I've done precious little birdwatching in December, and absolutely none on my local patch until the last few days. It was good, then, to get over to Cossington Meadows today and be met with not one but two unexpected arrivals (and ticks for the year list).
First was a Water Pipit, picking its way around the margins of a flooded area in the company of two Pied Wagtails and a Green Sandpiper. It's been there a few days, apparently, and seemed to be feeding well.
Second was a Great White Egret, in the company of a Little Egret and no less than eight Grey Herons. It too seemed to be feeding well in a small pool and along some flooded ditches, although it did draw the attention of a pair of Mute Swans, who moved it on from their little corner of the pool. Its pure white plumage and orangey-yellow bill seemed to have antagonised them, either because they thought it was some mutant swan, or because they just don't like to see another species using their colour scheme.
Those two ticks take the year list to a not very impressive 140-odd. Of course, birders being what we are, we're all desperate for the pipit and the egret to stay until Tuesday, so that we can make them among the first ticks on our 2008 lists.
Sunday, 30 December 2007
In the papers...
There was a good piece in yesterday's Guardian about Nottingham-based writer John Harvey, who is probably best known for his Resnick detective novels but who is also a fine poet, and was the moving force behind the poetry press and magazine Slow Dancer. I've got one of his books, Bluer Than This, from Smith/Doorstop, and it's excellent.
There was also this article about Charters and Caldicott, the cricket-loving old buffers in Hitchcock's classic The Lady Vanishes. Nice to see one of the great director's more overlooked films being taken seriously.
There was also this article about Charters and Caldicott, the cricket-loving old buffers in Hitchcock's classic The Lady Vanishes. Nice to see one of the great director's more overlooked films being taken seriously.
Monday, 24 December 2007
Merry Christmas!
An excess of festive cheer has kept me away from the screen for the last few days, and will continue to do so, I hope, for a while yet. I might just about put together a Best of 2007 in time for the New Year - until then, I'll just wish everyone a very Merry Christmas, and may your God go with you, as Dave Allen used to say.
Wednesday, 19 December 2007
Copyright conundrum
Good debate over at Surroundings regarding Wendy Cope's Guardian piece on poetry copyright, which I only got round to reading last weekend.
I think I'm firmly on the side of those who think that reproducing poems on the internet is likely, in the long run, to mean more sales for the poet concerned, although obviously it's entirely up to the individual poet what line they want to take regarding their own work. For my own part, I think nearly all the poetry I buy now (and the already groaning new bookcase I shifted into my back room two weeks ago tells me I buy a lot) is purchased after I've sampled the writer's work online. It doesn't happen nearly so much with the non-poetry books I buy, purely because they're usually much easier to find in bookshops, where you can spend hours flicking through them while you decide (Borders even provide sofas and coffee to help, for heaven's sake). So, is internet browsing of work really so different to hiding yourself in quiet corner of Waterstone's while you read all the best bits?
I think I'm firmly on the side of those who think that reproducing poems on the internet is likely, in the long run, to mean more sales for the poet concerned, although obviously it's entirely up to the individual poet what line they want to take regarding their own work. For my own part, I think nearly all the poetry I buy now (and the already groaning new bookcase I shifted into my back room two weeks ago tells me I buy a lot) is purchased after I've sampled the writer's work online. It doesn't happen nearly so much with the non-poetry books I buy, purely because they're usually much easier to find in bookshops, where you can spend hours flicking through them while you decide (Borders even provide sofas and coffee to help, for heaven's sake). So, is internet browsing of work really so different to hiding yourself in quiet corner of Waterstone's while you read all the best bits?
Wednesday, 12 December 2007
New at Stride
Couple of noteworthy posts over at Stride. First, there's these very fine poems by James Midgley, who you might also know as the editor of Mimesis. I found myself printing them off to read again at home, which is always a good sign with poetry I read on the net. They're well worth the company's ink.
Secondly, there's Stride editor Rupert Loydell's picks of the year. I can't claim to have read much that's on the list, although that's more down to lack of funds than inclination, but I did enjoy the Mike Barlow and Luke Kennard volumes, and I'll take this chance once again to sing the praises of Karen Solie's Modern And Normal. When I come to do my own pick of 2007, I'm pretty sure that it will be occupying top spot. Still just about time for that to change, I suppose, but whatever - it's a really excellent book.
Secondly, there's Stride editor Rupert Loydell's picks of the year. I can't claim to have read much that's on the list, although that's more down to lack of funds than inclination, but I did enjoy the Mike Barlow and Luke Kennard volumes, and I'll take this chance once again to sing the praises of Karen Solie's Modern And Normal. When I come to do my own pick of 2007, I'm pretty sure that it will be occupying top spot. Still just about time for that to change, I suppose, but whatever - it's a really excellent book.
Monday, 10 December 2007
An autobiography of America
If you mention the American author Thomas Wolfe to anyone in Britain, you will almost certainly have to stop two sentences later to explain that no, he isn't TOM Wolfe, the 'New Journalist' chronicler of the seismic social upheavals of the 1960s and author of 'Bonfire of the Vanities'. No, not at all; someone very different, in fact.
Born as the 20th Century got under way in 1900, Thomas Wolfe wrote during a period that many Americans regard as the 'Golden Age' of the American novel. He began as a playwright, and also wrote short stories, but it is his four long, unashamedly autobiographical novels that he is remembered for.
Packed with adjectives and adverbs, his opulent language communicates the life he saw through the shapes, textures, sounds, colours and odours around him. His writing career lasted a mere nine years, but during that time he produced a body of work quite unlike anything else in American literature.
Wolfe's books are highly lyrical, and his vast vocabulary can sometimes be overwhelming, but any effort required in reading the four volumes is more than repaid.
And the skin wrapping around the books, binding them all together neatly if not entirely coherently, is Wolfe's own life in a very light disguise.
Standing in 2007, Wolfe's books now seem like a huge autobiography of America itself in the early years of the 20th Century, during some of its darkest times. Somehow, he gets under the surface of that huge country and manages to show us what is going on there.
Sprawling is a word that is often used pejoratively, but in his case it would merely indicate how the books capture the enormous variety and diversity of American life during the Depression.
