Blogstats 2007-2014

This blog's been going for 7 years. The graphs show the stats during that time. My article blog has been going for about 5 years, and is as popular as my main and reviews blogs combined - 100,000 hits so far. I suspect that's because it's a honeypot as far as literary searches are concerned. Top searches that lead to the articles are for "avant garde poetry", "metaphor uses like or as", "language poetry examples", "short metaphors", and "nel mezzo del cammin". Top pages are

Translating Dante's La Commedia Divina	13187
Child narrators in adult fiction	9431
Getting Poetry published in the UK	8373
Metaphor and Simile	7188

CB1: Ann Drysdale and Caroline Gilfillan

I must have passed the Cambridge Royal Hotel over 10,000 times to and from work, but I've never gone in. All that changed on 27/3/2014 when CB1's poetry evening was there as a one-off. If I don't go to poetry events, poetry events will come to me. From my seat at the venue I photographed my workplace just beyond the hotel's carpark, the reflected chandelier adding some class to a dreary block of offices.

CB1 consistently presents a broad range of poets - some university-based, some from further afield. About 40 people usually attend. Ann Drysdale (from Wales) and Caroline Gilfillan are both seasoned, impressive performers. I'd not come across Caroline Gilfillan before. She mostly read from her poetic biography of the Samuel Pepys, who lived in interesting times (and was a Cambridge student). She also read a "mirror poem" (the first and last line the same, and so on).

I've read 2 books by Ann Drysdale and I read some poems of hers on the Eratosphere forums, so I knew what to expect - humane; never a dull moment. I learnt both from the content and the delivery. She's equally adept at comic, thoughtful and sad pieces, with entertaining inter-poem talk. She read poems about spreading her husband's ashes from various types of containers (tobacco tins, camera film tubes) in Paris, etc, which were all the more moving for having an edge of humour. Her prose introduction to her piece about babies' dummies was a work in its own right. I prefer her poetry to much of Wendy Cope's later works, partly perhaps because of its more open and conciliatory attitude to death.

As a bonus, Mary McLean from the poetry group I attend contributed to the Open Mic session.

States of Independence - Roy Marshall, Rory Waterman and e-lit

I went to 2 events -

Sunbathers, Tonight the Summer's Over

I listened to readings by Rory Waterman and Roy Marshall, who've both had books out recently. They're both personable family people with lively senses of humour (though the latter doesn't come out in their poetry as much as one might expect). They complement each other well - at times their styles overlap, though they've taken different routes to poetry (Roy was a "delivery driver, gardener and coronary care nurse, amongst other occupations"; "Dr Waterman lectures in English Literature and Creative Writing", and his father was a poet). I'm not a very patient poetry listener, but I could have handled more from both of them. Rory read the poems that I most like from his book - "Navigating", "Family Business", "To Help the Birds through Winter" etc. Roy gave us some poems from his book, which I bought (the first print run's already sold out!).

They're both active on the poetry scene, the kind of people whose success restores one's confidence in poetry's meritocratic claims. Rory co-edits "New Walk" and has appeared in some prestigious places recently (Times Literary Supplement, the Guardian, the Financial Times). I see Roy's name in many of the publications (paper and Web) that I read. The Acknowledgements page of his recent book mentions over 20 publications, and it's worth keeping eyes on his blog.

Reading and Publishing Digital Literature

David Devanny and David Boyes talked about electronic literature. Amongst the points they made were -

• Some people exclude plain e-books from electronic literature, insisting that there be some random/game/choice element, or some use of the WWW.
• Language as Gameplay: toward a vocabulary for describing works of electronic literature by Brian Kim Stefans was recommended
• Stud Poetry by Marko Niemi was shown. It's a commonly shown example
• Money - the "games model" (offering 3 chapters free, for example) works better for fiction than poetry
• Amazon claim that people buy more paper books after they've got a Kindle
• Poets aren't likely to be good coders and artists too, so collaborations are likely
• Readers might not get the most from works unless they look at the code
• Hypertext might not be dead but in itself it's not the answer
• Each interesting new work might almost be a new genre - i.e. necessarily avant-garde
• See Electronic Literature Collection 1 and Electronic Literature Collection 2 for examples
• David Boyes is putting together Blast 2014

