Tag: carol ann duffy

Blog/

New reading: Magma 74 and the Laureate’s Choice Anthology

Laureate's Choice Anthology and Magma 74

The new edition of Magma, edited by Benedict Newbery and Pauline Sewards, is dedicated to ‘work’, a subject close to my heart. It’s always puzzled me why there appears to be so little written about traditional (or otherwise) workplaces, given how many hours of many people’s lives are given over to work (in the sense of ‘earning a living’, although of course the Magma editors were hoping for plenty of poems about ‘work’ in its wider sense.)

Sarah Mnatzaganian‘s ‘Laying up’ appeared to me with its rich nautical vocabulary (‘…until our halves meet / and lie without stretch or slack, / my luff to your leech, head to your foot, / clew to your tack, throat to your peak’). I loved the evocation of a mass laying off (a subject I’ve tried to write about myself) by Fokkina McDonnell, ‘The empty hours’, with its matter-of-factness capturing the reality of having to stay dispassionate when tasked with an uncomfortable job (‘If we’d stayed at the Bridge Hotel, Kendal, staff / would have recognised us from last time, / would’ve made phone calls last night.’)  Steve Kendall‘s ‘Emotional Labour’ beautifully captures that feeling of doing what is essentially a meaningless job, with random rules and procedures (‘I must send it to whoever’s desk is equidistant from / the first addressee and Emma’), embroidering one’s thoughts with whatever it takes to make it through the day. I think my own poem comes under the category of ‘a bit offputting’, with its crossed out words and slightly odd title (‘Hospitality Management (Diploma) Enrol Now £2,400’). I hope it doesn’t put everyone off reading it though. I know I can be a bit impatient with this sort of thing, rather like my first thoughts about Shaun Carter‘s ‘<title> The office sound in broken code </title>’ – reading through broken code is a bit too close to home for me!

Magma‘s featured poet in this issue is Tom Sastry, who seems to be having a bit of a moment. He also pops up in The Laureate’s Choice Anthology (smith|doorstop), a selection of work chose by Carol Ann Duffy during her tenure as Poet Laureate. As a side note, I did first hear about the ‘Laureate’s Choice’ from Carol Ann when I was on a course with her and Gillian Clarke at Ty Newydd back in 2013. She asked me then (as well as a couple of others) to send her my pamphlet manuscript, for consideration. I didn’t really understand what it was about, but I sent her it anyway. Nothing came of it, but David Borrott, who was on the same course, made the cut. So when this anthology came through my door I was only a TINY BIT bitter!)

But back to Tom Sastry – his poems did rather jump out at me for their originality and intrigue. I loved ‘Difference’, a telling snapshot of a relationship running on parallel lines, the sadness of ‘The Office’ (‘You can bring the name of a bird/ in from the outside, if you like. You can bring its call/ on your ringtone…’ and the simple beauty of ‘Waking’ (‘I dreamt that we were older. It didn’t matter at all.’)

I enjoyed a huge number of the poems in this anthology. Just flicking through again I’m reminded of a few:  Yvonne Reddick‘s ‘The Bait’, Mark Pajak‘s ‘Spitting Distance’, David Borrott‘s ‘felicitous blending of figure and landscape’ and ‘Wolf Fell’, John Fennelly’s ‘Those flowers’.

The anthology doesn’t have a foreword, which is a shame, as I’d like to have read something by Carol Ann talking about the thinking behind the project and her selections. Some of the poets are clearly newcomers, whereas others I would describe as established already,  with full collections and awards to their name. It’s true that they were picked up over a five-year period – the first Laureate’s Choice collections were published in 2015. Nevertheless it makes for an interesting mix of work.

The Laureate’s Choice Anthology is available now from The Poetry Business, £10.

I’ll be reading (and possibly explaining a bit about my poem) at the London launch of Magma 74 on Thursday 6th July, 6.30pm at Exmouth Market, alongside many fine poets including Lorraine Mariner and Alison Brackenbury. Perhaps see you there?

Blog/

Roundup – current reading, events, Poet Laureate etc

I’m not sure where the month has gone – somewhere out the door together with the gardening, the yoga and the Spring days out, all of which have been on hold these last few weeks as I grapple with an inexplicable (literal) pain the bum, recently moved into my back. The joys of ageing! I promise I will never again be unsympathetic when hearing of anyone’s backache!

