uninteresting he changed his career and went into teaching. By the time of the outbreak of World War II he had become a conscientious objector.

With a love of words, he started and published the “Writer’s Forum” to encourage young, up and coming writers and artists to publish their works and help them step onto the world stage.

It was during his time with the Poetry Society he established a public print shop on the premises for poets to print their own book of poetry by using his equipment. Cobbing had a lot of opposition from the Societies’ General Council who were opposed to this modern way of thinking. Much later progress was made with the Society allowing a golf ball typewriter and a desk top lithograph plate maker to be added. Later he co-founded The Association of the little Presses here in the UK and Ireland.

Cobbing became fascinated by performance art. This gave him the opportunity of putting the “words” using the human voice and musical instruments together into groups. Some notable groups were abAna, a trio of Cobbing with Paul Burwell and David Topp, and Konkrete, with Cobbing, Paula Claire and Bill Griffiths.

Bob looked at the next generation, putting his teaching skills to the test by introducing poetry as a performance art to school children. He continued to produce his books and pamphlets of poetry and his performing arts until his death in 2002.

Bill Griffiths: poet

_{Image: Cycles Bill Griffiths 1976 (ref. PR6057.R5 GRI)}

Brian William Bransom Griffiths was better known in later life as Bill Griffiths. He was something of a polymath, being an Anglo-Saxon scholar, book designer, archivist, biker, pianist, social historian and poet. 

Bill was born in North-west London in the summer of 1948. He was educated at Kingsbury Grammar School. After leaving school he went to University College London to read History, graduating in 1969. In his early youth he had a short love affair with the Hells Angels and became a biker. He did a lot of biking around the local area with the Harrow Road Rats. 

In this muck’s city

A host

A HOST OF

With the bells (and bells)

View of a dimnshed church

I got out

First stanza of Harrow from Cycles Bill Griffiths 1976 ref. PR6057. R5 GRI 

Through his experiences with the Hells Angels began to write his poetry. Being out on the road he could see and experience life at its rawest from the saddle of a bike. These early poems were published in Poetry Review Forum. He also loved reading poetry such as works by John Keats, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Michael McClure and George Crabble.

In the 1970s he became manager of the Poetry Society print shop. Here he met up and coming young poets who later became known as the British Poetry revival. Among these up-and-coming poets he met Bob Cobbing and formed a lifelong friendship. Through collaboration work with Bob Cobbing and Paula Claire, Bill Griffiths was able to perform works of sound and visual poetry. This group was called the Konkrete Canticle. The group toured around the British Isles and to Canada, Sweden and Germany. In 1976 his first book of poetry, Cycles, was published.

Griffiths had many hands in different pots. He started his own small publishing press formally called Pirate Press, later Amra.   Even though it was a small company they were able to produce essays on the arts in society, political pamphlets, and listing poetry publications for Palpi the Association of little presses newsletter. Griffiths translated Gilgamesh, Romany, Welsh and Anglo-Saxon works, and published his own poetry. In 1987 Bill Griffiths gained a PhD at King’s College London in Old English, hoping this would lead to a new career.

Towards the end of the 1980s Griffiths had enough of London and moved to the north-east of England. He continued with his interest in old English and Saxon Literature and with his vast knowledge from his scholarship days he became involved with the archiving of local dialect material of that area. He published a dialect dictionary, Pitmatic and several collections of dialect literature. With his friend Bill Lancaster, he worked at the Centre for Northern Studies at Northumbria University and started another dialect project on children’s games and pastimes. In 2003, with his love of music and being a talented classical musician and highly skilled archivist, he was commissioned by Sage Music to catalogue the archives of the Northern Sinfonia and produce a history of the orchestra.

He died on 13 September 2007.

A blog by Anne Marie Mcharg Rare Books and Special Collections Assistant.