Iota

News just in: the shortlist for the Iota International Poetry Competition 2010 has just been announced, judged this year by the talented - and typically stylishly turned-out - poet Tim Turnbull. And amongst some familiar names - Martyn Crucefix, Mick Wood, Matthew Caley and Christopher North - I'm chuffed to see a poem of my own shortlisted.

The full list of prizes, shortlisted poets and poems is below; the winners will be announced at an awards event at the University of Gloucestershire on April 19th.


1st Prize £2,000
2nd Prize £1,000
3rd Prize £500
10 Supplementary Prizes of £50


(in no particular order)


"Here is The News" by Carol Beadle

"A truck called 'Perseverence' ", by Martyn Crucefix

"Look Who's Shunting The Nuclear Train", by Mick Wood

"Playtime", by Maeve Henry

"Los Angeles", by Matthew Caley

"The embolism suffered by Edward's father (during a sudden cold
snap)", by Rosie Sheppard

"Doors", by Kevin Russell-Pavier

"In the Gardens of Titans", by Clint Frakes

"Everyone Matters", by Jamie Walsh

"Untitled", by Pat Cash

"Where the Bull Got In", by Kate Miller

"New Flat", by Ben Wilkinson

"Eurythmy Artiste with Toque", by Christopher North


[ends]

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Nick Laird wins Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize

Good to see that Northern Irish poet and novelist Nick Laird has won the 2008 Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for his second collection of poems, On Purpose, published by Faber in 2007.

The award - given alternately each year to a work of prose or verse - was judged by poets Jo Shapcott and Michael Longley, and Sam Leith, literary editor of the Daily Telegraph.

It puts Laird on a distinguished list of previous winners, including Seamus Heaney, Hugo Williams, Geoffrey Hill, Tony Harrison, Don Paterson and Michael Hofmann.

Having enjoyed and reviewed the collection for the Winter 2007/08 edition of Irish literary journal The Stinging Fly, I recommend it to readers unfamiliar with Laird's work, as well as his first collection, To a Fault. Here's an excerpt from my review of On Purpose:

What is most impressive about On Purpose, however, is Laird’s charting of the loose and difficult territory of the existential crisis between our desire to control our lives and act with certainty and conviction, as set against the possibilities and inherent unpredictability of the world we actually encounter. As Don Paterson rightly urged in his T.S. Eliot lecture in 2003: ‘It’s important that poets remember that our first perception of the world is already a misinterpretation’ (though one, it must be noted, that is no less valuable than every other). Laird often succeeds within these poems, then, in exploring that which is – both personally and universally – so often beyond our grasp and understanding, be it in the narrator’s failure to describe a beautiful vista in ‘Use of Spies’, the attempt to break habits of a lifetime and escape blinkered perspectives in ‘Variation in Tactics’, or the dedicated hunter’s speculation and failing faith in some higher power in the sombre tones of ‘Hunting is a Holy Occupation’. Laird’s poetic voice has gained an added maturity and distinctiveness since his first collection, too; gone is the unconvincing ‘newladspeak’ that knocked the shine off some of his earlier work, honed into a style that allows for poems of greater brevity, rhythmical execution, and despite a deliberate variance in seriousness of tone, real feeling. Like Armitage, he is an impressive and distinctly male writer of love poems: the expression of masculine emotion and its awkwardness measured and balanced with an economy of sentiment, as in the narrator’s stating ‘Love, I’d turn for you clean-living, / relinquish drinking, fighting, singing’ in ‘The Present Writer’. And the more I read those poems of Laird’s that explore the rural and urban landscapes of Ireland, Britain, and beyond, the more I think it not an overstatement to compare his rich descriptive powers, during their finer moments, to Heaney’s. Take the following glittering stanzas from ‘On Leaving the Scene of an Accident’:

In the eastern suburbs deer appear.
Brushed by waist-high silver steppe grass
and the lighter strokes of barley stalks,

elegant as one might half-expect
the grazing self to be, except her grace
is one complicit in departure.

For those interested, the Guardian coverage is here.

