Diary Notes

So what about the cultural tastes of the politicians who make immigration policy? Welsh publisher Parthian has just announced World Leaders’ Favourite Poems compiled by Mehmet Basci, A Turkish Kurd now living in Switzerland who spent five years tracking down the poetic choices of national leaders with the admirably idealistic aim of reflecting “on our common hopes, fears and pleasures”. Of course, some in office when he began, such as Tony Blair (Rupert Brooke’s “The Soldier”), are no longer so. But Gordon Brown demonstrates the awesome scope of executive power in his choice of a poem by the American James Stockinger, which he often quotes in speeches:

“The hands of other people lift us from the womb.

The hands of other people grow the food we eat, weave the clothes we wear and

build the shelters we inhabit.”

When told of Brown’s choice, Stockinger was flattered, but he also felt duty-bound to explain that the – slightly misquoted – lines were actually from his doctoral thesis and not a poem at all. But if the prime minister says it’s a poem … Stockinger authorized a few judicious carriage returns and what was prose is now officially verse in the new anthology.

Nick Wroe, Guardian Review
Saturday 15 March 2008

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