Red Shelley
{{Short description|1981 book by Paul Foot}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox book |
| name = Red Shelley
| image = File:Red Shelley.jpg
| caption = Cover of the first edition
| author = Paul Foot
| country = United Kingdom
| publisher = Sidgwick & Jackson
| language = English
| subject = Percy Bysshe Shelley
| published = 1981
| media_type = Print
| pages =
| isbn = 978-0283986796
}}
Red Shelley is a 1981 work of literary criticism by Paul Foot. In it, the author draws attention to the radical political stance of the Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, as revealed in poems such as "Queen Mab" and "The Masque of Anarchy".{{cite news|first=Paul |last=O'Brien|url=http://www.camdennewjournal.co.uk/072805/r072805_02.htm |title=Shelley unbound by a giant of letters|newspaper=Camden New Journal|date=29 July 2005|access-date= 31 July 2013}}
Background
Foot describes how Shelley, while living in Italy, heard the news of the Peterloo Massacre of 1819. Like Shelley, Foot was an alumnus of University College, Oxford (from which Shelley was expelled for expressing atheist views), and held the poet to be his inspiration in embracing socialism.[https://web.archive.org/web/20121104181244/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/paul-foot-6165225.html "Obituary: Paul Foot"], The Independent, 20 July 2004. Accessed 31 July 2013.
"The Masque of Anarchy", Foot's favourite poem, was given to his sons to learn by heart,{{cite news|first=Tom|last=Foot|url=https://www.camdennewjournal.co.uk/article/game-changer |title=Game changer|newspaper=Camden New Journal|date=1 August 2019}} and a live performance by Maxine Peake at the 2013 Manchester International Festival, to commemorate the anniversary of Peterloo was the basis of a BBC Culture Show documentary that referenced Foot's work.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/jul/11/unjust-imprisonment-shelleys-poem|title=Letters {{!}} Unjust imprisonment of Shelley's poem|first=Rose|last=Foot|newspaper=The Guardian|date=11 July 203}}{{cite news|first=Paul|last=Vallely|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/reviews/theatre-review-the-masque-of-anarchy-manchester-festival-8708190.html |title=Theatre Review: The Masque of Anarchy, Manchester Festival|newspaper=The Independent|date=14 July 2013|access-date= 31 July 2013}}[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-23290187 "The Masque of Anarchy: Shelley's poem is 'slogan for modern times{{'}}"], BBC News, 13 July 2013. Accessed 31 July 2013.
Reception and influence
Communist thinkers such as Karl Marx are known to have found inspiration in Shelley's work.{{cite news|author-link=Ann Wroe|first=Ann|last=Wroe|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/jul/07/featuresreviews.guardianreview29 |title=Spirit for our age|newspaper=The Guardian|date=7 July 2007|access-date=31 July 2013}} However, critics including Christopher Hitchens have shed doubt on Foot's interpretation of Shelley's poetry, which "if [one doesn't] chance to know its context may be as readily pressed into service by any movement".{{cite news|first=Christopher|last=Hitchens|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/jan/28/percy-bysshe-shelley-christopher-hitchens |title=An Introduction to the Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley|newspaper=The Guardian|date=28 January 2010|access-date= 31 July 2013}}
In 2019, poet and activist Benjamin Zephaniah identified Red Shelley as a book that changed his life", saying: "As a young, angry black man in the 1980s, it was a revelation to find a dead white poet that made sense to me. Shelley turned me on to Mary Shelley, and Byron, and Keats, and my eyes were opened. Good poetry has no age, and no colour."{{cite web|url=https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/essays/42573/benjamin-zephaniah-the-book-that-changed-my-life |title=Benjamin Zephaniah: The book that changed my life|magazine=Prospect|first=Benjamin|last=Zephaniah|date=9 May 2019|access-date=27 February 2024}}
References
{{Reflist|30em}}
External links
- Terry Potter, [https://www.letterpressproject.co.uk/inspiring-older-readers/2016-10-11/red-shelley "Red Shelley by Paul Foot"], Inspiring Older Readers, The Letterpress Project, October 2016.
- Antenna Reviews, [https://nowordlimit.com/2022/08/14/red-shelley-by-paul-foot-radical-before-his-time/ "Red Shelley by Paul Foot: radical before his time"], nowordlimit.com, 14 August 2022.
Category:1981 non-fiction books