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Poetry Feature: Conor O'Callaghan

Conor O’Callaghan, an Irish writer born in Newry in 1968, is one of those poets who critics may lazily – albeit quite rightly – describe as ‘one of the best of his generation’, though he actually seems to fall on the cusp of two generations. Or at least has fallen short, despite having appeared in seminal Irish anthologies, of major British anthologies and promotions – too young for the New Poetry and the PBS’s New Generation campaign; inexplicably missing from the Next Gen and falling short of the cut-off point of Roddy Lumsden’s forthcoming Identity Parade – as inadequate as these may ultimately be at fully checking the pulse, let alone establishing the hierarchy of the literature of a given period (history will do that), they still (usually quite rightly) cement reputations, develop readerships, and give a representative flavour of poetry at the time. This isn’t to badmouth these publications or promotions, but to note that given the inevitable parameters, some genuinely talented and worthy writers often get sidelined or miss out through nothing more than plain bad luck.

This aside, I hope I’m right in reckoning that O’Callaghan’s work will stand the test of time. I can only reach for the usual platitudes in urging you to hunt down copies of his three collections published by Gallery Press to date – The History of Rain (1993) and Seatown (1999), collected together in Seatown and Earlier Poems (2000); and the excellent Fiction, published in 2005 – showcasing the development of an exciting and original poetic voice sounding itself out in poems that are engaged and engaging, witty, smart and sharp, but above all, driven by an energetic music that is as capable of challenging and amusing as it is of moving the reader.

In his review of Seatown in the Times Literary Supplement, Stephen Knight pointed to James Fenton, Robert Frost and Philip Larkin as pronounced influences in O’Callaghan’s work, and for those who are fans of any of these major voices in post-war poetry, you won’t be disappointed by his poems. But at the same time, quite rightly, Knight states that ‘despite the presence of these pungent voices, O’Callaghan’s poetry is marvellously his own’. This is largely to do with the knowingness of the poems, which amounts to more than the winks, nudges, sarcasm and irony that crop up in much contemporary verse. Instead, particularly in Fiction, O’Callaghan’s poetry combines the suggestive, deliberative and symbolic capabilities of verse with the inventive, imaginative qualities most readily associated with fictional prose, often to startling effect. This includes the likes of ‘Out-takes’, exploring the sounds left behind from a recording session (‘leftovers from a cleaned up / final version’; suggesting our polished, distorted view of ourselves); ‘Reception’, where the poet remembers an event from his childhood which turns out to be a story he was told ‘over a glass of ropey Chianti’; ‘Hello’, a sequence of poems exploring the invention of that phrase for ‘the blower, / since some kind of formula / for an opening exchange / had to be agreed upon / to get the ball rolling’; and the excellent vignette ‘The Narrator’, who ‘during the break in chapter / gets up to stretch beneath a skylight’, a theme returned to in ‘The Present Writer’, who ‘gets a kick / inhabiting the third person, as if talking across himself / or forever clapping his own exit from the wings’.

In short, O’Callaghan stuff is the business and deserves a wide readership. And needless to say, his next collection will be well worth waiting for. In the meantime, though, do check out the three poems of his which appear in this month’s issue of Poetry magazine, and the comic ‘The Modern Pastoral Elegy’ in that magazine’s archive. And rather than my blathering on any further here, I’ll let the poetry speak for itself – below is ‘Coventry’, the sonnet that opens Fiction, first published in the TLS.


Coventry


On a night as clear and warm as tonight,
in 1941, a stray German squadron
with a war to win and a radar on the blink
mistook the quays of neutral Seatown
for the lights of greater Coventry.

On a night as clear and warm as tonight –
when she has gone into an almighty huff
and taken the chat over heaven-knows-what
(or something of nothing with a bit of fluff)
and my lot once again is the box-room futon,
the guest duvet –
                                  I am inclined to think
perhaps the Luftwaffe after all were spot on,
and would give my eye-teeth for butterfly bombs
to fall into this silence I have been sent to.


poem by Conor O’Callaghan
republished with permission of the author
first published in the Times Literary Supplement, 20 October 2000
from Fiction (Gallery Press, 2005)

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Commended Poet Shock in National

So the first, second and third place winners of the National Poetry Competition have been announced. You can read them here.