From his native North Carolina to the political excesses of 1920s and 30s Europe as seen by an American abroad, and back again, Wolfe's books present a vista of life at that precise moment, yet ever-changing. Huge, shifting, yet dependable; presented with an eye that captures detail incredibly.
Yet, despite the worst of all he sees, there is never a sense of despair in Wolfe's writing. At the end of 'You Can't Go Home Again', he sums things up honestly but with defiance: "What befalls man is a tragic lot. There is no denying this in the final end. But we must deny it all along the way. Mankind was fashioned for eternity."
Seemingly making more of a criticism than a comment, Nobel Prize-winner William Faulkner once said of Wolfe that he was "trying to put the entire history of the human heart on the head of a pin".
Ironic in a way, when you consider that the books that Faulkner read were far shorter than those Wolfe had originally written.
In a prescient foreshadowing of the current debate surrounding the 'restoration' of Raymond Carver's short stories, the books on which Wolfe's reputation rests were the result of long hours spent by editors with judiciously applied blue pencils.
His first novel 'Look Homeward, Angel' began life as a much longer work called 'O Lost' and was more experimental in nature than the work we know.
His last three novels - 'Of Time And The River', 'The Web And The Rock' and 'You Can't Go Home Again' - were all edited sections of an enormous multi-volume work called 'The October Fair'. The original was in fact of a similar length to Proust's 'A La Recherche Du Temps Perdu'. And that's a lot of pages.
The final two novels were culled from this enormous manuscript following Wolfe's death in 1938 from tuberculosis of the brain.
'O Lost' has since been 'reconstructed' and published. 'The October Fair' has gone forever, so scattered among various editors at the time that we will never learn the shape that Wolfe intended for it.
Following Wolfe's death, at the tragically young age of 38, Faulkner spoke up again. This time he praised Wolfe as his generation's best writer, placing himself a mere second.
The Great American Novel is something that has obsessed the American literary etsablishment for longer than anyone can remember. There are those who claim that that fox had already been shot by the time of Wolfe's death - that he had done it and all bets were off. Others disagreed, and the debate still continues.
But Wolfe's prose, its elegant, impressionistic grace and at times its almost uncomfortable honesty, will live on whether that particular medal is pinned on its proud breast or not.
Though his name is not so well known this side of the Atlantic, the scope and breadth of his work deserves your attention and I urge you to pick up a copy and read.
Mark Howard Jones
Born as the 20th Century got under way in 1900, Thomas Wolfe wrote during a period that many Americans regard as the 'Golden Age' of the American novel. He began as a playwright, and also wrote short stories, but it is his four long, unashamedly autobiographical novels that he is remembered for.
Packed with adjectives and adverbs, his opulent language communicates the life he saw through the shapes, textures, sounds, colours and odours around him. His writing career lasted a mere nine years, but during that time he produced a body of work quite unlike anything else in American literature.
Wolfe's books are highly lyrical, and his vast vocabulary can sometimes be overwhelming, but any effort required in reading the four volumes is more than repaid.
And the skin wrapping around the books, binding them all together neatly if not entirely coherently, is Wolfe's own life in a very light disguise.
Standing in 2007, Wolfe's books now seem like a huge autobiography of America itself in the early years of the 20th Century, during some of its darkest times. Somehow, he gets under the surface of that huge country and manages to show us what is going on there.
Sprawling is a word that is often used pejoratively, but in his case it would merely indicate how the books capture the enormous variety and diversity of American life during the Depression.
From his native North Carolina to the political excesses of 1920s and 30s Europe as seen by an American abroad, and back again, Wolfe's books present a vista of life at that precise moment, yet ever-changing. Huge, shifting, yet dependable; presented with an eye that captures detail incredibly.
Yet, despite the worst of all he sees, there is never a sense of despair in Wolfe's writing. At the end of 'You Can't Go Home Again', he sums things up honestly but with defiance: "What befalls man is a tragic lot. There is no denying this in the final end. But we must deny it all along the way. Mankind was fashioned for eternity."
Seemingly making more of a criticism than a comment, Nobel Prize-winner William Faulkner once said of Wolfe that he was "trying to put the entire history of the human heart on the head of a pin".
Ironic in a way, when you consider that the books that Faulkner read were far shorter than those Wolfe had originally written.
In a prescient foreshadowing of the current debate surrounding the 'restoration' of Raymond Carver's short stories, the books on which Wolfe's reputation rests were the result of long hours spent by editors with judiciously applied blue pencils.
His first novel 'Look Homeward, Angel' began life as a much longer work called 'O Lost' and was more experimental in nature than the work we know.
His last three novels - 'Of Time And The River', 'The Web And The Rock' and 'You Can't Go Home Again' - were all edited sections of an enormous multi-volume work called 'The October Fair'. The original was in fact of a similar length to Proust's 'A La Recherche Du Temps Perdu'. And that's a lot of pages.
The final two novels were culled from this enormous manuscript following Wolfe's death in 1938 from tuberculosis of the brain.
'O Lost' has since been 'reconstructed' and published. 'The October Fair' has gone forever, so scattered among various editors at the time that we will never learn the shape that Wolfe intended for it.
Following Wolfe's death, at the tragically young age of 38, Faulkner spoke up again. This time he praised Wolfe as his generation's best writer, placing himself a mere second.
The Great American Novel is something that has obsessed the American literary etsablishment for longer than anyone can remember. There are those who claim that that fox had already been shot by the time of Wolfe's death - that he had done it and all bets were off. Others disagreed, and the debate still continues.
But Wolfe's prose, its elegant, impressionistic grace and at times its almost uncomfortable honesty, will live on whether that particular medal is pinned on its proud breast or not.
Though his name is not so well known this side of the Atlantic, the scope and breadth of his work deserves your attention and I urge you to pick up a copy and read.
Mark Howard Jones
Friday, 7 December 2007
Poetry in primary schools
It’s not often you’re going to see me talking about Ofsted on this page, but this report from the government education watchdog about the teaching of poetry in primary schools makes pretty interesting reading.
