First and last paragraphs of long essay about his friend. The next-to-last sentence seems to echo Otto Rank.
–Jim
From The Times Literary Supplement
May 12, 2010
Peter Porter 1929-2010
Clive James on the poet who talked for posterity
If the eternal life in which Peter Porter did not believe had granted him permission to check out the action shortly after his demise, he would have been interested in his obituaries. Self-deprecation having been his characteristic mode both in art and in life, he was always reluctant to claim a victory even when weighed down by the arrival of yet another van-load of laurels. But he might have been pleased to see how, in both Britain and Australia, those deputed in the media to lament his passing nearly all hailed him not just as an Australian poet, but as a poet of the English language. A matter of contention had finally been settled, simply because he had spent so long being the man and artist that he was. His early poetry was so brilliant that the argument should have been over immediately, but sometimes the obvious answer can take a lifetime to become common wisdom.
Taken from the Ernest Becker Listserv Discussion Archives