Anyway, I’m now at my standing desk, so please pass your most positive vibes to my ancient body as I compose a quick round-up of a few things I HAVE been doing.

wildnights-kim-addonizio

Currently reading

Kim Addonizio‘s Wild Nights (New & Selected) (Bloodaxe) which I picked up in Cork where I heard her read. I really enjoy her style: deadpan, ironic, dreamlike, much use of the colloquial, long lines of thought that take off at tangents but take you with them, wonderful variety of form and just enough opacity to intrigue the reader rather than exclude her. There’s something about the worlds she creates and inhabits that feels both foreign and familiar, and I find myself revelling in it.

Last month Mike Bartholomew-Biggs came down to Eastbourne’s Poetry Cafe event and read from his book Poems in the Case (Shoestring), and I’m now about half-way through. It’s a kind of whodunnit, combing traditional storytelling and poetry. I’m wracking my brain to think of the term – metatextual? metafication? – for the ‘story within a story’ form. For example, even some of the blurbs on the book cover refer not to this book, but to the work of the fictional characters within.

It’s a lot of fun and I love this kind of literary mashup. There are plenty of in-jokes and familiar tropes for readers who are themselves poets – the poetry residential, the amateur poet characters, the grand egos, simmering jealousies, publishing rivalries, concerns about authenticity and plagiarism. We read the poems written by the various characters, looking within them for clues. It’s a masterpiece of ventriloquy by Mike, who manages to create poems that could credibly have been written by a variety of different people. I haven’t got to the denouement yet so I’ve no spoilers to offer!

Events

Hastings Stanza got together with the Hastings Philharmonic Chamber Choir to present an evening of poetry and music. Orchestrated (see what I did there) by our own Antony Mair, the event was hugely enjoyable. None of us were quite sure how it would pan out, mainly because it had been instigated by the choir, and it was only a couple of days before when we found out what they would be singing. So we planned our contributions as ‘stand alone’ sets, each of us taking ‘change’ as our theme but interpreting it in our own ways. As it happened, the spoken sets worked really well interspersed with the music, which itself was wide ranging and challenging – from Hildegard of Bingen to Berio. We held it at The Beacon in Hastings, a lovely, intimate venue which is much more like someone’s living room than a concert hall. Afterwards we all agreed it was a great model – I’ve often pondered how to combine poetry with classical music and never come up with anything I was happy with. So this was a revelation.

I also made it to the Brighton launch of Finished Creatures which was one big turqoise social with excellent readings and a lotta lurve for editor Jan Heritage. Keep any eye out for further editions and reading windows.

On the writing front, I haven’t much felt like extended sitting, let alone getting my head around creative writing. But I have sent out a few more sweaty envelopes of ready-I-think-but-not-yet-sent poems (or something like that). I’ve also entered three (gulp) poetry pamphlet comps. I think this is all part of my 2019 resolution to send out more.

I suppose the big poetry news this month is our new Poet Laureate. When the Poetry Society polled their members back in the autumn, I’m pretty sure I made a case for Simon Armitage, who strikes me as someone who is both a literary big gun and also accessible, down to earth and committed to community engagement, the perfect to successor to Carol Ann in other words. But I suspected I was a bit behind the times. There was a lot of talk of how it ought to be a poet of colour, or another woman, or a woman poet of colour. I’ve always found the idea of positive discrimination somewhat problematic, and I know poets of colour who do so too – so much so that I even wonder if a few of those poets whose names were in the running (according to the media) may have discounted themselves (publicly or privately) because they didn’t want to be appointed on the ‘diversity ticket’. And before anyone says ‘but XYZ poet is at least as fine a poet as Simon Armitage’ that’s not really the point – the point is the waters had already been muddied by the suggestion that XYZ ‘ought’ to get the job because there ought to be a Poet Laureate who’s not white. Surely we all welcome any Poet Laureate who is enthusiastic about the role, uses it to connect more people to poetry and bring more poetry to more people, champions and supports poets of all backgrounds and all ages. Someone who carries on the amazing work done by Carol Ann Duffy – and incidentally I looked up the Guardian piece from 2009 when she became the PL and it’s a really interesting read –  apparently she’d been in the running a decade before, but declined. I wonder if in ten years’ time there’ll be less fuss made about how we need a poet of colour as PL. It will just happen.

