Come On Everybody

Come On Everybody brings together poems from a dozen collections published by Adrian Mitchell over five decades, from Poems (1964) to Tell Me Lies (2008).

His poetry''s simplicity, clarity, passion and humour show his allegiance to a vital, popular tradition embracing William Blake as well as the ballads and the blues. His most nakedly political poems - about war, Vietnam, prisons and racism - became part of the folklore of the Left, sung and recited at demonstrations and mass rallies. His childlike questioning was a constant reminder from the 60s onwards that poetry is first and foremost an assertion of the human spirit.

A pacifist prophet who remained true to his heartfelt beliefs, Mitchell reported back for over half a century from a world blighted by war, compromise, double-talk and pragmatism without losing his innocence, integrity and impish sense of humour. Angela Carter described him as a ''joyous, acrid and demotic tumbling lyricist Pied Piper determinedly singing us away from catastrophe''.