A Last Sheaf

A Last Sheaf is the title given to the second posthumous publication of works by the writer and painter Denton Welch. Published in 1951 by John Lehmann, it followed A Voice Through a Cloud, issued by Lehmann the previous year.

A Last Sheaf

First edition
Author	Denton Welch
Language	English
Genre	Short story collection
Publisher	John Lehmann
Publication date	1951
Publication place	United Kingdom
Media type	Print (Hardback)
Preceded by	A Voice Through a Cloud
Followed by	The Denton Welch Journals

The collection was assembled by Welch's partner, Eric Oliver, with assistance from Lehmann and Welch's friend, Francis Streeten.^[1] It consists of five stories appearing for the first time, four previously-published stories and two stories published in full^[2] for the first time. Also included are sixty-seven short poems and nine monochrome reproductions of Welch's paintings, at least one of which ("The Coffin House") had previously accompanied the publication of a short story. Contained in the text are a number of Welch's "decorations", as he called them. The dustjacket states that it is "adapted" from a drawing by Welch, but the overall design is not his; nor are the endpaper illustrations.^[3]

Contents

Part One

• Sickert at St. Peter's (first published in Horizon magazine, Vol. VI, No. 32, 1942)^[4]
• The Earth's Crust (first published in Contact magazine, Sept-Oct 1950, along with a reproduction of "The Coffin House")
• Memories of a Vanished Period
• A Fragment of a Life Story (first published in Horizon magazine, No. 117, 1949)
• A Party
• Evergreen Seaton-Leverett (first published in Orpheus II, John Lehmann 1949)
• A Picture in the Snow
• Ghosts
• The Hateful Word
• The Diamond Badge (first published in part as "The Visit" in Penguin New Writing 38, 1949)

Part Two

• A Novel Fragment (Chapter I first published alone in Life and Letters, Vol. 65, June 1950^[5])

Part Three

• Poems (67 poems, of which 15 had previously been published in magazines and journals including Abinger Chronicle, Penguin New Writing, The Adelphi and The Spectator)

Part Four

• Nine Paintings by Denton Welch

Critical response

Response to the collection was mainly positive, focusing heavily on the Sickert piece^[6] and considering the book to be a memorial to its author.^[7] Robert Phillips, writing over 20 years later, characterised the collection as "a mixed bag", although this seems to describe the mix of genres in the book rather than a qualitative assessment.^[8] Overall, however, Phillips reflects that A Last Sheaf did not enhance Welch's critical reputation in the way that the preceding publications did, and publication of the journals would subsequently do.^[9]

The only detailed analysis of the poems in A Last Sheaf also comes from Phillips. This also remains the only substantial analysis of Welch's poetry, and even here it is restricted to those in this selection.^[10] Phillips finds Welch's poems to be generally quite poor, ranking with his art (which he does not rate very highly either^[11]). He finds in some of them sub-Housman allusion,^[12] an excess of adverbs and adjectives,^[13] and sometimes ill-judged use of rhyme.^[14] Ironically, for Phillips, Welch's most "poetic" language is in fact to be found in his prose.^[15] Nonetheless, despite their inferior status, Phillips does find in them redeeming features: vivid gothick imagery, often shocking juxtapositions (as in "Jane Allen",^[16] Welch's most-reprinted poem) and a keener awareness of the war raging around him than in his prose.^[17]

Phillips' views on Welch's poems in the book have not been universally shared, however. Not long after they were published, the English composer Howard Ferguson set five of Welch's poems from A Last Sheaf for voice and piano. The work, entitled Discovery, was a favourite concert piece of Kathleen Ferrier, who went on to record it.^{[citation needed]}

Thirteen of Welch's poems were included in the text of his Journals, published the year after A Last Sheaf. It would be almost twenty-five years before any more of his poetry appeared in print again, in the 1976 anthology, Dumb Instrument.^{[citation needed]}