Tag: T S Eliot award

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January – ugh! Thank goodness for poetry events…

Royal Festival Hall

As the wind howls outside and the next five-day block of rain chunters towards our heads, I’m feeling very grateful for some poetry relief this dark month.

Last Thursday we got things going at the Poetry Cafe in London, for the first Telltale Press & Friends reading of 2016. It was super to hear Faber poet Jack Underwood perform a set that included poems from his collection Happiness which I loved reading, plus some great new material. He is so original and interesting, as well as being a thoroughly nice chap. And two other thoroughly nice chaps also read – Telltale’s own Peter Kenny and Siegfried Baber. Great to see Sieg settling into a lovely reading style. (I got some nice footage of PK and Jack on my new teensy video cam, and I can see myself getting a lot of mileage from it this year.) Our fourth reader was Kitty Coles, who’s very widely published but relatively undiscovered. A talent worth looking out for – you’ve probably already seen her work in various magazines.

Then this coming Thursday it’s the first Needlewriters event of the year, in my old home town of Lewes, featuring the lovely, talented and hard-working poet Clare Best, debuting yet another of her many projects, this time a collaboration with David Pullan. Really looking forward to that. Also on the bill is Tara Gould, and in the second half a tribute to the late Irving Weinman. Irving was a founder member of the Needlewriters and was working on his eighth novel when he died aged 78 in October.

Tomorrow of course is the Big One – the TS Eliot Prize readings at London’s South Bank. It gets more glittery and sold out every year. Can’t wait to see and hear the mighty DP, whose 40 Sonnets has just won the Costa poetry prize, and my newest hero Sarah Howe reading from the wonderful Loop of Jade (here’s my short review.)

Peter Kenny and I have second row seats this year, so we’ll be up close and personal with the poets reading. Not as up close as I’ll be the following evening though, at the award ceremony. Oh yes, Robin shall go to the ball!

 

 

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An evening at the T S Eliot Prize readings

T S Eliot Prize readings 2015

Since being introduced to this annual event about 5 years ago by poet friends Julia and Charlotte, I’ve made it a fixture on my calendar. Held at the cavernous Royal Festival Hall on London’s Southbank, the T S Eliot Prize readings seem to be as much about the socialising and the catching up with other poets as they are with the poetry itself.

And why not? Us poety-types aren’t always the most social of bods. As well as the chance to say hello to so many poet friends all in one place, I love the buzzy feel of this event – standing on one of the mezzanine landings and surveying the foyer and bar area (was that Melvyn Bragg over there?) Rubbing shoulders with the poetry glitterati (poet-ati?) I love the wonderful mix of ages and styles across the audience – it would be hard to point at one one person and say “that’s a poet”. And yet they probably all are.

Unlike last year, I didn’t go to Katy Evans-Bush‘s marvellous pre-readings workshop day, in which all ten nominated collections are dipped into, mulled over and discussed in the light of Katy’s expert analysis and guidance. I was familiar with the work of some of the poets reading, but certainly not all. And not these latest collections.

This year the Poetry Book Society went gung-ho on the live tweeting, with two of the tweeters at the end of our row causing a slight fracas at the end of the first half as people in the row behind them asked to desist from tapping into their phones non-stop. I did feel for the complainants. I had a terrific view from my seat and wanted to take photos of the poets as they read, but couldn’t bring myself to do it as I know it can be distracting. And as I struggled to concentrate on Pascale Petit‘s reading with the phone action going on next to me, I resolved quite early on that the my phone was staying in the bag. Except for the empty lectern shot you see here, taken before the second half got going. Anyway, I think the live tweeters were more discreet in the second half so hopefully peace broke out.

As regards the actual readings (ahem!) there was nothing I really didn’t like, but I did enjoy very much hearing Michael Longley (warm, down to earth, compelling), Arundhathi Subramaniam (assured and commanding), Fiona Benson (charmingly nervous but read very powerfully) and David Harsent (made me want to read more of him). Sadly there were three proxy readers – while I was gutted that Hugo Williams couldn’t be there, it was good news to hear that he is apparently on the mend, and actor Jeremy Clyde gave an excellent delivery of Hugo’s poems. Here is the ‘From the dialysis ward’ sequence from his collection ‘I knew the Bride’ (Faber). But I didn’t feel justice was done to Kevin Powers’ work ‘Letter Composed During a Lull in the Fighting’ (Sceptre) by the reader who took his place, as he didn’t come across as being at all engaged with the material, which was a shame.

As always, Ian McMillan did a fine job of compering, picking out aspects of the various collections and pulling them into an intellectual yet entertaining ribbon of thought. Funny yet respectful. I don’t really know how he does that but it works! And who will win the £20,000 prize? Who knows!

The full shortlist and details of the judges are here. The result is announced this evening.

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‘The Fishermen’s Farewell’ by Robin Robertson

Hill of Doors by Robin Robertson

Now that I’m enjoying a brief work hiatus (book submission made yesterday, drum-roll please) I’m hoping to catch up on my reading. This morning I picked up Hill of Doors (Picador), Robin Robertson’s T S Eliot award-nominated collection, and was reminded of how much I enjoyed my first brief meander through when it was given to me by poet friend Antony.

There are two threads of poems running through the book, and ‘The Fishermen’s Farewell’ comes from the Scotland/memories thread. From the title you might expect something whimsical or ballad-like, an elegy for a lost way of life. For me, the poem has a mysterious beauty and a music about it, but the picture it paints is far from sentimental.