In May of 1820, Percy Byshe Shelley, who was living at Pisa at the time, in Italy, wrote two letters to his friend Leigh Hunt. In the letter Shelley asked if Hunt knew if “any bookseller would like to publish a little volume of popular songs, wholy political, and destined to awaken and direct the imagination of reformers.“ Hunt declined to publish the collection and what a loss it was. In 1990, 170 years later, Paul Foot and Redwoods books set out to right the wrong by collecting together those works which they thought Shelley most likely would have included in the collection. It’s been 30 years since this collection was published. And now, I assume in honour of the 200th anniversary of Peterloo, Redwoods is republishing this collection. The new edition has been updated and we are now treated to an afterword by the brilliant Irish Shelley scholar Paul O’Brien. Ciarán O’Rourke is a brilliant young poet and Marxist from Ireland. He is the founder and editor of the online archive Island's Edge Poetry which features interviews with contemporary Irish poets about their work and craft. His first collection, The Buried Breath, is available from Irish Pages Press. He is based in Dublin, Ireland. Read his review of the new edition here!
