The Wanderer

A Kindle edition of Jane Holland's version of The Wanderer is out now, priced £1.99. I enjoyed it very much when it originally came out in print, being partial to all things Anglo-Saxon anyway, but the great thing about it is that it really requires no prior knowledge of Anglo-Saxon poetry at all - it's simply an atmospheric and moving re-imagining of a great poem.

What's new?

It's always nice to welcome a new literary magazine or webzine on to the scene, especially when it's one based in the Midlands (sorry, let my regionalism get the better of me there). Jane Holland's behind Epicentre Magazine, and I like the fact that she's planning to run it with rolling updates, rather than on an issue-by-issue basis. As she points out, that's what Stride has been doing for years, and doing very well - it's certainly the webzine that I read most regularly.

 If you look down my sidebar, you'll also see a button that links to the excellent Talking Naturally website. Charlie Moores is the man behind it, and the podcasts and 'Conference Calls' in particular are highly recommended.

Stealing Fire

There's a good tradition of poets leading second lives as novelists, and in particular as writers of what gets called 'genre fiction' (too often that term is used rather dismissively).

David Harsent and Jane Holland are two current names that immediately spring to mind, and they're now joined by Craig Sterling, better known as Edinburgh poet James Wood.

His debut novel, Stealing Fire, will be published by Leamington Books on 23rd June, and is being distributed at airports by WH Smith/BAA plc, by Blackwell Books and other high street retailers, plus, of course, online from the likes of Amazon.

You can find a website on the book here, a YouTube video on it here, and there's even four bottles of champagne on offer for the best review of Stealing Fire under 250 words submitted before 31st August 2011.

If you're actually in Edinburgh on the 23rd, Leamington Books will be giving away 50 copies at Edinburgh Airport between 8am and 10am, and the launch party will be at Blackwell Books (Edinburgh) at 6.30pm.

Now, Craig/James has said that his sole intention was to create a novel that was fun to write, and hopefully fun to read, too. And it is. I was lucky enough to see an advance copy, and it's the sort of rattling, rollicking read that you're very grateful for on a long train or plane journey. I used to be a big reader of thrillers, although I'd have to admit that I'm more familiar with Jack Higgins/Freddie Forsyth era stuff than the new giants of the genre, and Stealing Fire is a book that does exactly what you'd want it to do. It's pacy, exciting, funny in places, and above all, it grabs your attention and refuses to let go. Get hold of a copy and see what I mean...

Walcott wins the TS Eliot

Nobel laureate Derek Walcott won this year's TS Eliot Prize last night for his collection White Egrets, which was described by the judges as "moving and technically flawless".

I'm in the unfortunate position of having absolutely nothing useful to say on the matter, not having read any of this year's shortlisted books yet, although a couple are sitting there on my growing 'to read' pile. And while there are quite a few collections I might like to have seen on that final shortlist, I can't argue with the final selection. The few poems that I have read from Walcott's book, including one that appeared in one of the papers over the weekend, I've liked a lot.

But anyway, Jane Holland has blogged entertainingly about the Prize Reading here. 

Warwick Words Shindig

There's the latest Nine Arches Press Shindig at Wilde's Wine Bar, The Parade, Leamington Spa, this Sunday (12th September), at 7.30pm. Entry is free.

To celebrate October's Warwick Words festival, it will feature a reading from Warwick Laureates past and present, plus a prize draw for tickets to two Warwick Words events and some Nine Arches goodies. Warwick Laureates past and present confirmed to be reading so far are: Helen Yendall, Jane Holland, Cathy Whittaker and Marg Roberts.

Mark Goodwin will also be reading from his latest Nine Arches collection, Shod, and there'll be live music, too. You can sign up for open mic slots on the door.

Poetry in Polesworth

To mark National Poetry Day (this coming Thursday), the first poem in the Polesworth Poets Trail is to be installed this week.

Jane Holland's The River Anker has been etched into copper plate and fixed to five large pieces of Mancetter stone, donated by Tarmac at Mancetter Quarry, and have been sculpted by Planet Art. The stones will also include Michael Drayton’s poem, To the Ancor, and will be placed on the riverbank in Abbey Green Park, close to the footbridge.

