Breathing New Life
Letter from Elizabeth Beresford to Mark Howitt, 30 April 1973
It started in 1973 with a letter from Elizabeth (or Elisabeth, she was unsure herself) Beresford, author of the Wombles, in which she said I ought to go into the publishing world when I was older. After that, school, university, then a 38 year career break - or rather, a break for a 38 year career - and when I finally got around to writing, despite what my English teacher turned author Christopher Rush wrote (“I suppose that youngsters whose hands are destined one day to be filling your tax forms and your teeth, will find little use for poetry”), it transpired I wasn’t half bad.
“The more fully and unselfconsciously we are ourselves, and at the same time outward looking, the more likely we are to understand and appreciate the ways and culture of other people.”
It was in this belief that in 1970, Norman Wilson, founder of the Edinburgh International Film Festival, started The Ramsay Head Press. It was by no means exclusively a publisher of poetry (Christopher Rush’s excellent book of short stories Peace Comes Dropping Slow, for example), but was responsible for producing volumes by leading poets such as Tessa Ransford, Alice Stuart and Charles Graves.
Peace Comes Dropping Slow, Christopher Rush, The Ramsay Head Press, 1983
And now in a life of surprises - a surprise even to myself - writer, poet and artist Alice Keeling and I are breathing new life into The Ramsay Head Press. Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen said that adventure is just bad planning. I would go further, for the two us adventure has just been a chance meeting followed by a complete absence of planning. But describing his successful 1911 South Pole expedition Amundsen also said that everything went like a dance. So far, that is true of The New Ramsay Head Press.
A Change of Direction, Mark Howitt, The New Ramsay Head Press, 2026 (additional artwork, Alice Keeling)
If you missed the launch of my first poetry collection a few weeks back, well you missed a missed a great evening, those dizzying heights of joy set the bar high for the future. But A CHANGE OF DIRECTION is available to buy from The New Ramsay Head Press. Alice’s debut collection of poems + drawings THE WARM UNIVERSE is due out in October. It’s going to be great.
Alice and I will be reading from our books and celebrating The Ramsay Head Press both old + new at Typewronger Books on 25th September, details and tickets available here.
The Warm Universe, Alice Keeling, The New Ramsay Head Press, 2026