I’m not sure I’m in any way qualified to make any pronouncement on it, given that my own primary school career is 27 years in the past, but it did set me thinking back. I don’t honestly remember being taught ANY poetry at primary school, or at high school (11-14) for that matter. And both of them, I should say, were really pretty good schools, with excellent academic standards.
As others have pointed out, the report contains examples of poetry being written by schoolchildren, and it’s really rather good, which confirms an impression I’ve formed over the past few years. My own godson (aged 11) recently showed me a poem he’d written for school, and it was excellent, and a colleague was telling me earlier this week about the poem his young daughter had written at school. She’d taken the sort of imaginative leap that I can’t imagine we’d have made if we’d been set the same exercise 30 years ago. In fact, a couple of years ago I attended a workshop at which much the same exercise was set, and while some interesting poems resulted, I think we all played it much safer. Finally, when I ran a workshop in a primary school a couple of years back, I was surprised but delighted by the standard of work the children wrote. Best of all was the fact that the kids (they were 10) gave the impression of being familiar with both very traditional poetry and much more modern stuff, and of being able to read and write either.
What I’m saying, I suppose, is that in my very limited experience, poetry does seem to be taught rather better these days, at least if what the children are writing is anything to go by. And while widening the range of what is taught is probably a good thing, I hope it’s not used as an excuse for chucking out all the older stuff. Room for both, surely?
I’m not sure I’m in any way qualified to make any pronouncement on it, given that my own primary school career is 27 years in the past, but it did set me thinking back. I don’t honestly remember being taught ANY poetry at primary school, or at high school (11-14) for that matter. And both of them, I should say, were really pretty good schools, with excellent academic standards.
As others have pointed out, the report contains examples of poetry being written by schoolchildren, and it’s really rather good, which confirms an impression I’ve formed over the past few years. My own godson (aged 11) recently showed me a poem he’d written for school, and it was excellent, and a colleague was telling me earlier this week about the poem his young daughter had written at school. She’d taken the sort of imaginative leap that I can’t imagine we’d have made if we’d been set the same exercise 30 years ago. In fact, a couple of years ago I attended a workshop at which much the same exercise was set, and while some interesting poems resulted, I think we all played it much safer. Finally, when I ran a workshop in a primary school a couple of years back, I was surprised but delighted by the standard of work the children wrote. Best of all was the fact that the kids (they were 10) gave the impression of being familiar with both very traditional poetry and much more modern stuff, and of being able to read and write either.
What I’m saying, I suppose, is that in my very limited experience, poetry does seem to be taught rather better these days, at least if what the children are writing is anything to go by. And while widening the range of what is taught is probably a good thing, I hope it’s not used as an excuse for chucking out all the older stuff. Room for both, surely?
Wednesday, 5 December 2007
So Here We Are 8
Here's the link to So Here We Are 8, the latest of Tears In The Fence editor David Caddy's Poetic Letters From England. As ever, it's interesting stuff, taking in all sorts of diverse writers, including John Arlott.
On that subject, I know he's regarded by many as the voice of summer, but I was a bit too late to hear much of his radio career, and so Richie Benaud takes that title in my memory. Usually TV sports commentators are grating at best, but I always loved Richie's pithy way with a phrase. His exchange with Geoff Boycott on the last day of the 4th Test between England and South Africa in 1998 was magnificent, and his despairing exclamation that "it's absolute carnage out there now" as David Gower stroked 215 against the Aussies in 1985 was the stuff of legend.
I think I might be straying from the point a little...
On that subject, I know he's regarded by many as the voice of summer, but I was a bit too late to hear much of his radio career, and so Richie Benaud takes that title in my memory. Usually TV sports commentators are grating at best, but I always loved Richie's pithy way with a phrase. His exchange with Geoff Boycott on the last day of the 4th Test between England and South Africa in 1998 was magnificent, and his despairing exclamation that "it's absolute carnage out there now" as David Gower stroked 215 against the Aussies in 1985 was the stuff of legend.
I think I might be straying from the point a little...
In the workshop
The December edition of Writers' Forum used my poem Yellow Bellies in its monthly poetry workshop, to illustrate assonance and alliteration, among other things. The series of articles takes different poems each month and uses them to offer straightforward, practical advice to writers. The magazine also includes news, a wealth of contacts for submissions and competitions, and a monthly poetry competition, so it's well worth checking out. Many thanks to Poetry Editor Sarah Willans for using my work.
Monday, 3 December 2007
Arrowhead say yes!
Friday’s reading came at the end of a pretty exhilarating few days for me. Some time ago, I submitted a manuscript for a full-size poetry collection to Arrowhead Press, and they’ve just accepted it. The working title is Troy Town (although I have quite a few alternatives in mind), and publication is currently set for the middle of next year.
Of course, there’s still a lot of work to be done, but when Making The Most Of The Light was being put together, it surprised me just how much I enjoyed that editing, honing process (it helps when you have an excellent editor), so I'm really looking forward to getting stuck in.
Naturally, I’m delighted by all this and haven’t quite got my head round it yet. I can’t claim to be familiar with all of Arrowhead’s poets, but I’m flattered to be in the company of those I do know. Bob Cooper (whose work is sometimes described as “New York meets Newcastle”) is a really excellent poet, whose perceptive criticism at The Works has been a big help to me, and David Bircumshaw (another Leicester poet), had a really unusual and memorable collection published by them a few years back. Another Works regular, Poetry Scotland editor Sally Evans, is there too, and Jennifer Copley, Lyn Moir, Marita Over and Sue Vickerman are all poets I’ve read and enjoyed. And of course, Poetry Editor Joanna Boulter’s own On Sketty Sands is a really fine chapbook (she went on to be nominated for the Forward Prize, I think, for her recent collection).
Funnily enough, at Friday’s reading, I met Peter Rafferty, who has already had a collection published by Arrowhead, and who shares my predilection for birds in poems. I like the look of his book a lot. It's good to be on board.
Of course, there’s still a lot of work to be done, but when Making The Most Of The Light was being put together, it surprised me just how much I enjoyed that editing, honing process (it helps when you have an excellent editor), so I'm really looking forward to getting stuck in.