It's the first of 10 contemporary poems that will be installed over the coming weeks - two commissions and eight pieces chosen from a national competition. As I've mentioned before, I'm always delighted to see anything that raises the profile of this blog's guiding spirit, so I'll be going to have a look ASAP, and I'll come back with photos. Perhaps I'll combine it with a run all the way into Birmingham to have a look at the newly-discovered Anglo-Saxon hoard.

Project Director, Malcolm Dewhirst said “This is the culmination of a lot of hard work from a dedicated team of people who shared the vision of bringing poetry back to Polesworth. We hope that the poetry trail will attract poets from all over the world to come to Polesworth and that this will be the first of many poetry events to be held in this literary town, which saw the greatest poets of the 16th century meeting at Polesworth Abbey.”

Poetic Justice

US poet Annie Finch and UK poet Jane Holland have started the website Poetic Justice, which is described as "an activist website devoted to organizing actions for gender justice throughout the English-language poetry world". Follow the link to find out more...

The Titanic Cafe revisited

Jane Holland has blogged at Raw Light about David Hart’s utterly splendid new book from Nine Arches Press, The Titanic Cafe closes its doors and hits the rocks or: Knife, fork and bulldozerultra modern retail outlet complex development scenario with flowers.

Her review says, far better than my meagre effort, just why this is a must-buy, but I’ll add one more thing. Having now got my hands on the actual book (I did the review from a preview copy), it’s a real thing of beauty, and even includes a pull-out map. I love maps, of any kind, so combining them with poetry is an absolutely surefire winner where I’m concerned.

Happy birthday!

Nine Arches Press celebrated its first year last night, and a very busy year it's been, what with books by Jane Holland, Liam Guilar, Tom Chivers and David Hart, and two issues of Under The Radar (a third is imminent), plus a number of readings. Oh, and books by Peter Carpenter and press founder Matt Nunn are on the way later in the year.

Anyway, the birthday party at the University of Warwick last night was excellent, with good music (Fan Tan Jack, as Jane Commane has reminded me), good cakes, and of course good poetry. There were readings by Jane Commane, Matt Nunn, Jane Holland, Sian Hughes, Simon Turner, George Ttoouli and myself, and plenty of chat. It would be unfair to pick out highlights, really, but a couple of George's poems (Ghost and another whose title escapes me just now) kept going round my head all the way home. I also bought a copy of Sian's book, The Missing, having enjoyed her reading and remembering several of her poems from magazines.

For the record, my 'set list' was:
At Home
Things Left In Hotel Rooms
The Memory Of Water
Worst Case Scenario

Oh, and many thanks to Matt for mentioning both Walkers Crisps and Englebert Humperdinck when introducing me! Chuck in Gary Lineker too and you'd have the Holy Trinity where us folk at the north end of the M69 are concerned.

Birthday party

Nine Arches Press celebrates its first birthday next week with a party/reading/shindig at The Capital Centre, Milburn House, Milburn Hill Road, University of Warwick (actually nearer Coventry).

It’s on Tuesday (May 5th), from 7pm-10pm, it’s free, and will mark the press’s first year in the poetry-publishing business. There’ll be a selection of Midlands poets, including the likes of Jane Holland, George Ttoouli, Matt Nunn and Simon Turner, and there’s an open mic for any up and coming poetry talent.

Oh, and as if that’s not enough, there’s cake too.

Sphinx 10

The latest issue of Sphinx is just about out, featuring an interview with George Simmers, of Snakeskin, in heroic couplets, plus features on Worple, Grey Hen, bluechrome, and my interview with Jane Commane and Matt Nunn of Nine Arches Press.

There are also the usual reviews and the wonderful Savage Chickens cartoons, and the magazine's online reviews include four by me - Jane Holland's Lament of the Wanderer, Frances Corkey Thompson's The Long Acre and Anne Caldwell's Slug Language (those two both from HappenStance), and Gordon Jarvie's Watching The Sun and Other Poems.

I won't spoil them for you, but I will say that I enjoyed all four chapbooks - Jane Holland's and Frances Corkey Thompson's were particularly memorable.

Raw Light spotlight

Jane Holland has very kindly published The Memory Of Water, one of the poems from Troy Town, as part of her season of other poets at her Raw Light blog.