What Happenstance debut poets do next

Having read Matthew Stewart's From pamphlet to full collection post and re-read my Career paths post I was interested to see the fate of poets who'd had debut pamphlet publications with HappenStance. Here's a list of people who've continued publishing elsewhere (apologies for any omissions)

Author	HappenStance publication	Subsequent books (poetry unless otherwise stated)
Patricia Ace	"First Blood", 2006	"Fabulous Beast" (Freight books, 2013)
Clare Best	"Treasure Ground", 2010	"Excisions" (Waterloo Press, 2011) "Breastless" (Pighog, 2011) (pamphlet)
Anne Caldwell	"Slug Language", 2008	"Talking with the Dead" (Cinnamon Press, 2011)
Niall Campbell	"After the Creel Fleet", 2012	"Moontide" (Bloodaxe, 2014)
Rose Cook	"Everyday Festival", 2009	"Taking Flight" (Oversteps, 2009) "Notes from a Bright Field" (Cultured Llama, 2013)
Peter Daniels	"Mr Luczinski makes a move", 2011	"Counting Eggs" (Mulfran Press, 2012) "Vladislav Khodasevich:Selected Poems" (Angel Classics, 2013) translations
Kirsten Irving	"What to do", 2011	"Never Never Never Come Back" (Salt, 2012)
Gregory Leadbetter	"The Body in the Well", 2007	"Coleridge and the Daemonic Imagination" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012) theory
Eleanor Livingstone	"The Last King of Fife", 2005	"Even the Sea" (Red Squirrel Press, 2012)
Tim Love	"Moving Parts", 2010	"By all means" (Nine Arches Press, 2012) stories
Rob Mackenzie	"The Clown of Natural Sorrow", 2003	"The Opposite of Cabbage" (Salt, 2009) "Fleck and the Bank" (Salt, 2012) (pamphlet) "The Good News" (Salt, 2013)
Richie McCaffery	"Spinning Plates", 2012	"Ballast Flint", (Cromarty Arts Trust, 2013) "Cairn" (Nine Arches Press, 2014)
Gill McEvoy	"Uncertain Days", 2006	"The Plucking Shed" (Cinnamon Press, 2010) "Rise" (Cinnamon Press, 2013)
Matt Merritt	"Making the Most of the Light", 2005	"Troy Town" (Arrowhead Press, 2008) "Hydrodaktulopsychicharmonica" (Nine Arches Press, 2010) "The Elephant Tests" (Nine Arches Press, 2013)
Andrew Philip	"Tonguefire", 2005	"The Ambulance Box" (Salt, 2009) "The North End of the Possible" (Salt, 2013)
Jon Stone	"Scarecrows", 2010	"School of Forgery" (Salt, 2012)

Conclusions? Well, unsurprisingly the young poets fare better, though Peter Daniels is no slouch. It's a shame that "Salt" is no longer an option.

A poetry blog tour

Matt Merritt was looking for people to take part in a tour of poetry blogs, so like him I answered four standard questions about my own work. Also like him I'm happy to link to other poets who want to continue the tour.

What am I working on?

A blank-verse poem about Art and Time is vexing me at the moment. I'm also trying to get another pamphlet out. The number of pamphlet competitions is increasing, so I'm giving them a try. I've been sending out a general pamphlet and two themed ones.

How does my work differ from others in the genre?

Mostly it doesn't. Currently I'm trying to publish some poems old and new that depend on re-arranging letters. I've tried to justify this in an article that was accepted by Hinterland - Something Old, Something New – The Return of Letters. My rationale is that just as some poets use sound-effects to enrich their work (engaging an extra part of their - and the reader's - brain) so letter-effects can be used too. The trouble is that just as some readers (especially those not brought up with rhyme/metrics) get fixated by rhymes to the detriment of the content, so some readers over-emphasise the wordplay.

I'm also happy to incorporate non-lyrical material, in particular essay-like sentences or factoids.

