Book of a Lifetime: Second Best Moments in Chinese History by Frank Kuppner

From The Independent archive: Darian Leader shares a delightful secret – a lively and funny Scottish poet who confronts the dialectic of the universe and invites us to consider what it means to be alive

Detail from cover of ‘Second Best Moments in Chinese History’, published by Carcanet in 1997 (Carcanet)

Some years ago, when artists and writers frequented The Groucho Club, there was much excited late-night chatter about founding The Frank Kuppner Appreciation Society. Stationery would be printed, and the Glaswegian electronics engineer transported first-class to one of London’s top hotels, where a reading would be arranged.

Sadly, perhaps, the scheme was never realised. It was feared that the author of The Intelligent Observation of Naked Women, A Bad Day for the Sung Dynasty and Second Best Moments in Chinese History might feel like a performing monkey, obliged to showcase his skills to an audience he cared little for.

His books continued to circulate, passed from hand to hand feverishly, and lines from his verse extracted and adored. How much lighter life seemed when one could at last acknowledge that “Life is a dinner party without a host./ And, frequently, without a dinner party either.”