Bernard Kops
Bernard Kops was born in Stepney in 1926, the youngest of seven children to Dutch - Jewish parents. He is one of Europe's best - known Jewish playwrights who has written plays, novels, radio plays, television plays and poetry about London's East End. Success first came with his play 'The Hamlet of Stepney Green' where he has gone on to write numerous other plays and seven volumes of poetry. Discover snippets of Bernard Kops' East End poetry here and discover more about him and his work through our Local Studies Library and Archives and your local Idea Store Library.
- Whitechapel Library, Aldgate East
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How often I went in for warmth and a doze The newspaper room whilst my world outside froze And I took out my sardine sandwich feast. Whitechapel...
- Three Songs From 'The Hamlet of Stepney Green'
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( I ) Beggars can't be choosers, so pass the word around, No matter what you do, you'll end up underground. Silver trout are sleeping in heaps upon...
- Passover '38
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One thing I remember even more than the hunger. Scrubbing my knees, smarting my hair and rushing downstairs into that playground of my childhood;...
- Exile
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It is raining outside, It is raining. The wet leaves are rotting into the earth, into the sockets of my father’s song, into the mouth of my...
- Hackney! Sunday! Rain!
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Hackney! Sunday! Rain! You know the sort of day. Black empty trees against a desolate sky. Expressionless people buying sad daffodils outside the...
- Whatever Happened to Issac Babel?
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Whatever happened to Isaac Babel? And if it comes to that – whatever happened to those old men of Hackney who sat around a wireless, weeping...
