An inspiring poet Adrian Mitchell sang, chanted, whispered and shouted his poems, urging us to love life and fight against oppression

Adrian Mitchell died at four in the morning of 20 December. He had been suffering from pneumonia and while in care in hospital had a heart attack from which he didn't recover. He was 76.

Adrian was a socialist and a pacifist who believed, like William Blake, that everything human was "holy". That's to say he celebrated a love of life with the same fervour that he attacked those who crushed life.

He did this through his poetry, his plays, his song lyrics and his own performances. Through this huge body of work, he was able to raise the spirits of his audiences, in turn exciting, inspiring, saddening and enthusing them.

His output ranged across poems and plays for the youngest children, anthologies he edited, to political satires, adaptations and translations of classic literature, to blues and jazz lyrics....