Naturally, I’m delighted by all this and haven’t quite got my head round it yet. I can’t claim to be familiar with all of Arrowhead’s poets, but I’m flattered to be in the company of those I do know. Bob Cooper (whose work is sometimes described as “New York meets Newcastle”) is a really excellent poet, whose perceptive criticism at The Works has been a big help to me, and David Bircumshaw (another Leicester poet), had a really unusual and memorable collection published by them a few years back. Another Works regular, Poetry Scotland editor Sally Evans, is there too, and Jennifer Copley, Lyn Moir, Marita Over and Sue Vickerman are all poets I’ve read and enjoyed. And of course, Poetry Editor Joanna Boulter’s own On Sketty Sands is a really fine chapbook (she went on to be nominated for the Forward Prize, I think, for her recent collection).
Funnily enough, at Friday’s reading, I met Peter Rafferty, who has already had a collection published by Arrowhead, and who shares my predilection for birds in poems. I like the look of his book a lot. It's good to be on board.
Sunday, 2 December 2007
HappenStance Border raid
From left: Myself, James Wood, Eleanor Livingstone, Trish Ace, Rob Mackenzie, Helena Nelson.
On Friday, I hot-footed it north to Carlisle for a reading, alongside five other HappenStance poets, as part of the Border Poets series.
I usually like to see a bit of the countryside on such jaunts, but it rained all the way up to Scotch Corner, and across the Stainmore Pass to Penrith, putting paid to my plan to do a bit of birding and stop off at the spot where semi-legendary Viking king of York Eric Bloodaxe (see the poetry connection?) was finally brought to bay.
We had one or two problems finding each other once we got there (and two or three excellent pints of Black Sheep), but were at the Tullie House Museum and Art Gallery in good time to appreciate what really is a lovely venue. And what followed was without doubt the best reading I’ve been involved with.
There was a good-sized audience, who were appreciative, knowledgeable and gratifyingly willing to part with their money for chapbooks (we were pretty much sold out by the end of the night). The variety of poets on show seemed to work particularly well, offering plenty of light and shade and both obvious and more subtle similarities (three of us, quite unintentionally, read poems with Robinson Crusoe connections).
Eleanor Livingstone, who launched her chapbook at the same event as me two years ago, read well from her excellent The Last King Of Fife. The title poem, in particular, is a favourite of mine, but she’s a very sure-footed poet, in an understated way, so there was plenty else to enjoy.
I’d only just met James Wood, but have been enjoying his The Theory Of Everything since it came out. He reads very well, with an engagingly animated manner, and his technical mastery and breadth of knowledge are worn lightly, both drawing the reader in and allowing him to surprise them when things take a darker turn.
Trish Ace was also a new face to me, but again I’ve been enjoying her book, First Blood, for months. We talked a little beforehand about attitudes to putting the domestic and everyday into poems, and Trish mentioned that perhaps the prevailing climate is against this, but her reading rather reinforced my view, that when it’s done well, as here, what is there to complain about? She makes connections between the personal and the wider world without signposting them or straining for significance, she distils emotion well, and she's another excellent reader.
Rob Mackenzie is another who manages to be animated without ever getting theatrical. It’s a style that suits his poems down to the ground, too, because he constantly springs surprises on you (in both style and subject matter) without ever reaching for easy, look-at-me effects. He read Concentration, one of my favourites from his chapbook The Clown Of Natural Sorrow, and his genuinely creepy At The Harry Potter Launch drew audible gasps from the audience.
For my part, I read five from Making The Most Of The Light, plus one from Winter Gifts, and a new-ish poem. The full set-list was:
1. Familiar
2. Man Overboard
3. Vocabulary
4. Poem
5. Redwings
6. At Home
7. Cure
In between times, HappenStance’s founder and all-round creative dynamo Helena Nelson read poems and talked about the experience of starting a chapbook press from scratch. I think every one of us would say we owe a great debt to her, not only for taking a punt on putting out our books, but also for her hugely supportive and instructive editing of said pamphlets.
We all told the audience a bit about our current activities and plans (more on mine tomorrow), and afterwards chatted with them while books were bought, drinks seen off, etc. If any of them are reading this, thank you too for making it an enjoyable and inspiring night.
I meandered back, via a secondhand bookshop in Penrith (£7 for two books, on 14th century poetry and medieval history), and RSPB Leighton Moss, where the wind was keeping the Bitterns and Bearded Tits deep in the reedbeds, but a very showy Great White Egret gave great views.
Wednesday, 28 November 2007
Brittle Star
I had a poem, Treaty House, accepted for issue 19 of Brittle Star yesterday, in what's been a big week for me. I've got a couple of major developments to report, but they'll have to wait until the weekend. In the meantime, it's full steam ahead practicing for Friday's reading (I know my name's not there, but I will be there, honest). I've been reading loudly to the living room for the last week. The response has been somewhat muted.
Sunday, 25 November 2007
Essential Hitchcock
Last Saturday, The Guardian contained a pull-out supplement with Part 1 of their 1000 Albums To Hear Before You Die. Of course, I didn’t read the introduction properly, so didn’t bother to buy the paper during the week to collect the subsequent parts, thinking that they were going to be published on consecutive Saturdays. Stupid, I know.
So, I have no idea whether Robyn Hitchcock’s classics I Often Dream Of Trains or Eye made it in there. I do know, though, that you can get both, plus his first solo album, Black Snake Diamond Role, and a host of bonus demo tracks, in a new boxed set called I Wanna Go Backwards. You wouldn’t be disappointed.
I like a lot of Hitchcock’s albums with The Egyptians, but those first two I mentioned, I Often Dream Of Trains and Eye, are on another level. Both feature nothing more than his (often multi-tracked) voice, plus his own acoustic guitar and piano accompaniment. On Eye, in particular, his finger-picking is stunning, mixing folkiness with a peculiarly English psychedelic flavour. Both albums, I should add, are very immediate, catchy even, and although the influences of Syd Barrett, John Lennon and Bob Dylan are always apparent, they’re never overpowering, Hitchcock being too much his own man to let that happen.
