Summer 2022
Printer poet
The Last Cuckoo: Dennis Gould
Directed and produced by Mark Chaudoir, edited by Ben Bishop and Polly Ward, camera by Richard Jopson.Poet and letterpress printer Dennis Gould in his Stroud workshop.
Stroud-based poet, letterpress printer and activist Dennis Gould is the subject of The Last Cuckoo, a short film that captures the life and work of an individual within the creative environment that sustains him. Filmed when Gould was 79 (he is 85 this year), the pandemic interrupted director Mark Chaudoir’s original schedule, but his study has managed to capture the essence of someone fully committed to poetry and to print.
In The Last Cuckoo, Gould’s words, whether spoken out loud or printed on paper, are framed against the backdrop of the Cotswold town that has played an important role in fuelling his rebellious spirit. Gould’s involvement in activism has been there since his earliest days of political protests and CND marches. As a young man in the peace movement, he even spent a short time in prison …
Mark Sinclair senior editor at Unit Editions and freelance writer, Stroud
Read the full article in Eye no. 103 vol. 26, 2022
Eye is the world’s most beautiful and collectable graphic design journal, published for professional designers, students and anyone interested in critical, informed writing about graphic design and visual culture. It is available from all good design bookshops and online at the Eye shop, where you can buy subscriptions and single issues.