I for one don't feel ready to comment on the quality and deservedness of these winning poems just yet (competitions are so much luck, especially the National and the undoubtedly high standard of many of its entries), but something interesting has turned up of late: word is that a lot of fuss is being made behind the scenes at the Poetry Society over one of the commendations.

This is down to former PM Tony Blair having apparently entered the competition and having been anonymously judged as a commended poet.

The problem apparently stems from his poem's contents, smearing certain current cabinet members and revealing some incredible truths about his time in office.

Of course, this recalls the recent story of the mysterious versifier at Downing Street, though one would hope that the quality of Blair's poem is greater than that of the doggerel 'upon the stair'...

With regard to Blair's verse, then, it is suspected that the judges thought that the poem was by another author and hence written in a witty, postmodern, Luke Kennard-esque style. So at least that bodes well for its overall quality. The realisation that the poem was written by Blair, however, revealed a darker, more truthful and disturbingly confessional side to it.

Whether or not Blair's poem will actually be commended remains to be seen, of course, but I among many others will be very interested to read it.

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By Way Of An Update

A few things have appeared online and dropped through the letterbox of late.

The first is the new issue of Magma, No.40, which is edited by Roddy Lumsden and one of the strongest and most exciting to date. Its focus, quite accidentally down to the 'fine poems starting to appear from so many young writers' received in submission for the issue, is on young poets, featuring an interview with the likes of Foyles Young Poet of the Year winner Richard O'Brien and tall-lighthouse poet Jay Bernard, as well as poems from a wide range of impressive young writers, and more established talents such as Ros Barber, Claire Crowther and Sarah Wardle.

It's well worth a read, with particular highlights including Mark Waldron's 'I called the plumber...' (that rare beast: the successful funny poem) and Tony Williams's richly descriptive 'Argument About the Definition of Red'. And Eloise Stonborough, a young Oxford poet and blogger, has an excellent piece, 'Jet Lag', in deft rhyming couplets. There's also Nick Laird's poem-homage to Louis MacNeice, and book reviews by Rob Mackenzie and Katy Evans Bush.

In fact, I've a spare copy of the issue for a lucky reader, but there's a catch. I need a good, new poem to feature next month on the Facebook Poetry Group: the growing, global gathering for poets ranging from high school students to professional prize-winning writers, founded by Canadian London-based poet Todd Swift.

Group is here: http://shef.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2416793140

So if you're a poet with, say, a few magazine appearances or any prizes / other successes under your belt, send me a poem and bio info to my email address (on my profile page) and I'll post the issue out to you as payment for featuring the poem, if selected.

In other news, my critical perspective of Maurice Riordan's work, Faber poet and editor of Poetry London, is now up on the British Council's Contemporary Writers site.

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Pomegranate

As the wind howls outside and something that’s trying to be snow descends from the skies, what better time is there to spend a while browsing an exciting new poetry ezine? Pomegranate is something I stumbled across recently: a plucky endeavour from a bunch of Foyles Young Poets prize-winners that aims to give a voice and literary platform to young writers everywhere. So far, two issues have been published, containing poetry from the likes of Forward Prize-shortlisted Salt poet Luke Kennard and Mimesis editor James Midgley, as well as refreshing work by some really promising and startlingly young poets including Emily Tesh, Martha Sprackland and Richard O’Brien.

Highlights from issue 1 include O’Brien’s ‘On Returning to the Morrison’s Produce Department’ and Tesh’s ‘Interview with a Goddess’, and James Midgley’s ‘Seducing the Leopard Gecko’ makes for the wonderfully descriptive and impressive stand-out piece from issue 2. Well, at least in my humble opinion anyway: head over there yourself to check out what’s on offer. The link’s here.

