My earlier poems were sadder than my poems are today, perhaps because I wrote them in confusion or when I was unhappy. But I am not a melancholy person, quite the contrary, no one enjoys laughing more than I do.
Many varieties of sonnet, of course, have been written over the ages.
I remain loyal to Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert in music and to Shakespeare and Jane Austen in literature.
Blake has always been a favorite, the lyrics, not so much the prophetic books, but I suppose Yeats influenced me more as a young poet, and the American, Robert Frost.
I like rhyme because it is memorable, I like form because having to work to a pattern gives me original ideas.
There is far too much literary criticism of the wrong kind. That is why I never could have survived as an academic.
