Phil Brown on Hugo Williams

Over at Rogue Strands, Matthew Stewart has posted about Phil Brown's excellent Huffington Post feature on Hugo Williams, a poet whose work I've always enjoyed.

It rang quite a few bells with me. Years ago, 2004 I think, I went to hear him read in the theatre at Uppingham School. It was a weekday evening in late autumn, and I think I was the only person there who wasn't actually a pupil at the school. I'm not sure if the kids there had been dragooned into attending by their teachers, but they were an enthusiastic, appreciative and large audience.

After he'd read, I had a few words with him in the bar, and he very kindly offered to take a look at some of my work (I didn't ask him to, honestly). A few weeks later, I received a charming handwritten letter, in which rather as Phil describes, he pointed out why the poems really weren't very good. He was right and the advice he offered with a view to improving them was taken on board. But he also, by way of illustrating some of his points, enclosed a handwritten copy of his own poem Memory Dogs. At the time, I assumed it was a poem that he'd discarded previously, but it subsequently appeared in his collection Dear Room. I'm glad to hear that his health has improved, and that he's writing again.

Maps and Legends

This is out from Nine Arches Press next week, just in time for Christmas. It's an anthology celebrating five years of Nine Arches, and is edited by Jo Bell, featuring poetry from Claire Crowther, David Morley, Luke Kennard, Maria Taylor, Angela France, Daniel Sluman, Alistair Noon, Tom Chivers, David Hart, Roz Goddard, Phil Brown, Deborah Tyler-Bennett, Ruth Larbey and myself.

The anthology will be launched with a reading next Wednesday, December 11th, from 7.15-9pm, at Room 101, Library of Birmingham. Tickets are £6 / £4.

A toast...

Tonight is, of course, Burns Night, and while I have no Scottish ancestry that I'm aware of, I'm all for anything that involves the national celebration of a poet, along with the eating of haggis (you can keep the neeps) and the drinking of a single malt or two.

Following on from the big night this year, there's an event taking place in Dumfries this Friday and Saturday, from 7.30pm-11pm, called First Foot @ The Stove. It includes an international art project, conceived and curated by Hugh Bryden and David Borthwick, called Windows On Burns Night. A whole host of poets wrote a piece of their work onto clear plastic, to be displayed on windows around the town. There are more details on it here.

My own poem, Prayer, appears at The Globe. I doubt if I'll be able to get up to Dumfries anytime soon, but I'm proud to have been involved in this project.

Funnily enough, at Monday night's Shindig in Leicester, Burns made a wholly unscheduled appearance. I've talked before about how little themes seem to emerge at each reading, and in the first half of Monday's, mice kept cropping up, especially in John Lucas's fine spot. He read at least as many poems by other people as his own, but it worked extremely well. Jane Commane of Nine Arches Press then challenged someone to read Burns' To A Mouse in the second half. I assumed that the gauntlet would remain on the ground, but Nick Leach took it up magnificently, reading the poem absolutely superbly.

The rest of the night saw great readings from Helen Calcutt and Jessica Mayhew (sadly, Phil Brown couldn't make it), and the usual excellent mix of open mic slots, including a couple of collborations.

Last night, I was reading at Poetry Bites, of which much more later in the week. In the meantime, I'm going to be having a quiet night of it, with a book or two and a large glass of Caol Ila. Here's to Rabbie...

Leicester Shindig! returns

Crystal Clear Creators and Nine Arches Press are staging their latest Shindig! open mic reading at The Western, Western Road, Leicester, next Monday from 7.30pm. As usual it's free and open to all, and you can sign up for open mic slots at the door.

Featured poets are Jessica Mayhew, John Lucas, Phil Brown and Helen Calcutt.

Jessica Mayhew is 22, and is part way through her degree at the University of Northampton, where she is studying English Literature and Creative Writing. A pamphlet, Someone Else's Photograph, will be published by Crystal Clear Creators in March 2012.

Phil Brown teaches English in Sutton and has been regularly writing poetry for about 10 years. In 2009 he was shortlisted for the Crashaw Prize and won the Eric Gregory Award in 2010. His debut collection, Il Avilit, has just been published by Nine Arches Press. He is the Poetry Editor for the online magazine and chapbook publisher, Silkworms Ink.

John Lucas’s most recent book is Next Year Will Be Better: A Memoir of England in the 1950s. He runs Shoestring Press.

Helen Calcutt was born in 1988 and grew up in the West Midlands, with familial roots in South West Wales. Her first pamphlet collection is forthcoming next year with Perdika. She works as a visiting writer for, among others, Creative Alliance, Writing West Midlands, and The Young People’s Writing Squads. She was awarded an Arvon writing Grant in

September 2011.

Looks a great line-up as usual - I'm looking forward to getting hold of Phil Brown's collection.