Amy Jo Philip
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It was a packed house and a night of surprises. A night to remember, even if it wasn’t a night of tears. No, I’m not talking about that minor award ceremony in Holywood. I mean the Shore Poets reading last night. The crowds turned out–well, the Mai Thai was crowded–to hear Jacob Polley, Debbie Cannon…
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Besides the usual fine fare at Shore Poets this Sunday, with Jacob Polley, Diana Hendry and Debbie Cannon, there’ll be something extra special: acclaimed Gaelic poet and novelist Angus Peter Campbell will launch the Mark Ogle Memorial Poem. Angus Peter will read Mark Ogle’s poem “English Rain” and “Our Rain”, the poem he has written…
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“The joy of the Lord is your strength.” (Nehemiah 8:10) It’s a verse often used in certain quarters, under the rubric of encouragement, to bludgeon the hurting for a failure to demonstrate happiness in pain. No thought given to the harm this misapplication does or what it implies, namely that God is not to be…
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Rob Mackenzie has posted a list of forthcoming readings at the Great Grog. It’s an interesting and exciting line-up. I’m slated to reappear in February next year, along with the always-entertaining Tim Turnbull, Andrew Shields (who I’m looking forward to meeting) and AN Other. Before that, the only reading in the diary is the April…
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If you’re one of those people who thought about going to the reading at the Great Grog last night but decided to stay in and watch, oh I don’t know, the Antiques Roadshow, kick yourself. No: harder. Colin Will and Rob Mackenzie have already blogged on the night, so I won’t go on at length,…
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The Scottish Book Trust has remodelled its entire website, including its online writers register. My page in the register is here. There are a few links to be inserted here and there, but overall the site looks pretty good. The register entries give a lot more information than previously. That makes them considerably more work…
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ReadySteadyBook reports that Geoffrey Hill‘s Collected Critical Writings is due out from OUP in March. I wouldn’t expect an easy read, of course, but perhaps his criticism might elucidate his poetic to some extent. Not having read any of it, I wouldn’t know, but it should be worth a look. Several of the essay titles…
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Interesting to hear Tom Paulin talking so much about the sound texture of poems on yesterday’s edition of The Verb. Worth listening to while you still can (seven days). It’s a trailer for his new book, The Secret Life of Poems, which Faber describes as a primer which offers [47 poems] – or on occasion…
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I closed my first post on Tiel Aisha Ansari’s criticism of my new rhyme terminology by saying that the mention of structure brought me to her most fundamental objection. She is bothered that my nomenclature risks broadening the definition of “rhyme” to the point where it loses all usefulness. This comment grows out of her…
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I’m a little behind time with this, having had little energy for blogging in the tail end of the old year, but I thought I’d highlight my two latest magazine scalps. I’ve a poem apiece in issue 63 of The Rialto and issue 25 of that beautifully produced Irish magazine, The SHOp, whose founding editor…
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It’s good to see Tiel Aisha Ansari’s critique of my Reasoning Rhyme posts on her Knocking From Inside blog. This is the first time anybody has taken me to task on any elements of my rhyme terminology and analysis, and it’s envigorating. Ansari says there is a lot she likes about my terminology. However, she’s…
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Peter Piper’s pop-up blocker blocks a pack of pretty blatant pop-ups.
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I don’t know where Simon Barrow came across this quotation on grief from Rowan Williams, but it’s worth reproducing here: “[G]rief and desperate loneliness aren’t political things but human things. It’s only when we can get to the humanity can we begin to get beyond the sterility of historic racial and religious conflicts. Facing the…
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Last year, I exhibited three poems at an exhibition at the offices of our church here in Linlithgow, organised by my wife. This year, the exhibition has moved to the bigger space of the church building, expanding its range of media–already wide last year–and the reach of its contributors to include several people from outside…
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On a brief visit to Waterstones at the West End of Edinburgh’s Princes Street yesterday, I was very pleasantly surprised to see quite an interesting poetry section. Instead of being populated by the usual suspects with one or two token others thrown in, it included a few American imports and a healthy selection of small…
Amy Jo Philip 