Tag: residential course

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Notes on a poetry residential at Garsdale

I’m back from an inspirational week at the Garsdale Retreat, on a poetry residential course that deserved to be full but wasn’t – if you’ve ever done an Arvon week then I recommend you go to Garsdale for a change. Although the selfish part of me doesn’t want anyone else to discover it, I of course want it to be wildly successful. It’s run by partners Hamish and Rebecca, who realised a dream by relocating to the Yorkshire Dales (although strictly speaking they are just into Cumbria) from Hertfordshire. The Retreat has only been open a year but I predict its courses will very soon be oversubscribed. Kim Moore has been a tutor there and has blogged about it too.

On our week, just four of us had Ian Duhig to ourselves, plus a very absorbing  evening reading from Hannah Lowe, food to die for, very comfortable accommodation and a gorgeous location. Lambs baaa-ed me to sleep each night and I witnessed the joy of Jackpot the bull being introduced to a field of cows. I saw my first-ever red squirrel. And one day we were even treated to the sight of a steam train passing. We were guests at a cello & piano recital and one evening did a lot of shouting and laughing over a ‘literary game’ that Hamish has clearly got very good at. Plus – oh yes! I wrote, read, thought about, listened to and discussed a lot of poetry.

Ian Duhig has an encyclopedic knowledge of literature, history, myth & legend, politics, the environment and much more. (He’s also hilariously down-to-earth.) Tapping into him was rather like releasing a fireman’s hose (nothing lewd intended in this simile!) and many times I found myself giving up trying to write down references or understand everything and just let his talk flow over me. It felt like the way you pick up bits of a foreign language by going to a country and sitting in a cafe where you overhear conversations and the background talk of a TV or radio. The tutorials with him were intense. I was already somewhat in awe. ‘The Lammas Hireling’ made a huge impression on me when I first read it, and, dear God, he’s won the National twice. Now, in one-to-ones I’m aware I can be a bit difficult at times, so I was very grateful for his forbearance & generosity. I came away challenged and felt suitably kicked up the arse.

The fragmentary way of absorbing ideas and sounds ties in pretty well with the key theme of the week, which was how ‘nothing is wasted’ – digging up fragments, interrogating them, piecing things together, enjoying the connections but also the gaps. In this spirit of this, and since so much of what happens on a course stays between those who were there, in this blog post the narrative ends here.

In what follows I share a few of the phrases and ideas that stayed with me, along with some photos I took there which I hope give a feel of the experience.

“We live in descriptions of places not places” – Wallace Stevens –  I tracked this down to a letter written to Henry Church in April 1945.

Untranslateable words, eg Dustsceawung (Old English) – meaning ‘viewing or contemplating dust in the spirit of all things turning to dust. Such contemplation may loosen the grip of worldly desires.’ Ha!

Walls, windows, doors. Idea of ‘the wall which is a door’ in Theology.

‘The ear drieth words as the mouth tastes the meat’ – Book of Job

The disappearing East Coast of England.

Does complex form make you think the poem is less sincere?

“A poem is a bridge that leads to itself” – Paul Muldoon

You don’t want the reader to think “this part of your work is based on an assumption that I don’t think you’ve challenged.”

“Taking the line for a walk” – Paul Klee.

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.

Angst/

The key to writing better poetry is …

Saw a tweet about the new Arvon course list for 2012 being up. So couldn’t resist taking a look.

I’m going through this thing at the moment where I feel a desperate need for some sort of mentoring, or at least workshopping, with better poets than myself. Better writers, more experienced… I guess I don’t necessarily define ‘better’ in terms of recognition or success, but of course that’s part of it.

But it’s funny, sometimes, when I meet someone in a poetry setting, I get an immediate feeling that they’re ‘good’ – it’s hard to describe really, but I get a little ‘ping’, a lightbulb moment I suppose.

I can think of three people who’ve given me this feeling in the last few years. But I’m too shy to name them right now 🙂 The point is, they’re not all obvious candidates for the ‘lightbulb moment’. And I’ve come across many others who you’d think would qualify, but don’t.

It’s probably nothing to do with poetry wisdom or anything. Just a spark, a perceived (and possible one-sided) rapport.

Anyway, the Arvon courses that jumped out at me were a week on ‘Advanced Poetry’ with Carol Ann Duffy (quality-controlled entry, which I like) – but it’s a) in Scotland and b) overlapping with family holiday (already booked) …. a week in Devon with Mimi Khalvati and Sean O’Brien (I think… if I remember that correctly) – I haven’t yet been able to infiltrate the Lewes Live Lit monthly workshops with Mimi Khalvati, something that frustrates me NO END – and the idea of travelling to darkest Devon JUST to get into a workshop with her, when I can’t do so in my HOME TOWN, seems deliciously perverse.

And then there’s the possibility of a week with Don Paterson, albeit a ‘fiction and poetry’ week, when fiction interests me not one iota…. but Don Paterson? Oh my. Don. Paterson.

So I probably won’t be shelling out my £650 this year to the Arvon Foundation. And anyway, all these courses…. they’re a business, right? Just how many courses have the successful poets actually been on, at least, those who’ve been plying their trade since before the MA Creative Writing boom?

Isn’t writing better poetry down to reading good poetry, attempting to write stuff that’s as good, and practising again and again?