Blog/

Poems for a Christmas concert

not another Dickensian Xmas

I was recently asked to select some readings to go in between the movements of a choral piece. The piece is Bob Chilcott’s On Christmas Night. In it, Chilcott sets a number of carols in a sequence, telling the Christmas story from the fall of Adam and Eve (yes, it hadn’t occurred to me that it starts there – Nativity Plays usually skip straight to the shepherds in the fields) – to the birth of Jesus.

I’ll come clean now – it was my husband who asked me, on behalf of the East Sussex Community Choir which he conducts. The project interested me, so even though I knew there wouldn’t be any payment on this occasion (!) I was happy to take it on.

The score suggests which readings would be suitable, but that others may be substituted. Now, I’ve been to plenty of concerts (especially at Christmas) where there are readings in between the music. Almost without exception they are either the standard Bible readings of ‘lessons and carols’ (such as the one that’s broadcast each year from King’s College Cambridge), or they are ‘light’ – passages from Dickens or ‘The night before Christmas’ by Clement Clark Moore, amusing Christmas-themed stories or anecdotes. Or else it’s Eliot’s Journey of the Magi.

I wasn’t interested in doing the ‘same old’, so I set out to find poems or texts that were by living/contemporary writers. I wanted secular, not sacred – words that would complement the religious story being told by the choir, and invite contemplation of the wider spiritual context – themes of wonder, joy, love, birth, death and the cycle of nature.

I topped and tailed with two extracts from A C Grayling‘s extraordinary The Good Book, a kind of secular Bible and a fascinating compilation of thousands of texts by philosophers, teachers, prophets, leaders, literary figures and writers. So, alongside the carol about Adam eating the apple and falling from grace, we are reminded how a tree bears both flowers and fruit, and its fruit is knowledge, which teaches the good gardener how to understand the world.  The closing extract is a short passage about the nature of wisdom, which parallels the Biblical story of the ‘wise men’.

For the rest of the readings I chose poems:

Janet Sutherland‘s ‘line’ from her collection Hangman’s Acre takes us into a wintry but beautiful landscape where geese ‘carve a soundless line’, where ‘simple shapes’ and ‘muffled earth’ set a scene of waiting and anticipation, before ‘the line sets out alone’. There is both apprehension and wonder in this – to navigate a path (through life?) with ‘no compass   no margin’ and yet not to hesitate, but to simply wait for the moment. For me, this approximates to the journey facing Mary, and indeed Christ after her – they face up to the unknown because they have no choice – they have faith and they accept.

‘Prayer’ by Carol Ann Duffy is a favourite of mine, and I knew that it would be familiar to at least some of the audience. For me it examines self-doubt, sadness, possibly even grief, in a way that uplifts by showing us the hope and love present when we open our ears to the quotidian sounds around us. Life goes on, children practise their piano scales, we cope with bad days – all this and more expressed in a sonnet which concludes with an extract from the Shipping Forecast, an enduring and recognisable ritual not unlike daily prayers and ‘Latin chants’. And as with ‘line’, there are musical references in ‘Prayer’ which felt appropriate for this context.

When it came to the nativity, I wanted a poem to express all the wonder, hope, and love felt by a parent at the birth of a child. ‘William’ by Jack Underwood (from his collection Happiness) is a creative, exuberant and highly original love poem to a new baby, from his father. Starting from the point of what he is familiar with, the speaker then finds himself at a loss when faced with ‘your fine melon head, your innocent daring-to-be’ – completely ‘uncooked’ at the newness and intensity of his feelings – ‘I can feel my socks being on’ – pure joy and a lot of fun.

The final poem I chose was the wonderful song-like ‘A short story of falling’ by Alice Oswald from her collection Falling Awake. It takes the audience back to the theme of birth, lifecycles, regeneration and the wonder of nature. The title also plays on the idea of the Biblical ‘fall’ with which we began. There is so much beauty in this poem – the summer shower that ‘steals the light and hides it in a flower’ and the narrator wanting to know how to ‘balance/ the weight of hope against the light of patience’. Like a song, we reach the end and feel we are ready to being again – ‘the story of the falling rain / that rises to the light and falls again’.

I can’t say yet whether all this will work or not, as the concert is this evening in Lewes! The reader will be a member of the choir who’s also an actor – in rehearsal he delivered the poems with sensitivity and clarity. I haven’t asked for the poems to be printed in the programme as I didn’t want to risk breaching any copyright, so it’s all in the reading. All the poems are credited though, and I hope it may encourage some people to seek out the books in which they appear. Not everyone will be that interested, but at least it gets contemporary writing in front of a general audience.

