Amy Jo Philip
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I’ve just been putting together a tasty wee poetry reading for 16 August. It will be at at the Fruitmarket Gallery Edinburgh and will feature Rob A Mackenzie, Isobel Dixon, Simon Barraclough, Helen Ivory, Helen Mort and myself. I’m really excited to be reading alongside such cracking poets in such a wonderful venue at the
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Russell Jones, well known to those of us on the Edinburgh poetry scene, has reviewed The Ambulance Box on his blog. It’s a balanced, insightful review, with some really interesting things to say about, for instance, the role of the land in the book’s poems. I take on board the following criticism: the formal structure
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I’ve been thinking about the idea of home over the past several days, in preparation for my workshop and reading at Greenbelt at the end of August. So far, the only creative response it’s produced — well, the only one I think worth sharing, anyway — is a handful of Scots pwoemrds or vispo pieces,
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Jennifer Williams keeps it short and to the point: When on the Aeolian Isles (thanks to a travel bursary but sort of like a holiday as it was so stunning) writing my first collection … Metamorphoses by Ovid Collected Poems by C.P. Cavafy JL Williams’ poetry has been published in journals including Poetry Wales, The
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The times and venues of my appearances at this year’s Greenbelt festival have just been confirmed. First up is a poetry workshop at 2 pm on Saturday 27 August in Crest. The workshop is entitled “Lines Home” and will probe the idea of home, tying into this year’s Greenbelt theme. That’s followed on Sunday 28
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This is an edited version of a piece that Elspeth wrote for the Scottish Poetry Library‘s Poetry Reader newsletter last year: On the road touring across the USA and Canada as production manager with Puppet State Theatre Company, my bedside book collection a) moves from one hotel nightstand to another on an almost weekly basis b) overlaps
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Here’s a quick round-up of several recommendations from comments on my Facebook note and Ingrid van der Voort’s repost of the same: Ruth Murphy: Alice Walker — Horses Make a Landscape Look More Beautiful. Robert Peake: Marvin Bell’s Wednesday is both portable and rewards re-reading. I like to take multiple passes through slim volumes when
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I rarely approve of taking poetry on holiday. I’m far too shallow, skittish and lazy to deal with the potential after-effects: really fantastic poems have the unpredictable ability to sneak out of nowhere and stun, or give me a dizzyingly vertiginous glimpse of what’s missing from my soul (most of it), or at the other
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I haven’t been “on holiday” for years, but I’ve lived by the sea for almost two years now, so the poetry which springs to mind is the stuff which has accompanied me to the beach. My criteria for good holiday poetry: something which grabs and keeps hold (because it’s rip-roaringly funny, maybe, or emotionally gripping);
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Although it’s not directly a response to my call for memorable holiday poetry reads, Andrew J Shields has offered this brief post on reading the Aeneid, which fits the bill quite nicely. Andrew Shields’ poems have appeared in many journals, as well as in the chapbook Cabinet d’Amateur (Cologne: Darling Publications, 2005). His translations from
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It must have been the summer of 1995, the summer following my first year at university. The book was Edwin Morgan’s Themes on a Variation, borrowed from the Scottish Poetry Library, which was still crammed into Tweeddale Court at the time. The beach was Cocklawburn near Berwick-upon-Tweed — a favourite of my family’s for heaven
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Holidays? What are they? But if you want an excellent book of poems, one that’s so good you can actually read it in the airport because it makes the outside world disappear, be silenced, my punt is Letters to the Tremulous Hand by Elizabeth Campbell, published by John Leonard Press in Australia. Her second book,
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Not much poetry in the Guardian Review’s article where “writers recall their most memorable summer reads”, which is kind of disappointing for “news that stays news”, if typical of these lists. However, I suppose it’s not bad to have two poets recommended — Housman and Homer — given that there was a single poet among
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Yesterday I received the e-mail below from Colin Herd. It looks like a really interesting opportunity for writers of any kind in or near Edinburgh at the appropriate time to interact with and respond to new visual art: As part of Edinburgh Annuale 2011, the festival of independent art practice, I’m editing and publishing a
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Edinburgh’s Shore Poets is turning 20 this year, and the current committee has decided to record a CD with all the present and former Shore poets they can get a hold of. Hopefully, it will also include recordings of the late Gael Turnbull reading his work — they do exist; I heard some at the
Amy Jo Philip 