It has already featured fine poems from Katy Evans-Bush and Rob Mackenzie (whose book The Opposite Of Cabbage is just out), and I can't help being slightly envious of Katy that she managed to supply a poem of that quality that hadn't made it into her very fine book Me And The Dead!

There are plenty more poets to follow, too, so keep an eye on Raw Light...

Browsing the blogs

Thanks to Jane Holland for flagging up this – Polesworth’s most famous son is finally getting the recognition he deserves, and there’s the chance for you to follow in his footsteps (quite literally, once the poetry trail is finished). Just follow the links provided, and your poetry could be part of it all.

And Carrie Etter has highlighted this – sign up, and you get a poem a week sent to your inbox. Presses involved are Anvil Press, Arc Publications, Cinnamon Press, Enitharmon, Heaventree Press, Landfill, O’Brien Press, Oversteps Books, Peterloo Poets, Salt Publishing, Seren Books, and tall-lighthouse. Hopefully it'll be a chance for some less well-known poets to get a bit of exposure - good on Oxford Brookes.

Shindig!

Well, despite my fears that the miserable weather and the attractions of late-night shopping would keep people away, there was a really good turnout at last night's reading at the Friends Meeting House, on Queen's Road in Leicester. Several familiar faces, from Leicester Poetry Society and elsewhere, including HappenStance poets DA Prince and Marilyn Ricci.

Jane Commane kicked things off, but unfortunately I missed most of her set. Matt Nunn, one of the other poets reading, had got lost on one of the more unfathomable bits of Leicester's road system, so I had to try to guide him in on the mobile. The audience response was very good, though, and her poems in Under The Radar 2, which was being launched, are really excellent.

I read next, and thoroughly enjoyed myself, which is always a good sign. I tried a couple of new, or at least new-ish poems, and they seemed to go down well, which was encouraging.

After the interval, we had an open mic slot, and very possibly the performance of the night came from a Nottingham poet called Chris (I've forgotten his surname, stupidly - drop me a line if you read this, Chris!), who read from memory and was absolutely electrifying. Several people afterwards said just how much they had enjoyed his reading, and I hope I'll be seeing him again round Leicester or Nottingham soon. There was Mark Goodwin, who's been published by Shearsman and whose work I've enjoyed in a number of magazines over the years; Caroline Cook, another small press mag stalwart and whose poem Sex With Larkin proved popular; and Colin Derrick, who bravely read his first-ever poems, very well.

Matt had arrived by then, and a good thing too. He's very, very funny, and yet at the same time always utterly serious. There's anger and poignancy in there too, and his delivery is, I think, spot-on. He's got a new collection coming out next year - keep an eye out for it.

Finally, Jane Holland read from her new Salt collection, Camper Van Blues, plus one poem from On Warwick. It was a good way to round things off, because CVB seemed to touch on quite a few strands that other poets had brushed up against earlier in the evening. And everybody seemed to go home pleased with what they'd seen and heard, so I hope it will be the first of a series of similar events. I've spent most of today writing for work and watching England surprise everyone in Chennai, but I'll get moving with organising a follow-up ASAP.

Oh, and of course, here's the set-list:
The Meeting Place
At Home
Scorpio Over La Selva
Things Left In Hotel Rooms
Troy Town
At Gedney Hill
The Memory Of Water
January
Midstream
Window Seat
Raining, Craswall, Evening

A final reminder...

Just to mention (yet again!) that there'll be live poetry and an open mic at the launch of Issue 2 of Under The Radar magazine, at Friends Meeting House, Queen’s Road, Leicester, at 7.30pm tomorrow.

Jane Holland, editor of Horizon Review, will be reading from her latest collection, Camper Van Blues; Matt Nunn, one of UTR's editors and a very funny man, will read from his forthcoming collection, Sounds in the Grass; UTR's other driving force, Jane Commane, will read a selection of her recent work; and I'll be reading from Troy Town and one or two newer pieces. It's all free, and open mic slots are available, so turn up early to register for a place. We're not allowed alcohol in there, sadly, but there will be soft drinks and a few nibbles.