A lot of the time that’s down to the lyrics. Admittedly, sometimes Robyn gets a bit self-consciously weird and tries a bit too hard, but most of the time he sets out a highly individual vision that’s often unsettling, often funny, occasionally heartbreaking (especially the very Dylanesque Linctus House, on Eye) and always thought-provoking.
Another album that might have made it in there is Graham Parker and The Rumour's Squeezing Out Sparks. I bought it on CD the other day, having long ago lost my old tape of it, and it still stands up well. Parker got sick, in the late 70s, of being tagged as an angry young man along with Elvis Costello and Joe Jackson, but you can see (or hear, rather) why it happened. He sounds like a man with a lot to get off his chest, and on this album, the musical backing is stripped back to a pretty raw, guitar-heavy sound. There are one or two weak tracks, but Discovering Japan, Passion Is No Ordinary Word and Local Girls hit the spot, and You Can’t Be Too Strong almost qualifies as sensitive. There are two bonus tracks, with his old brass section back on board, one a fairly straight but decent stab at the Jackson 5’s I Want You Back, and the other called Mercury Poisoning, a bile-filled but upbeat kiss-off to his old reord company.
He never quite hit the commercial heights that Costello and Jackson did, but arguably he stayed truer to his original vision.
So, I have no idea whether Robyn Hitchcock’s classics I Often Dream Of Trains or Eye made it in there. I do know, though, that you can get both, plus his first solo album, Black Snake Diamond Role, and a host of bonus demo tracks, in a new boxed set called I Wanna Go Backwards. You wouldn’t be disappointed.
I like a lot of Hitchcock’s albums with The Egyptians, but those first two I mentioned, I Often Dream Of Trains and Eye, are on another level. Both feature nothing more than his (often multi-tracked) voice, plus his own acoustic guitar and piano accompaniment. On Eye, in particular, his finger-picking is stunning, mixing folkiness with a peculiarly English psychedelic flavour. Both albums, I should add, are very immediate, catchy even, and although the influences of Syd Barrett, John Lennon and Bob Dylan are always apparent, they’re never overpowering, Hitchcock being too much his own man to let that happen.
A lot of the time that’s down to the lyrics. Admittedly, sometimes Robyn gets a bit self-consciously weird and tries a bit too hard, but most of the time he sets out a highly individual vision that’s often unsettling, often funny, occasionally heartbreaking (especially the very Dylanesque Linctus House, on Eye) and always thought-provoking.
Another album that might have made it in there is Graham Parker and The Rumour's Squeezing Out Sparks. I bought it on CD the other day, having long ago lost my old tape of it, and it still stands up well. Parker got sick, in the late 70s, of being tagged as an angry young man along with Elvis Costello and Joe Jackson, but you can see (or hear, rather) why it happened. He sounds like a man with a lot to get off his chest, and on this album, the musical backing is stripped back to a pretty raw, guitar-heavy sound. There are one or two weak tracks, but Discovering Japan, Passion Is No Ordinary Word and Local Girls hit the spot, and You Can’t Be Too Strong almost qualifies as sensitive. There are two bonus tracks, with his old brass section back on board, one a fairly straight but decent stab at the Jackson 5’s I Want You Back, and the other called Mercury Poisoning, a bile-filled but upbeat kiss-off to his old reord company.
He never quite hit the commercial heights that Costello and Jackson did, but arguably he stayed truer to his original vision.
Thursday, 22 November 2007
Grail birds
Last Monday, we (myself, editor Kevin Wilmot, deputy editor Mike Weedon and photographer Tom Bailey) spent the day putting together a feature for the January issue of Bird Watching, involving what’s known as the Big Sit. You’re not allowed to move from within a smallish circle (17 ft diameter, I think), and you see how many bird species you can spot in a set length of time. We tried it at three different locations, for an hour at each.
Some of the results were surprising (only two Grey Herons, no Collared Doves, no House Sparrows), and it certainly makes you approach your birding in a different way, putting a high emphasis on birdsong, for starters. We thought we did pretty well – 54 species in an hour at Eldernell, out on the Nene Washes; 40 at Woodwalton Fen Nature Reserve; and 43 at Ferry Meadows Country Park, on the outskirts of Peterborough.
The highlight, for me at least, came at Woodwalton, when a Bittern dropped into the reeds on the far side of the pool we were watching. It’s one of those grail birds for me – I’m sure I could have seen one before now by going to Minsmere or somewhere similar, but I always thought I’d rather see one in the course of my normal birding. They’re still very rare in the UK (and the dreadful summer we just had, plus the more recent floods, will have done nothing to help that), but when you finally do see one, they’re well worth the wait.
Over the last two days, I’ve been birding around the local patch. Yesterday there was a nice little group of Goosanders at Watermead Park, and a spectacular, noisy flock of around 10,000 Starlings at Cossington Meadows. Today, I dithered over whether to go out, and where to go, and finally dodged heavy showers to drop into Kelham Bridge, a small local reserve (it’s a former sewage works). I’d been there for 15 minutes, with nothing to see but a few Moorhens and Mallards, when a male Hen Harrier appeared and started quartering the reedbeds and grassland. They’re hugely impressive and utterly distinctive silver-grey birds, and I was able to watch it for about a quarter of an hour before it disappeared over the hill, although hopefully it might hang around for a few days.
But to get to the point, finally. That type of sighting is what makes me enjoy birding, because afterwards it always strikes you as a massive stroke of luck. One bird, making its way across the country, and a tiny window of opportunity to see it passing through your area. If I’d, say, stopped at the garage before birding, instead of after, I might have missed it. I might have not bothered at all, what with all that rain around. I might have been looking the other way as it made its entrance, and have remained in blissful ignorance as it floated around behind the hide.
Of course, if you’re a glass-half-empty type of birder, you probably spend your time thinking of all the birds you didn’t quite see, but that way lies madness.
Some of the results were surprising (only two Grey Herons, no Collared Doves, no House Sparrows), and it certainly makes you approach your birding in a different way, putting a high emphasis on birdsong, for starters. We thought we did pretty well – 54 species in an hour at Eldernell, out on the Nene Washes; 40 at Woodwalton Fen Nature Reserve; and 43 at Ferry Meadows Country Park, on the outskirts of Peterborough.
