Basil Bunting

So he was 19, and she was 21, and the marriage was very brief.

In 1949, Charles received his master's degree, and the very next year he married his second wife, a woman named Bortai Bunting, who was the daughter of a prominent British poet named Basil Bunting.

Oh.

Yes, Basil.

In this, our first episode of The Nerve for the new academic year, I'm delighted to be joined by David Toms.

David is a poet and author from Waterford who currently lives in Norway.

His memoir, Pacemaker, about living with a rare congenital heart defect, was released to rave reviews from the likes of Dierne Grifa, Elaine Feeney and Patrick Franey, and his poetry collection, Northley, was described in Poetry Ireland Review as being a fertile marriage between two poetic traditions, referring to its drawing together of Scandinavian and Irish influences.

Now he releases his collection Hold Over Fire, which features a unique and playful relationship with language and a preoccupation with history that emerges in a range of different ways.

So thank you so much for joining me, David.

So we're kind of, we're pretty locked in more with this.

Yeah.

And so at what point were you writing poetry then? So the history thing was obviously a really strong influence on you.