Content-wise I think I've more of an aversion than many writers have to doing what's been done before, even if I've never done it before. Why add to the pile of poems about finding your old toys and jigsaws in the loft?

Why do I write what I write?

It's not an uncontrollable urge. I can imagine not writing poetry - I average only a poem a month anyway. I don't see poetry as a way to express the otherwise inexpressible (though it may be the shortest, most elegant way I can express something, so I try).

I find it less likely that I'd give up creative writing in general. Increasingly I'm distrusting white-space. If I have a little idea I'd rather use it to slightly strengthen a story than plonk it grandly in the middle of a plinth of white-space and give it a suggestive title.

How does your writing process work?

I scribble notes on scraps of paper. Sounds, interesting words, phrases, ideas for poems, etc. They get collected into notebooks. Every so often I trawl through the notebooks. Here's an extract

Sometimes (though less often lately) a poem arrives more suddenly, bypassing the notebook. First drafts are always hand-written. I might hand-write several more drafts. Only when I think I might be able to finish the piece do I type it in.

Now see the next part of the tour

• Mary McLean

States of Independence, Leicester 2014

States of Independence is happening on Saturday 15 March at Clephan Building, De Montfort University, Leicester, and it's all free. Dozens of small presses will be there, and there are dozens of talks starting from 11am. "This year there is a strong emphasis on fiction … we have asked each and every session to include something on marketing".

Poetry Judges

Last year Wendy Cope was the Bridport poetry judge. This year it's Liz Lochhead. I detect a trend.

The Leeds Piano competition isn't judged by Jazz pianists. There's a wide enough range as it is, without introducing further complications. Indeed, I'd be surprized if there were a worthwhile competition anywhere that Classical and Jazz pianists could both enter. But also I doubt that a judge would be chosen who only plays Mozart. Poetry judges have to cope with a range of poetry styles far exceeding that of the Leeds Piano competition. They won't be equally appreciative of all types, and practitioners might be expected to have more biases than outsiders have. Indeed (as in Art with some Turner prize entrants, and in Music with Schoenberg, Glass, etc) they may have trouble accepting that an entry qualifies as a creative work at all, let alone a good one.

So what features should a judge have?

• Able to evaluate a poem, whatever its type - This is so infeasible an objective that competition organisers probably don't bother too much about fulfilling it. It's clearly not the highest priority.
• Able to attract entries for the current competition - Crucial. A practising poet (or famous non-poet) is much more useful than an experienced anthologist or teacher. The judge may even be in a position to promote the event
• Able to attract entries for future competitions - Important. The person's judgement shouldn't attract adverse criticism. Competitions want to attract regular clientele, and organisers certainly don't want people demanding their money back because the winning entry "wasn't a poem".
• Availability - Judging the Bridport consumes much time at a point in the year when some of the best candidates won't have time to spare

Editors of major magazines might be considered well placed to be judges, you'd have thought. Their well-calibrated sensibilities should be immune to the tricks of the trade. Essay and text-book writers might be good candidates too. But unless they're also poets, they don't usually have a chance. Judgement by committee might broaden the aesthetics, so why not pair up Liz Lochhead with (say) Keston Sutherland? Well, for a start it's more expensive to have multiple judges, and it's not a risk-free option -

• In Bad Poem, Fergus McFadden queries the success of the Andrew Motion and Gillian Clarke pairing in judging the 2013 Cardiff International Poetry competition (first prize 5000 pounds). His views were shared by several poets I know. In any case, why have 2 poets who are so similar?
• In a 1990s Stand Poetry competition, judges Denise Riley and Ken Smith couldn't agree on a list of winners so each chose their own list
• "When we were judging [The Booker] we tried three different voting systems and each time a different winner emerged", Rowan Pelling, the Observer, March 9, 2008

So why has the Bridport committee chosen Liz Lochhead? I presume because last year was a financial success. I don't doubt her ability to select a winning poem that's good of its type. However, I think there are aspects of my poetry that she might not take into account, and at 8 quid a shot it's not worth the gamble.