The highlight, for me at least, came at Woodwalton, when a Bittern dropped into the reeds on the far side of the pool we were watching. It’s one of those grail birds for me – I’m sure I could have seen one before now by going to Minsmere or somewhere similar, but I always thought I’d rather see one in the course of my normal birding. They’re still very rare in the UK (and the dreadful summer we just had, plus the more recent floods, will have done nothing to help that), but when you finally do see one, they’re well worth the wait.
Over the last two days, I’ve been birding around the local patch. Yesterday there was a nice little group of Goosanders at Watermead Park, and a spectacular, noisy flock of around 10,000 Starlings at Cossington Meadows. Today, I dithered over whether to go out, and where to go, and finally dodged heavy showers to drop into Kelham Bridge, a small local reserve (it’s a former sewage works). I’d been there for 15 minutes, with nothing to see but a few Moorhens and Mallards, when a male Hen Harrier appeared and started quartering the reedbeds and grassland. They’re hugely impressive and utterly distinctive silver-grey birds, and I was able to watch it for about a quarter of an hour before it disappeared over the hill, although hopefully it might hang around for a few days.
But to get to the point, finally. That type of sighting is what makes me enjoy birding, because afterwards it always strikes you as a massive stroke of luck. One bird, making its way across the country, and a tiny window of opportunity to see it passing through your area. If I’d, say, stopped at the garage before birding, instead of after, I might have missed it. I might have not bothered at all, what with all that rain around. I might have been looking the other way as it made its entrance, and have remained in blissful ignorance as it floated around behind the hide.
Of course, if you’re a glass-half-empty type of birder, you probably spend your time thinking of all the birds you didn’t quite see, but that way lies madness.
Tuesday, 20 November 2007
HappenStance reading
A week on Friday, November 30, I'll be reading with five fellow HappenStance poets at Tullie House, Carlisle.
The event is one of a series run by Border Poets, and will feature Helena Nelson, Patricia Ace, Eleanor Livingstone, Rob Mackenzie and James Wood, as well as yours truly. If you live locally, or you're in the area, come along to listen and say hello.
Quite apart from what should be a very enjoyable evening of poetry, a chance to meet old friends and make new ones, I'm looking forward to seeing a part of the country I've never really been to before (I might have passed through, just the once). And there's all those prime wetland birding sites all the way up the west coast that I'll just have to pop into on the way there or back.
The event is one of a series run by Border Poets, and will feature Helena Nelson, Patricia Ace, Eleanor Livingstone, Rob Mackenzie and James Wood, as well as yours truly. If you live locally, or you're in the area, come along to listen and say hello.
Quite apart from what should be a very enjoyable evening of poetry, a chance to meet old friends and make new ones, I'm looking forward to seeing a part of the country I've never really been to before (I might have passed through, just the once). And there's all those prime wetland birding sites all the way up the west coast that I'll just have to pop into on the way there or back.
Friday, 16 November 2007
Hwaet?
I didn't have very high hopes for the new film version of Beowulf, and this review pretty much confirms my fears. Not at all sure about those plot changes.
Tuesday, 13 November 2007
Fin again
My copy of Issue 1 of Fin, the Nottingham-based poetry mag I mentioned here, arrived yesterday.
First impressions are important, and it got off on the right foot with me by a) Looking compact and smartly-produced, rather like an American chapbook; and b) telling you exactly where it stands from the off. It does this with two statements, one of which reads "Fin is funded by subscribers and nobody else", and the other which states, rather unusually "One or two poems in each issue of Fin are likely to have been published before. We like the new stuff, but we think it's ridiculous to insist that a good poem only has one outing. All we'd ask is that you let us know when and where." I like that idea - more magazines should try it.
Anyway, inside are poems and nothing else, and the line-up of poets is a very impressive one. You've got the likes of Hugo Williams, Ian McMillan, Sheenagh Pugh, Mark Halliday, John Lucas, Mairead Byrne, Martin Stannard and CJ Allen, as well as plenty of other names you'll recognise from the small press world. There's also HappenStance poet Gill McEvoy, whose poem Weather Forecasters was one of my favourites on first reading ( I liked CJ Allen's Poem a lot, too).
You can subscribe (£12 for four issues, £3.50 for one, cheques payable to Fin) by writing to Fin, PO Box 9207, Nottingham, NG14 7WP, England. I recommend it. Oh, and submissions go to the same address.
First impressions are important, and it got off on the right foot with me by a) Looking compact and smartly-produced, rather like an American chapbook; and b) telling you exactly where it stands from the off. It does this with two statements, one of which reads "Fin is funded by subscribers and nobody else", and the other which states, rather unusually "One or two poems in each issue of Fin are likely to have been published before. We like the new stuff, but we think it's ridiculous to insist that a good poem only has one outing. All we'd ask is that you let us know when and where." I like that idea - more magazines should try it.
Anyway, inside are poems and nothing else, and the line-up of poets is a very impressive one. You've got the likes of Hugo Williams, Ian McMillan, Sheenagh Pugh, Mark Halliday, John Lucas, Mairead Byrne, Martin Stannard and CJ Allen, as well as plenty of other names you'll recognise from the small press world. There's also HappenStance poet Gill McEvoy, whose poem Weather Forecasters was one of my favourites on first reading ( I liked CJ Allen's Poem a lot, too).
You can subscribe (£12 for four issues, £3.50 for one, cheques payable to Fin) by writing to Fin, PO Box 9207, Nottingham, NG14 7WP, England. I recommend it. Oh, and submissions go to the same address.
Monday, 12 November 2007
Boost your word power
OK, thanks to a recent post on Fretmarks, here's an incredibly simple, incredibly addictive game for whiling away your days. The beauty of it is, when your boss asks why you've spent the last eight hours playing it, you can scream back "I WAS TACKLING WORLD HUNGER!!!!!" with a clear conscience.
I think that description of it on Fretmarks - "a combination of tetris and crack cocaine" - hits the nail squarely on the head.
