John Pudney may well be one of the underrated fiction authors of the twentieth century, but possible not underrated as a poet. But I was completely charmed by this Almanack of Hope, a series of sonnets by John Pudney, one for each month of the year and each with a drawing by the great Paul Nash. The book was published in 1944 and Paul Nash's style with his slightly twisted natural lines and sometimes weirdly angular shading makes for just the right dark undertone to this wartime production setting the slightly macabre elements against the pre-war pastoral English idyll. It's quite a remarkable set of drawings I think.
