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The father of glam rock, Marc Bolan, was renowned for glitter, make-up, camp clothes and performances. His music evolved from ethereal, Tolkenesque influences to stylistically original pop. He died at a time when his persona was still engulfed in the commercialisation of the pop character he had created, leaving the full enigma of his mind untold. Much has been written about Marc Bolan the "Glam Rock King" but little has touched on the person below he make-up. This book aims to do just that, inspired by a large selection of previously unpublished poetry of Bolan's, reflecting his earlier works in "The Warlock of Love". "From Beneath the Wizard's Gown" endeavours to delve into the corners of Bolan's mind that made him the charismatic, mystical icon who wrote apparently senseless lyrics. This book aspires to restore a depth of understanding to his words, enhancing his credibility as an artist, a wordsmith and a musician. The poetry, written in Bolan's own hand, has been aesthetically reproduced from its original form with an edited 'translation' of each poem giving an interpretation of what are perceived to have been Bolan's intended words.Enigmatic imagery, previously unpublished photographs of Bolan, depicting the naturally ethereal aura he possessed, punctuate the pages of this encompassing, tactile probe into the roots of Bolan's thoughts, that made him the intriguing Wizard-like character who enchanted the music world with his lingual painting of mystical images. This book aspires to look into the eyes of Marc Bolan, unglittered.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Wielder Of Words,
By
This review is from: From Beneath the Wizard's Gown: Marc Bolan - Unglittered (Hardcover)
Tony Stringfellow has attempted what many people, especially rock critics, may have thought was impossible: to bring sense and credence to Marc Bolan's words.In 'From Beneath The Wizard's Gown' he has performed that task admirably. Whilst the average rock fan or pop collector might baulk at an examination of some unfamiliar poems from Bolan's notebooks, anyone with a real love of music and an interest in it's wierder and more exotic avenues will love this book. Each chapter considers one of Marc's poems in great detail, and while the poems in the earlier part of the book reference mythological or literary sources, the final two are essentially science fiction narratives with more or less instant accessibility. However, it should already be clear to any lover of Bolan's songwriting that he had a deep love of mythology and literature(his song 'Dandy In The Underworld' was subtitled 'A Bolanic revision of Orpheus descending', and he often spoke of his love of C.S. Lewis and Tolkien) and Stringfellow certainly makes this abundandly clear. The book is lovingly crafted and full of worthwhile insights into Bolan's thoughts and feelings, but most of all it matches Bolan's own flights of inpiration with the imaginative feats of it's own author. No Bolan fan can afford to be without it, and anyone interested in rock music history will be fascinated with it's intricacies. All that remains is for someone to attempt the same sort of examination of Bolan's songwriting itself.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Extremely disappointing,
This review is from: From Beneath the Wizard's Gown: Marc Bolan - Unglittered (Hardcover)
This is an extremely disappointing book to the extent that after just a few pages of reading it starts to become impossible to anticipate having the patience or tolerance to envisage my actually wanting to finish it. However, having done so, I am not convinced of anything the author has written. In fact I would claim that there is not a single sentence in `From Beneath the Wizard's Gown' that has any resonance of accuracy or truth that I felt I could agree with, therefore I am at a loss to fathom why someone has taken it upon themselves to write such a narrative around someone who is now dead. The only person who could lay claims to any of the postulations asserted by the author would have been Marc Bolan himself. Most importantly let there be no doubt that although the author has tried convincing the reader that he has based his writing on some form of research, the truth is that this book clearly attempts to inform and convince on mere subjective postulation alone. He has done himself and his subject no favours in this book, in fact there is the possibility of the danger that some readers might actually believe what is written here. But, having said the above I realise that the author has been genuinely sincere in sharing his profound admiration for the man of whom he is writing; some of us know that when you are holding `The Warlock of Love'; `My People were fair...'; `Prophets, Seers and Sages...'; `A Beard of Stars'; and `Unicorn' you possess works of true art that are unique in the World. But no-one else has the right to assert the types of adjudications contained in this book that are based merely on their own subjectively personnel and therefore biased postulating, and expect to do so without being criticized. The author has written this book for his own reasons. As the reviewer above has already written - this book says a lot more about the author than it does about Marc Bolan.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Badly written hagiography,
By
This review is from: From Beneath the Wizard's Gown: Marc Bolan - Unglittered (Hardcover)
I wanted to like this book, I really did. Marc Bolan is the first pop star I can really remember; I was far too young to go and see him live, but his corkscrew curls, unthreatening sexuality and whimsical lyrics lit up a couple of years of my childhood. He was a fairy prince with a twinkle in his eye, Narnia with its innocence slightly tarnished. He was the original toy-boy, petite and sly, just wicked enough to charm the ankle socks off daft little girls like me.
Other stories have since emerged, showing another, darker side to the magic. We've heard about the ruthlessly ambitious con-artist who'd step on his own grandmother to get to the top, the false friend who dropped people like used Kleenex, the bloated fantasist who died at the right time for his reputation. Most of Bolan's family and friends are now dead, but in the absence of first-hand recollections I'd have hoped any biographer would look for the real man behind the charmer and the charlatan. What Tony Stringfellow gives us instead is a bunch of personal prejudices, which are more revealing about him than about his subject. Stringfellow has plainly never forgiven Bolan for "selling out", exchanging the hippy trappings of his earliest days for the star-spangled banner of glam-rock. Given that the majority of Bolan's fame rests on the latter part of his career with T.Rex, this angle seems a little counter-productive. Instead of considering Bolan's spectacular rise and fall, most of the book is given over to minute consideration of his rambling and dyslexic notebook fragments, reproducing them with all the awe usually offered to museum manuscripts. Stringfellow even offers them as "poems" in "translated" form, though whether this improves their sense or comprehensibility is doubtful. The problem is that Stringfellow seems happy to accept Bolan at his own romantic estimation - a "wizard", a "man blinded by love" for whom imagination was more important than life. Maybe it was. But instead of exploring the miracle of how Mark Feld the tubby little Hackney chancer conjured up superstar alter ego Marc Bolan, he paints a grandiose picture of a self-taught literary genius -- dismissing producer Tony Visconti's claim that Marc was almost illiterate and that books had to be read to him. Similarly, he bats away charges of "ruthlessness" with a quote from a teenage girl Bolan saw to a bus stop one afternoon in 1965. He was " a nice, genuine guy" who didn't "take liberties", she recalls. Well, that settles that, then. It has to be said that the book is also appallingly written - riddled with lousy grammar, terrible spelling and chaotic punctuation, it's plainly never been near a professional editor. It's unwise to unravel comparisons with Tennyson and Spenser when you can't put together a literate sentence yourself, and the book is stuffed with indigestible arguments and unsubstantiated conclusions. David Gilmour of Pink Floyd -- whose secretary June Child later married Bolan -- once described him as "a big pain in the arse, of course, very full of himself." Like many people in the business, though, Gilmour was also "very fond of him" - and that's the kind of enigma Stringfellow never unravels. There's certainly a place for a good book about the glittery, glorious old snake-oil salesman. But sadly, this one doesn't come close. first published in subba-cultcha.com
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