I think that description of it on Fretmarks - "a combination of tetris and crack cocaine" - hits the nail squarely on the head.
Friday, 9 November 2007
Special offer - FREE poetry book!
If anyone would like a free copy of Solitaire, the anthology of winners in this year's Templar Poetry pamphlet competition, get in touch (it'll have to be UK only, I'm afraid). I bought a copy at the Derwent Festival the other week, forgetting that one would be on the way because I entered the competition myself. It duly arrived yesterday, so it might as well go to a good home.
First come, first served - drop me an email with your address, and I'll post it out.
First come, first served - drop me an email with your address, and I'll post it out.
Thursday, 8 November 2007
Best of the blogs
Too snowed under at work and too bone idle in my lunch hour to actually write anything of interest myself (too busy watching flocks of Fieldfares getting blown past the window, too), so here's my pick of the morning's browsing.
Rob Mackenzie set me thinking with his piece on poetry reviews, while
George Szirtes raises a few of the questions that occurred to me on hearing the Today programme item he mentions. Happy reading.
Rob Mackenzie set me thinking with his piece on poetry reviews, while
George Szirtes raises a few of the questions that occurred to me on hearing the Today programme item he mentions. Happy reading.
Wednesday, 7 November 2007
Out now
The tenth anniversary issue (No.40) of Obsessed With Pipework arrived yesterday. There's a load of good stuff, with an international flavour, especially three poems by Noosa Lee which I've read and re-read several times. Noosa is behind the blog That's So Pants, which is always an entertaining read.
I've got three poems in OWP too - Small Hours, First Night and Minding The Gaps.
I've got three poems in OWP too - Small Hours, First Night and Minding The Gaps.
He's at it again
More drivel from Richard Ingrams in a recent column in The Independent. I can't find it online, so here's the text:
"When so many people regard the welfare of wildlife as more important than that of human beings. it isn't surprising that a massive police operation should be mounted following the killing of two hen harriers in Norfolk.
"There is now even a special arm of the police force, the National Wildlife Crime Unit, to crack down on such killings. The cost of maintaining it is enormous and the results in terms of prosecution negligible. In the hen harrier instance, the dead birds have not even been found. The investigation is an expensive charade.
"Behind all this lies the almost fanatical crusade to foster the introduction of birds of prey into the countryside. And it has been a great success. There are now in Scotland growing numbers of huge sea eagles and in England, as I have previously noted, thousands of red kites, not to mention almost equal numbers of buzzards.
"The birds are all protected under EU legislation and have the vociferous support of organisations like the RSPB. There are parallel campaigns in the animal world to introduce wild boars and even wolves into the countryside.
"Gamekeepers are usually blamed for the killing of birds such as hen harriers which prey on grouse and partridges. But farmers have good reason to resent them when they can attack lambs and poultry. (The hen harrier I assume is so called because it harries hens, just as the sparrowhawk preys on sparrows.)
"But to the fanatics of the RSPB such complaints are irrelevant. The welfare of these savage birds, they say, must take precedence over that of farmers and their lambs, not to mention the many smaller birds which constitute their staple diet".
Five minutes of research is enough to show this up for the nonsense it is (I've ranted about this before), but it's still galling to read, knowing that it's not down to ignorance or befuddlement, but pure malice. He doesn't even try to deal in facts - where are the figures for this police investigation, for example. Half his column is baseless assumptions, and the rest is lies.
I'll say it again - introduction of birds of prey into the countryside? Most of the species he mentions are native species, previously reduced to dangerously low numbers by persecution from the likes of this halfwit. As for the "massive police operation" he mentions - well, a few phone calls by Norfolk Police before things are hushed up? Strange definition of "massive".
It's hardly surprising that he feels at liberty to talk such rubbish, though, when this sort of thing is going on. I'd bet my house that the whole thing would have been purused with a great deal more vigour had the shooters been two air rifle-toting hoodies from a housing estate. The RSPB should be ashamed of its passive acceptance of what's happened, too. Why aren't they demanding answers from the estate of their patron?
PS. Of course, you'd be justified in thinking that this is making a lot of fuss about something which, compared to the war in Iraq, for example, is small beer. But the fact that Ingrams has actually used his position to do a lot of good over the years makes his childish attitude on this (and even more questionable stance on things like anti-semitism and homosexuality) all the more reprehensible. He sees himself, I think, as a professional curmudgeon. You can make your own mind up as to whether listening to such a person is entertaining, but you can hear the same in any pub, any night, without paying extra for the privilege.
"When so many people regard the welfare of wildlife as more important than that of human beings. it isn't surprising that a massive police operation should be mounted following the killing of two hen harriers in Norfolk.
"There is now even a special arm of the police force, the National Wildlife Crime Unit, to crack down on such killings. The cost of maintaining it is enormous and the results in terms of prosecution negligible. In the hen harrier instance, the dead birds have not even been found. The investigation is an expensive charade.
"Behind all this lies the almost fanatical crusade to foster the introduction of birds of prey into the countryside. And it has been a great success. There are now in Scotland growing numbers of huge sea eagles and in England, as I have previously noted, thousands of red kites, not to mention almost equal numbers of buzzards.
"The birds are all protected under EU legislation and have the vociferous support of organisations like the RSPB. There are parallel campaigns in the animal world to introduce wild boars and even wolves into the countryside.
"Gamekeepers are usually blamed for the killing of birds such as hen harriers which prey on grouse and partridges. But farmers have good reason to resent them when they can attack lambs and poultry. (The hen harrier I assume is so called because it harries hens, just as the sparrowhawk preys on sparrows.)
"But to the fanatics of the RSPB such complaints are irrelevant. The welfare of these savage birds, they say, must take precedence over that of farmers and their lambs, not to mention the many smaller birds which constitute their staple diet".
Five minutes of research is enough to show this up for the nonsense it is (I've ranted about this before), but it's still galling to read, knowing that it's not down to ignorance or befuddlement, but pure malice. He doesn't even try to deal in facts - where are the figures for this police investigation, for example. Half his column is baseless assumptions, and the rest is lies.