So no ‘jolly old Saint Nick’ or Tiny Tim or the ghost of Christmas past for the audience tonight, but more challenging fare! Let’s do it!

Blog/

The Reading List, week 3

Duffy, Larkin & Howe - the Reading LIst week 3

Things have gone a tad pear-shaped these last 2 weeks and I’ve managed to read only 3 books –but I have various excuses, ranging from (ahem!) work, getting ready for our holiday (imminent), selling our house (exchange of contracts WE HOPE imminent), flat-hunting for new flat to replace the one we had to pull out of, a weekend of singing at Westminster Abbey (magical) and arrival of first grandchild (born this morning).

The Bees – Carol Ann Duffy (Picador 2012)

I heard Carol Ann read from this collection when it was shortlisted for the T S Eliot prize. For me she’s a perfect Poet Laureate in that she manages to write poetry that has wide appeal – yet it’s not ‘popular’ in the sense of relentlessly lightweight, and not ‘accessible’ in the sense of there being no work for the reader to do. If there was one overall impression I had after reading this book it was the pleasure Carol Ann takes in the sounds of language – she’s bold with her use of assonance, alliteration and internal rhyme, the most obvious example probably being ‘Cockermouth and Workington’ – ‘No folk fled the flood, / no flags furled or spirits failed –/one brave soul felled.’  Seeded through the book are a number of poems about the poet’s mother, all very moving. Favourite poem: ‘Cold’.

Philip Larkin – High Windows (Faber, 1974)

This is where I show my ignorance (or innocence?) because I admit to being a Larkin virgin (unless you count having read the odd notorious excerpt). I spotted this slim volume, romped through the book and thoroughly enjoyed it, even the curmudgeonly stuff, and laughed in what were probably the wrong places. Here is a style that seems to sit somewhere between John Betjeman in his less twee moments and contemporary poets like Sam Riviere: idiomatic, conversational, multi-layered wit. Reading this collection feels a little like overhearing an unguarded conversation in the pub. ‘And however you bank your screw, the money you save / Won’t in the end by you more than a shave.’ (‘Money’). Favourite poem: ‘Vers de société’.

Sarah Howe – Loop of Jade (Chatto, 2015)

I bought this book on the basis of one short poem in the Guardian and I’m pleased I did. You know that feeling when you’re reading stuff by someone you’ve not encountered before, and you just know this is the Real Thing. I see Loop of Jade is on the Forward Prize shortlist and I’ve absolutely no doubt Sarah Howe will be all over the big poetry prizes in the future, on GCSE syllabi and more. It’s a big, lush book which had me intrigued from the off. I wasn’t convinced by the back cover blurb and the promise of ‘an exploration of self and place, of migration and inheritance’, which sounded a bit familiar. But to be fair it’s hard to describe the density of the language and the pull of so many intricate images, of contemporary China, memories of the poet, her mother and grandmother (‘half-finished bowls / of rice, the ivory Mah Jong tablets / clacking, like joints, swift and mechanical’ – ‘Crossing from Guangdong’), ancient stories and fantastic characters. There are prose poems, snippets of chinese, a meditation on a life model, a hot night in Arizona, a beautiful ekphrastic poem which should be used as reference in all workshops on the subject.

At the start of the book is a quote from Borges referring to ‘a certain Chinese encyclopedia entitled The Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge‘ which classifies animals into groups such as ‘sirens’, ‘frenzied’ and ‘drawn with a very fine camelhair brush’. These then form the basis for many of the poems in the collection. Super, super stuff.  Favourite poem at the moment (but hard to choose): ‘Woman in the garden’.

This post is the latest update to my ‘Reading List’ project begun in July 2015.

Angst/

A literary lunch, a rejection and a Robert Frost mystery

Emerging from the fug of the common cold, what should greet me but a ‘no thanks’ notification from Ambit. It seemed like an automated/standard reply this time, so I think I have to give up on it for now. The last rejection I had from them felt more personal and encouraging.  I think three or four rejections in a row (can’t remember how many it’s been with Ambit, actually) from a mag is a fairly strong indicator that my stuff just isn’t their bag. (Unless I’ve had something published by them before, which is quite different.) So Ambit now joins the ‘probably not’ list. (If the list gets too long I may have to revise my strategy but at the moment it works fine!)