And if you like what you find, there’s more in store: issue 3’s out in March, and the next issue of longstanding print-based poetry magazine Magma, edited by Roddy Lumsden, promises to be one of the most exciting in recent years, featuring work by some of the Pomegranate team, other up and coming poets, interviews, and a sequence from yours truly. It too will be available in March, with news and updates on the Magma website. In the meantime, and before I post on it, I’ll be working on a few reviews, as well as looking forward to the results of various competitions, including the National: I’ll be holding out for a slightly more adventurous winner this year, especially with Penelope Shuttle on the judging panel.

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Jean Sprackland's Tilt

Alongside reviews of Frances Leviston's Public Dream and Sophie Hannah's Pessimism for Beginners, my review of Jean Sprackland's Costa Award-winning third collection, Tilt, is available, in the latest issue of Tower Poetry's Poetry Matters. You can find it here.

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Who Will Win the Eliot?

Tomorrow evening sees the judges’ final decision made, and Valerie Eliot, the widow of the great poet, will award this year’s TS Eliot Prize of £15,000 (what Andrew Motion has described as ‘the prize most poets want to win’) to the poet whose book is deemed most worthy.

Who’s for a little sweepstake, then? As Todd Swift noted on Eyewear, this year’s shortlist doesn’t quite seem to measure up to the vibrancy and variety of poetry published in the UK in 2007: neither Annie Freud’s wonderful debut The Best Man That Ever Was, Luke Kennard’s witty and funny The Harbour Beyond the Movie, nor Daljit Nagra’s dexterous and inventive Look We Have Coming to Dover! making it.

But then I’ve haven’t read some of the books on the shortlist, so perhaps it’s cast its net a bit wider than I first imagined. I’m not a big fan of Sophie Hannah’s work, though, even if the title of her latest, Pessimism for Beginners, is eye-catching and intriguing. Neither have I read Sarah Maguire or Edwin Morgan’s shortlisted collections, though I intend to get round to them. Though I’m particularly happy to see Alan Gillis’s Hawks and Doves make the listing: I appreciate the way his work combines good humour and sharp wit with gravitas and striking sincerity. As with his debut, this collection’s well worth investigating.

Elsewhere, and I think Matthew Sweeney’s Black Moon stands a good chance, as does editor of Poetry Review, Fiona Sampson’s Common Prayer. Sean O’Brien’s been shortlisted for the prize before, but having picked up his third Forward Prize for The Drowned Book, it seems unlikely that this collection will take the Eliot as well.

The rank outsider, of course, and the cause of much excitement for the media and publicity surrounding the award, is Frances Leviston, with her debut Picador collection Public Dream. For such a young poet to be shortlisted for the Eliot harks back to 2003 when Jacob Polley’s first, The Brink (another from Picador) was similarly shortlisted. But just as Polley lost out to a much more established poet (his editor, Don Paterson, who won his second Eliot with Landing Light), it seems likely that someone with a little more reputation than Leviston with take the prize this year. Not that Public Dream isn’t an impressive collection, of course, but as far as prizes go, that’s the way the cookie crumbles. Plus, things often tend to come around: I’ll be very surprised, for example, if she doesn’t take the 2008 Forward Prize for best first collection.

But for now, my money’s on Ian Duhig’s The Speed of Dark. Aside the fact that Duhig’s been shortlisted for an Eliot twice before (last in 2003, for the Lammas Hireling) and so in some ways the prize now seems overdue to him, the collection also plain deserves the recognition: taking the Middle Ages as a point from which to explore the problems of the present, post-9/11 world in creative and illuminating ways. For an insightful perspective on the collection, see Katy Evans-Bush’s review of it on The Poem, here. In the meantime, anybody else care to make a prediction?


The Speed of Dark by Ian Duhig (Picador)
Hawks and Doves by Alan Gillis (Gallery Press)
Pessimism for Beginners by Sophie Hannah (Carcanet)
The Meanest Flower by Mimi Khalvati (Carcanet)
Public Dream by Frances Leviston (Picador)
The Pomegranates of Kandahar by Sarah Maguire (Chatto & Windus)
A Book of Lives by Edwin Morgan (Carcanet)
The Drowned Book by Sean O'Brien (Picador)
Common Prayer by Fiona Sampson (Carcanet)
Black Moon by Matthew Sweeney (Jonathan Cape)

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