2019.07.21 John Cooper Clarke, 诗人

shiyi18

John Cooper Clarke first achieved fame with his poetry during the punk rock era of the late 1970s. Born in Salford in 1949 to Hilda and George, he suffered from tuberculosis as a child and was sent to recuperate with a relative in Wales. He failed his 11 plus exam and was educated at a secondary modern school which he hated. However the one “rose in a garden of weeds” was his English teacher, Mr Malone, who instilled a love of poetry in John and his classmates.

John had various odd jobs after leaving school at 15 and by his mid-20s, he was reciting his poetry in clubs around Manchester. His entry into the punk scene was helped, he says, by “already looking like a punk”, and despite some initially hostile receptions from audiences waiting for the Sex Pistols or the Buzzcocks, he acquired a cult status, going on to release five albums of his poetry set to music by former Joy Division producer Martin Hannett.

By early 1980s, he was also in the grip of a heroin addiction which would see him write very little for over a decade. He cleaned up in the early 90s after marrying his second wife, Evie, and having a daughter, Stella. His star began to rise again in 2007 when one of his poems was used in an episode of The Sopranos and others were included on the GCSE syllabus, which led to collaborations with artists like Plan B and Alex Turner of the Arctic Monkeys.

BOOK CHOICE: Against Nature by Joris-Karl Huysmans
LUXURY ITEM: A boulder of opium twice the size of his head
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: How Great Thou Art by Elvis Presley



约翰-库珀-克拉克在20世纪70年代末的朋克摇滚时代以其诗歌首次成名。他于1949年出生于索尔福德，父亲是希尔达和乔治，小时候患了肺结核，被送到威尔士的一个亲戚家休养。他没有通过11岁以上的考试，在一所他讨厌的现代中学接受教育。然而，他的英语老师马龙先生是一朵 "杂草园中的玫瑰"，他向约翰和他的同学们灌输了对诗歌的热爱。

约翰15岁离开学校后做过各种零工，到20多岁时，他在曼彻斯特周围的俱乐部朗诵他的诗歌。他说，他进入朋克场景的原因是 "已经看起来像个朋克"，尽管最初有一些等待性手枪乐队或Buzzcocks乐队的观众对他有敌意，但他获得了一种崇拜的地位，接着发行了五张他的诗歌专辑，由前Joy Division制作人Martin Hannett配乐。

到了80年代初，他也被海洛因的毒瘾所控制，这使他在十多年里很少写作。90年代初，在与第二任妻子埃维结婚并生下女儿斯特拉后，他戒掉了毒瘾。2007年，他的明星开始重新崛起，他的一首诗被用于《黑道家族》的一集，其他的诗被列入GCSE教学大纲，这导致他与Plan B和Arctic Monkeys的Alex Turner等艺术家合作。

书籍选择：乔里斯-卡尔-怀斯曼的《对抗自然》。
奢侈品：一块比他的头还大的鸦片巨石。
卡斯塔维的最爱：猫王的《你是多么伟大》。