On the positive side, I had a very nice time on Tuesday at the Chelsea Arts Club where my lovely agent (for my non-fiction writing) was hosting a Christmas lunch for some of her authors. A great chance to meet other (far more successful) writers and get enthused about everything from space exploration to Norris McWhirter. Imagine my excitement to meet a fellow poet there by the name of Liz Dean. Liz told me she had a fair amount of work published a few years back, but other projects have taken her away from the poetry scene lately. We talked about magazines, submissions, pamphlets, the way forward and so forth. She made a suggestion which I found intriguing and came away thinking “Yes, I will do that in 2014…” We actually shook hands on it, so indeed I must do it! I won’t say any more now, but all will be revealed here in the fullness of time. Ha ha!

The news that Douglas Dunn has won the Queen’s Medal for poetry had me panicking that I’d not read a thing by him. Well, ‘panicking’ is probably too strong a word, but that general feeling of “oh no! here’s another famous poet I haven’t read or even heard of! what the bloody hell do I think I’m doing, noodling about writing poetry or even having the PRESUMPTION to call myself a sortofpoet when my knowledge of The Canon is so completely inadequate” – that kind of thing.

So partly in a knee-jerk reaction and partly because I needed to return Simon Armitage’s Tyrannosaurus Rex versus the Cordoroy Kid (many gems there) I went to the library and spent an hour or so with the one Dunn book they had which was The Year’s Afternoon (brilliant title poem you can read here). I took it away to read properly, and also a copy of Answering Back, an anthology of pairs of poems, one by a contemporary poet in response to one by a more established/dead one. Edited by Carol Ann Duffy. This looks really meaty and I know I’m going to enjoy it, just from looking at who is responding to who, for starters.

Arrived in the post last week was the latest edition of Rattle, from which I get my regular dose of American poetry and Poems With Titles That Are Quite Often Longer Than The Actual Poems Themselves And Every Word In The Title Is Capitalized (sic). Also by my bed is the Winter edition of Poetry Review which I’ve only skimmed through so far but noticed another enjoyable and cheeky nod to Robert Frost’s ‘Stopping by woods’ – a poem by Kate Bingham called ‘Midnight’. In the last edition we had ‘Floating on Lake Windermere in a Stolen Boat’ by Sean Hewitt, a similar homage. Maybe it will be a recurring theme? Something to watch for!

Books/

A poem by Jenny Lewis

At Ty Newydd recently I was fortunate enough to be working alongside some wonderful poets, and with their permission I’ll be featuring some of them here.

The first is Jenny Lewis. I think Jenny was the most experienced of all of us, with many, many strings to her bow, and yet she wore her expertise with generosity and humility. Her comments were insightful and supportive and she produced some lovely work. It was very fitting that she won the competition set for us at the end of the week, with a very clever sestina. Jenny explained that it had been rejected by a certain poetry magazine, and so she’d rather lost faith in it (the poem that is), but Carol Ann Duffy wasn’t having any of that. “Who was the editor?” she barked.

Taking Mesopotamia

Anyway, I’m delighted that Jenny agreed to have a poem featured here. This is from her latest collection, Taking Mesopotamia (Oxford Poets/ Carcanet 2014). Of it, Bernard O’Donoghue writes: “Jenny Lewis’s quietly angry book is an account of the Iraq wars – mostly imposed from outside – of the past hundred years. Taking Mesopotamia – a brilliantly ironic title for our times – controls its anger through an accomplished and flexible technique in verse and prose. It is compulsory reading, even for those who don’t normally read poetry: an eloquent rejoinder to those who say poetry can’t, or shouldn’t, concern itself with public matters.”

Do visit Jenny’s website to get a feel for everything she’s up to, and for more details of her publications.

MOTHER

Childbirth was like being excavated:
my belly rose on whalebone wings,
pain soared about me like a bloodied angel:

then you were born

I saw you with my own eyes
I held you day and night:
you lay in my arms, a glowing pupa.

At Kut-al-Amara you were back-lit,
the moon pointed you out against the ridge –
when Turkish gunners stopped your spade

you fell slowly, shedding iridescence

each night in dreams I fail to catch you –
your bones the fragile quills of rescued fledglings
you placed by the stove for warmth

From Taking Mesopotamia (Oxford Poets/ Carcanet 2014) First published by The Oxonian Review, 2012.