I'll say it again - introduction of birds of prey into the countryside? Most of the species he mentions are native species, previously reduced to dangerously low numbers by persecution from the likes of this halfwit. As for the "massive police operation" he mentions - well, a few phone calls by Norfolk Police before things are hushed up? Strange definition of "massive".
It's hardly surprising that he feels at liberty to talk such rubbish, though, when this sort of thing is going on. I'd bet my house that the whole thing would have been purused with a great deal more vigour had the shooters been two air rifle-toting hoodies from a housing estate. The RSPB should be ashamed of its passive acceptance of what's happened, too. Why aren't they demanding answers from the estate of their patron?
PS. Of course, you'd be justified in thinking that this is making a lot of fuss about something which, compared to the war in Iraq, for example, is small beer. But the fact that Ingrams has actually used his position to do a lot of good over the years makes his childish attitude on this (and even more questionable stance on things like anti-semitism and homosexuality) all the more reprehensible. He sees himself, I think, as a professional curmudgeon. You can make your own mind up as to whether listening to such a person is entertaining, but you can hear the same in any pub, any night, without paying extra for the privilege.
Tuesday, 6 November 2007
Braggy Blackstart
I spent most of last week lying on the sofa, coughing and sneezing and cursing the fact that I was ill during the one week of the year that there's no cricket on Sky. By the weekend, though, I finally felt a bit more normal, so ventured out to a gloriously autumnal Bradgate Park for a gentle stroll.
Now we in Leicestershire are justly proud of 'Braggy'. It's a wide expanse of bracken-covered moorland, dotted with granite outcrops, including the local landmark Old John (a hill topped by a distinctive folly). It was given to the people of the county early in the 20th century, having once been the home of the Greys (of Lady Jane Grey fame*). On a beautiful day, it's always busy with walkers, mountain bikers, picnicking families and so on, but it has to be said, it's not that great for wildlife, perhaps because there are so many people about. There are plenty of common birds, including Green Woodpeckers around the anthills, but not too many of the sort of species you might normally expect in such habitat (similar areas nearby, closed to the public, do much better). The Red Deer are always worth seeing, though, and there was one particularly magnificent male on view.
Anyway, I made my way along the paved path into the centre of the park, to the recently revamped tearooms, to see quite the most obliging rarity of the year. An immature male Black Redstart (see the pictures down the side) was busy catching insects on the roof of the tearooms, occasionally getting bullied by a Robin, but otherwise happily co-existing with the local Pied Wagtails. They're rare birds in the UK (although very common in Central Europe), but he seemed to have decided that the shallow slope of the tearooms made an acceptable alternative to a scree-covered mountainside. I expect the outcrops are much to his liking, too. I did very briefly see one on migration close to my home earlier in the year, but these were much better views, in much better light. It more than made up for a couple of very fallow birding weeks.
* I don't trust Wikipedia on this one. It says Lady Jane Grey was born in Bradgate House, now a fenced-off, peacock-haunted ruin in the middle of the park, but I was always told that she was born in the tiny manor house at Groby, a couple of miles away. And going off at a complete tangent, Groby (pronounced Grooby) crops up in one of Sir Walter Scott's novels. He often stayed at Coleorton Hall, near Ashby de la Zouch, and used two local sayings which he then used in the book. One was "there'll be many a dry eye in Groby Pool", said when someone unpopular died. The other was the fantastic "...and I'll thatch Groby Pool with pancakes", used as an expression of disbelief. Sadly, it's not clear whether either actually was used locally, but I'd like to think so.
Now we in Leicestershire are justly proud of 'Braggy'. It's a wide expanse of bracken-covered moorland, dotted with granite outcrops, including the local landmark Old John (a hill topped by a distinctive folly). It was given to the people of the county early in the 20th century, having once been the home of the Greys (of Lady Jane Grey fame*). On a beautiful day, it's always busy with walkers, mountain bikers, picnicking families and so on, but it has to be said, it's not that great for wildlife, perhaps because there are so many people about. There are plenty of common birds, including Green Woodpeckers around the anthills, but not too many of the sort of species you might normally expect in such habitat (similar areas nearby, closed to the public, do much better). The Red Deer are always worth seeing, though, and there was one particularly magnificent male on view.
Anyway, I made my way along the paved path into the centre of the park, to the recently revamped tearooms, to see quite the most obliging rarity of the year. An immature male Black Redstart (see the pictures down the side) was busy catching insects on the roof of the tearooms, occasionally getting bullied by a Robin, but otherwise happily co-existing with the local Pied Wagtails. They're rare birds in the UK (although very common in Central Europe), but he seemed to have decided that the shallow slope of the tearooms made an acceptable alternative to a scree-covered mountainside. I expect the outcrops are much to his liking, too. I did very briefly see one on migration close to my home earlier in the year, but these were much better views, in much better light. It more than made up for a couple of very fallow birding weeks.
* I don't trust Wikipedia on this one. It says Lady Jane Grey was born in Bradgate House, now a fenced-off, peacock-haunted ruin in the middle of the park, but I was always told that she was born in the tiny manor house at Groby, a couple of miles away. And going off at a complete tangent, Groby (pronounced Grooby) crops up in one of Sir Walter Scott's novels. He often stayed at Coleorton Hall, near Ashby de la Zouch, and used two local sayings which he then used in the book. One was "there'll be many a dry eye in Groby Pool", said when someone unpopular died. The other was the fantastic "...and I'll thatch Groby Pool with pancakes", used as an expression of disbelief. Sadly, it's not clear whether either actually was used locally, but I'd like to think so.
Monday, 5 November 2007
So Here We Are 7
Here's the latest of Tears In The Fence editor David Caddy's Poetic Letters From England to download. It's something of a tribute to Bill Griffiths, who died recently. It's full of interesting material, so have a listen.
As always, you can read it at David's blog, if you'd prefer.
As always, you can read it at David's blog, if you'd prefer.
Thursday, 1 November 2007
Mimesis 3
Issue 3 of the excellent Mimesis is out now - you can order it or download it from the website. You'll notice that it contains three poems by me - McNaught, Ramsons and Under Cotopaxi - but try not to let that put you off, because it's a magazine that offers a varied and impressive selection of poetry.
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