Articles

A selection of article for further reading.

John Cowper Powys

This 1906 leaflet publicising a series of lectures by JCP in 1906 presents JCP’s outline notes for lectures covering Cowper, Burns, Wordsworth, Shelley, Tennyson, Browning, and Matthew Arnold. It fleshes out this important period in JCP’s life as a University Extension Lecturer with its format of six fortnightly lectures.

JCP’s article for Scribner’s Magazine, published in 1935

W.J. Keith — Reader’s Companions

(Thanks are due to Jacqueline Peltier whose powys-lannion website originally hosted these articles).

W.J. Keith’s four Reader’s Companions to major works of John Cowper Powys give background information — on JCP’s life, mythological references, historical background — in handy alphabetically arranged guides. These serve as helpful guides to a first reader of a complex novel such as Porius unfamiliar with Welsh mythology, and essential reference books for those re-reading John Cowper Powys’s major works.

W.J. Keith — Other Works

John Cowper Powys and Magic

JCP and Magic (Part 1) has been reformatted specially for this website from a less-than-perfect pdf of la lettre powysienne 26 (Autumn 2013). Keith presents this essay as a supplement to his book Ultimate Things: magic being an allied subject to religion and mythology, and space not permitting its inclusion there. Part 1 is presented here, Part 2 is available in la lettre powysienne 27 (Spring 2014).

Ultimate Things

P.J. Kavanagh: three introductions to John Cowper Powys’s works

These three articles are aimed at interested readers who are unfamiliar with Powys (or with the particular work under review). They are an excellent way-in for those new to Powys who are wondering whether to take up the challenge. Anyone trying to persuade a friend to give Powys a chance should send them a link to one of these.

George Steiner 1929–2020: a tribute