Jenny LewisJenny Lewis
Jenny Lewis’s published works include When I Became an Amazon (Iron Press, 1996/ Bilingua, Russia 2002), Fathom (Oxford Poets/ Carcanet 2007) and After Gilgamesh (Mulfran Press, 2011) a verse drama for Pegasus Theatre, Oxford. Her forthcoming collection Taking Mesopotamia (March 2014, Oxford Poets/ Carcanet) expresses the revulsion and despair that ordinary people, especially women, feel towards war. She teaches poetry at Oxford University.

Angst/

At Ty Newydd, part 2

sea-grass-pylon

Here’s the longer post I promised about my week at Ty Newydd. First of all, some of the advice and sayings I captured from the tutors during workshops. It’s not a long list, but we were mostly doing exercises, so I just wrote down phrases that resonated with me:

  • Train yourself to remember details
  • Sometimes by going through an exercise of trying to remember something that happened in the past, you can surprise yourself with what comes out
  • When you’re in a poem, all else disappears – “touch the miracle by allowing this to happen”
  • “At the moment it’s falling apart like a glass of water that’s spilled”
  • There has to be a very good reason for a line to only contain two words
  • Think of verbs as the battery of the poem – they give it life and energy
  • Form forces you to “make choices and to be hard on yourself”
  • You need to love the ‘clay’ between the bricks (ie all the bits of a poem you make have overlooked)
  • There are some words like ‘flotsam’ that “only appear in poems”
  • You can say something more movingly if you don’t over-egg it
  • Have a rationale for your line lengths and stanza lengths – the architecture of the poem
  • Be careful about saying ‘not xyz’ in a poem because then you are saying it!

How we spent the time

There were 16 of us on the course and I was very pleased to find myself thrown together in workshops with so many accomplished and talented poets. We were put into ‘mini groups’ of 3 or 4 and encouraged to work together in our spare time. I warmed very much to my mini-group and I think we did some good work together – we certainly had a lot of laughs (or was it hysteria?) and shared a good amount of wine, all important elements of the bonding, of course.

The idea of spare time was an interesting one! I was in awe of those students who made time to go for runs or a long walk. Two of the days were rainy but I was persuaded to get a bit of fresh air on the last day, which I needed as I had a massive headache from around Thursday lunchtime.

As well as the workshops each morning and two of the afternoons, we had plenty of homework to keep us busy. I was very pleased with my week’s output – two poems that are three-quarters there and the seeds of at least three more. Morning sessions started at ten, so I usually found myself working in my room for at least an hour or so before. At the other end of the day I struggled. On Wednesday I was on the cooking team, so when the afternoon workshop ended we had half an hour ‘free’ until reporting for kitchen duties which then tied us up for the rest of the night, returning to the kitchen after Imtiaz Dharker’s reading to empty the dishwasher and put stuff away. The ‘secret poem’ evening was great fun, but by 11pm when it was drawing to an end I was absolutely fried.

train sign

The thorny issue of tutorials

A few of us (not all – one person took me task for bringing it up) were disappointed to be told right away there would be no individual tutorials, since it was clearly stated on the course literature that there would be ‘plenty of time’ for this during the week. Someone asked the question on the first night and the issue came up several more times, and eventually the tutors defended the decision by saying that individual tutorials tended to just waste everyone else’s time, and were only a feature of beginner-type courses.

The whole thing was (as one student pointed out) simply to do with managing expectations. Some of us had been so excited by the prospect of a hobnob with CAD or GC that it had become a huge selling point of the course. When in fact, if we hadn’t expected it, no-one (me included) would have been disappointed, because we would have gone there simply prepared to take our chances as and when. Which is what happened eventually on the last day, when someone came running into the dining room saying ‘come quick! this is the stuff we’ve been wanting to hear all week!’ – the tutors were in the conservatory, answering questions about getting published, pamphlets, how they (and others) had done it, advice & insider tips … all the things we wanted to ask. Within minutes we were all sitting around them like disciples, agog and hanging on every word.