More information at www.ninearchespress.com

Shindig! in Leicester

There's live poetry and an open mic at the launch of Issue 2 of Under The Radar magazine, at
Friends Meeting House, Queen’s Road, Leicester, at 7.30pm on Thursday, December 11th.

Readers include:
Jane Holland – editor of Horizon Review, reading from her latest collection Camper Van Blues; Matt Nunn – Birmingham’s finest poetic export, reading from his forthcoming collection, Sounds in the Grass; Warwickshire-based poet Jane Commane reading a selection of her recent work; and yours truly, reading from Troy Town and some newer poems.

It's free, and open mic slots are available - turn up early to register for a place.

More information at www.ninearchespress.com

Back in Blighty

I’ve just come back from a week in the Azores, where I went to write a couple of articles – one about the archipelago as a birding location generally, and the other about the Priolo Life project, which has been fighting to save the Priolo, or Azores Bullfinch, from extinction.

After a brief stopover on Sao Miguel, it was off to Corvo, the smallest and most westerly of the islands, seven square miles of extinct volcano with just enough flat land for a runway and a village. Like the rest of the Azores, it’s covered with lush vegetation, with lots of small cow pastures between thickly wooded valleys and ravines.



In between some torrential rain, we found a Red-eyed Vireo high up on the mountain, but things really took off just after a large container ship had passed the island.

First, Belgian birder David Monticelli found a Common Yellowthroat in a patch of scrubby bushes close to the village. He couldn’t find any of us to tell us until breakfast the next day, so we headed back to the same spot at first light praying it hadn’t disappeared.

It hadn’t. We thought we heard it call once or twice, and then I found it flitting around a patch of maize in the company of some Blackcaps. Later, David found another (or more likely, his original). As we were waiting, though, he also spotted a chunky, strongly marked passerine, and we both got great views of a Rose-breasted Grosbeak.


It’s well-known that a lot of rare transatlantic vagrants hitch a ride part of the way, and here it was in practice. Unfortunately, I had to fly back to the main island, Sao Miguel, at this point, but the others have since found a variety of North American birds of Corvo.

After a slightly hair-raising night drive along the fog-bound, rain-lashed coast road from Ponta Delgado to Nordeste, I met up with the Priolo Life people. The idea was to get stuck in as a volunteer, to give our readers an idea of how to combine a birding holiday with a bit of practical conservation. So, I spent my time high up in the mountains, clambering up and down steep, muddy trails and getting ripped to shreds by brambles while surveying the native plants the Priolo needs if it’s to survive. And of course, we saw plenty of the birds themselves. They’re not, you’d have to say, as colourful or striking as the European Bullfinch, but they’re a fine sight all the same, and thanks to the project, their future looks a little brighter.

Finally, driving back to Ponta Delgado airport, I stopped on a headland along the coast to stretch my legs and tried to tune into BBC Radio 4, to get the India vs Australia cricket score. Instead, I got Start The Week, and by a strange chance the first voice I heard was of poet Jane Holland!



The pictures show (from top): Corvo; Belgian birder David Monticelli trying to photograph the Common Yellowthroat on Corvo; the north coast of Sao Miguel; and Nordeste.

On the Horizon

The first edition of Horizon Review, Salt Publishing's new online magazine, is now live. Edited by Jane Holland, it includes poems by, among others, Alison Brackenbury, George Szirtes, James Midgeley, Rob Mackenzie, Andrew Shields, Andrew Philip, Zoe Brigley and Katy Evans-Bush, plus art, fiction, reviews and articles. It looks a great read - ideal for a quiet Sunday afternoon.

I also received the new Tears In The Fence yesterday and have been dipping in and out of it since. So far I've liked Julie Lumsden's poems, and enjoyed Tom Chivers' regular column and a review of a book by Elisabeth Bletsoe. I like the look of her poems a lot, and will have to get hold of the volume in question.

Finally, Poetry Nottingham arrived in the week. I've got a poem, Troglodyte, in there, and there's loads of good stuff by the likes of DA Prince.

Happening poetry

Not getting much time to post at the moment (for entirely selfish, pleasure-seeking reasons), but this post on Jane Holland's blog Raw Light, and the original Guardian article that it mentions, make very interesting reading. More later, perhaps...