Clive James dies at 80; a last poetry book will come next year | The Bookseller

Picador poetry editor Don Paterson said: "While James had always written poetry, it became his principal focus in his last decade; this unexpected late blossoming produced book after book of effortlessly-turned, moving and memorable verse, which saw several of his poems - among them the celebrated ‘Japanese Maple' - shared around the world. It was however typical of James's immense generosity that the last book he'd finish - The Fire of Joy, a reader's guide to his favourite poems from the English canon - was a work of pure enthusiasm. James was always prized for his superhuman learning (he really had read all those books) and one of the greatest turns of phrase in contemporary English; but he also possessed the rarest and most valuable skill we find in the critic: the language of praise. Any encounter with James, either in print or in person, left you desperate to go and open a book, watch a film or a TV show, or hunt down a recording. With Clive's passing we lose the wisest and funniest of writers, a loyal and kind friend, and the most finely-stocked mind we will ever have the fortune to encounter.''