The people

Naturally what happens in Ty Newydd stays in Ty Newydd. So no identifying details of individuals or the work we covered. But from my own observation, both tutors were extraordinarily giving and worked hard to challenge us and help us develop our writing. It was a generous and supportive group producing some wonderful work. I’ve got exciting names on my radar now: David Borrott, Ben Rogers and Ruby Turok-Squire, for example. Jenny Lewis, who won the competition on the last day with a brilliant sestina (which I had no chance of beating even if I had overcome my flounces about entering) is an accomplished poet with more than one collection already with Carcanet. Her warmth, expertise and sheer humility about her own writing were admirable.

By the end of the week I felt the tutors and students had come to a pretty good rapport. I’ve no idea how Carol Ann Duffy and Gillian Clarke teach so many of these courses and remain sane, cheerful and motivated. I have huge respect for them. I’ve never taught on a residential course but I know how exhausted I get after even a half-day workshop with demanding students. It was lovely that both tutors brought along and introduced us to their family in the evenings. The staff at Ty Newydd were so accommodating, relaxed and friendly; I couldn’t fault the atmosphere in that sense.

Relaxing in the library at Ty Newydd

Final thoughts

Several of the students had been on residential courses before, in some cases quite a few. I think I’d be reluctant to do it again in this format. Although for me the ‘outcomes’ of the week (as it would be officially termed I guess) were excellent, I was surprised at how stressful I found being hothoused with so many people I didn’t know. A smaller group would have allowed more real connection with each others’ writing, and might have felt less hectic. I seem to need a lot of thinking time, and because of this I’m not sure my own contributions were that helpful – it takes me longer than five minutes to offer meaningful feedback on a previously unseen poem. But I know there are the economics of numbers to consider.

What I’m hoping is that the payback (if I dare call it that – I was made aware that not everyone likes to talk about the poetry business in such terms) of the week will extend far into the future. I hope I’ve made some friendships and that there may be opportunities for future collaboration, mutual invitations and who knows what other projects. I hope I’ve learned some valuable lessons, about writing and much more. I think I have.

Robin at Ty Newydd

Angst/

At Ty Newydd, part 1

We’re halfway through the Ty Newydd poetry ‘masterclass’ with Carol Ann Duffy and Gillian Clarke, I’m writing this at 5am because my mind won’t relax, so here are my thoughts so far.

Ty Newydd, the Writers Centre for Wales

Firstly, I have nothing but praise for the staff here – Awen in the office, Gavin the warden and chef and his mother-in-law with the lilting accent – everyone has been so lovely, relaxed and accommodating. I have lucked out with my room – it’s big, quiet and warm, I have my own bathroom, the shower is hot. All perfect. There are stunning views from the landing window. The weather has been wonderful and seasonal. This house seems to have a myriad rooms, nooks, little stairways and books, books, books at every turn.

Ty Newydd conservatory

And the course itself? On day one I got off to a shaky start – on the first evening we were gathered together in the library and asked to interview each other in pairs and introduce ourselves. My neighbour and I went for the usual – families, jobs, backgrounds, poetry successes and why we were here. Everyone else seemed to take the quirky route (‘her favourite poet is Lorca, she wishes more people liked wind turbines and her earliest memory is tasting her first mango’) – I made this one up by the way, but you get the picture.

Ty Newydd dining room

We were also told on the first evening the format of the week – seven workshops in all: two morning workshops with each of the tutors, two afternoon sessions with both tutors in which we may bring a poem for feedback (8 participants on Tuesday, the other 8 yesterday) and on Friday afternoon we’ll be compiling an anthology, although I’m not sure what the tutors’ input on that will be. The evenings are for readings. On Tuesday both the tutors read. It was very special to have a ‘private’ reading like that, and there was a lively Q & A at the end. Yesterday we had a visit from Imtiaz Dharker, who clearly has a very warm relationship with both the tutors. She read some new poems and one or two which were clearly favourites from her repertoire. There was poignancy and humour in her work and a quiet beauty to her voice and interpretation, as well as humour. We loved her.

This evening we will have a ‘secret poem’ session – everyone submits an anonymous poem, which are then read out and we have to guess who wrote what. Supposedly it’s a test of who’s been paying attention to other people’s writing and style. Tricky. On Friday it’s the chance for us all to read something and I have to say I’m looking forward to that – both for the chance to read but also to hear other people’s work, since so far we’ve mostly been generating workshop poems.

The only thing that’s been sprung on us is the news that there’s to be a competition. Carol Ann and Gillian decided yesterday it would be fun. This is the one thing that’s derailed me. Not to bore you too much with the detail of what’s been going on in my head but I’ve decided not to take part (It’s not obligatory). Here’s my honest reason: if I entered and didn’t win, I’d be completely gutted. I’m not saying I’m necessarily think I’m a better poet than any of the other participants, but if I’m not then I don’t want to have my nose rubbed in it. And not winning would make me feel that way – even though YES I know it’s not an objective measure of talent and YES I know it’s just a ‘bit of fun’ – I know, I know – but it matters to me that I come away from this week feeling a little stronger and more confident as a poet. And a stupid thing like a competition could undermine everything I’ve experienced here. Maybe I’m the only one to feel this way and if so perhaps I’m just not as big a person as everyone else. Whatever – I will not take part, I will remove that particular stress and I’ll be very happy for the winners!

I think I’ll leave it there for now – more about the workshops, participants and the tutors in my next post.

Courses/

Out and about the next few weeks . . .

There seems to be plenty happening at the moment, so here’s a quick round-up of some things I’m going to / involved with …

Improve your social web presence - for writers

Firstly, please bear with me if I give a quick plug to my short course at New Writing South which starts tomorrow week, 26th September, 6.30 – 9pm for three weeks, on ‘Improving your social web presence’. It’s basically for any writer who has made small inroads into social media but may be struggling a bit – with finding the time, wondering what to blog or tweet about, not sure how to find writer communities online, struggling with the etiquette or thinking about a Facebook Page, that sort of thing. Lots of practical examples and exercises designed to help writers be inspired, develop useful contacts and find the joy in social media. It’s £80 for the 3 sessions and 10% discount for NWS members. I think there are only 2 places left but I’ll no doubt be running it again in the Spring.

Faber social

Next Tuesday 24th I’m excited to be going to a Faber Social to hear Sam Riviere, Ruth Padel and others plus music. Yay!

Coming up very soon is my trip to Ty Newydd Writers’ Centre for a residential week with Carol Ann Duffy and Gillian Clarke. I have a feeling it’s going to be pretty epic and I’m so looking forward to it. Not sure what the broadband is like there, so I may be off the grid for a week and blogging about it when I get back.

Next month I’m planning to get to the Troubadour evening on October 21st to hear an array of lovely poets – it’ll be my first trip to the Troubadour, so am looking forward to that. Details of all the autumn Troubadour readings are here. The next day at Keat’s House in Hampstead, the idea of hearing poetry heavyweights Don Share and Maurice Riordan debate Ezra Pound’s ‘Don’ts’ is just too tempting. Tickets for that event are available from the Poetry Society.

Later that week a bit closer to home is Needlewriters, a quarterly event in Lewes. The October 24th event features our very own John Agard and Grace Nichols, so it’s bound to be a sell-out. I’m delighted to have been invited to join the organising committee of Needlewriters. It’s not really a committee as such – with minutes, officers and regulations – thankfully.  (What is it about the word committee? We need a new word which encompasses the idea of a group of organisers working for a common cause, but without the connotations of officiousness, jobsworthyness and petty politics. Or maybe that’s just my take on it?)

Let me know if you going to any of the above, and let’s say hello.

TFL poets

PS completely off-topic but I noticed on the Popshot blog that Transport for London are seeking a number of poets-in-residence to work out of tube stations during the week of National Poetry Day – if you’re in London it sounds like a lot of fun – details here (PDF).

Courses/

Train ticket booked

Ty Newydd photo by Touchstone

… for Criccieth. I’m all set for the residential course at Ty Newydd in October with Carol Ann Duffy and Gillian Clarke. So it now feels like I’m actually going. I’m reading CAD’s ‘Rapture’ and GC’s ‘Recipe for Water’ at the moment and feeling buoyed up at the statement on the Ty Newydd course description saying “there will be ample time devoted to one-to-one tutorials” – whoa. I think Arvon only offer one short tutorial during the week. So that sounds very promising. Meanwhile I’ve been looking up all the other participants and there are some very experienced poets, so I’m looking forward to a challenging and fruitful week.

On the subject of courses, I’m very grateful to Josephine Corcoran for flagging this up on Facebook – a free online course from the University of Pennsylvania on American poetry which is just what I need. I’ve signed up for it, although not sure I’ll have the time to do the written work – but even just to watch the video discussions and learn in a passive way I think will be great.