Keeping books and magazines

As regards writing, it's been a quiet autumn. Instead, we've been refitting the bedroom with a floor-to-ceiling wardrobe that has lots of book space. I look up old collections quite often (most recently I looked for Chrissie Williams' "Flying into the bear" pamphlet having bought her "Bear" book) so it's useful not to have my books and magazines boxed away. The photo shows about half of what I have.

The classifications are "publications I'm in", "magazines" (my most recent issue of each. I added "n+1" to the collection recently), "poetry monographs", "HappenStance", "prose monographs", "poetry anthologies","prose anthologies", "other". I'm beginning a "flash" section. Strangely sized magazines have a section too. I've hardly any novels.

I use the "magazines" most often, to show fellow writers places they might want to send their work to. It's the anthologies that I most often re-read. Since most of the books are small-press they contain material that's not on-line, and is probably out of print. I find them a useful resource. For example, when checking on the modern use of sestinas I found many examples I wouldn't have found elsewhere.

I don't think I'm hoarding. I've kept only one complete set of magazines, namely "Panurge".

Going fast

Pop into the HappenStance shop while stocks last.

Notes for a style vs content workshop

The notes I used to run a workshop on style versus content in prose are online now - see Style and substance

Krakow

We had 4 days in Krakow, staying in a place whose staircase reminded me of Edinburgh tenements. We saw the Salt mines, the lively Jewish Quarter, and a few Museums. Being with the younger generation opened my eyes to how things are nowadays - useful for updating my story-writing. I took my first Uber, stayed at my first airbnb, learnt about reviewing, and watched while the rest of the family hired scooters for little trips.

From the tower in the square we got a good view. We've been to Prague, and noted a few similarities. Wedded couples were being photographed around the town. Drivers were good about stopping at zebra crossings. I saw no betting shops. There were a few (sometimes chic) second hand shops, lots of "Alcohole" shops but no public drinking.

At the foot of the tower is a popular photo-opportunity - people poke their head through the eye hole.

I realised that my knowledge of Polish culture is close to zero, I've read Miłosz, Szymborska and Herbert a little, and Conrad. A visit to the national museum helped me catch up with 20th century art. I also visited the modern art gallery by Schindler's factory.

Dark Horse issue 41 and reputations

"Dark Horse issue 41" has 96 pages, nearly half of them devoted to the editorial, essays, an interview and bios (just one page of them). There are essays about the role of the internet in damaging the reputation of living poets, and articles examining the reputation of dead poets. Was Anthony Hecht a misogynist? Was Whitman?

I've wondered before about how writers' reputation are affected by their deaths. For some, it's as if the literary world is waiting for them to die so they can be written out of the records. A poet can write good poems, they can help keep a poetry institution or magazine going, but if others write better in a similar style, if someone can step into their vacated role, they'll soon be forgotten.

Then there are the larger-than-life writers, those who are for some reason memorable. There's a risk that when they die, their poetry will go down with them, sometimes undeservedly.

Karl Knights' essay "Three Palsied Poetry: Poetry and Disability" looks at the reputation of 3 poets who had cerebral palsy. Because of their disability they were all physically memorable. I suspect people found it hard not to think of the poet when they read the poetry. This can work both ways.

• Larry Eigner (I've never heard of him) struggled to type with 2 fingers. He wrote little about his disability. He was in seminal Black Mountain and L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E publications. Though championed by William Carlos Williams, Bukowski, etc, he received little recognition in his lifetime. He's beginning to receive acclaim. Knights thinks that "By focussing on form and experimentation, he made a posterity for his work likelier."
• Vassar Millar (I've never heard of her) wrote much more often about her disability. She wrote religious poetry too and was rigorously formal. James Wright admired her work. She was nominated for a Pulitzer in 1961. Knights thinks that "Since her death, her work has been almost entirely forgotten."
• Christy Brown's "My Left Foot" was published when he was 22. I've read it and I've seen the film. Brown later thought the book was 'immature juvenilia'. He spent 17 years writing "Down All the Days", a novel which received much acclaim - "the most important novel since Ulysses" said an Irish Times reviewer. Knights thinks that "Brown's novels have come to be seen as frivolous novelties". They're now out of print, though "My Left Foot" is still around.

Later Knights writes that "The only instance I can think of where a disabled person attained an editing post is Judy-Lynn del Ray". As he points out, this infiltration into the institutions is important. I think it's why cultural changes can take years - first there were more woman writers, then more women editors, then there were women writers who grew up in a world where there were more women editors.

What non-poets need to know about poetry

• There are no poets - Nobody earns their keep merely by writing poetry.
• Poetry's not often a special language - Read it first as if it were prose, ignoring the line-breaks.
• There are many types of poetry - True, there are many types of music too but you don't often have Abba and Beethoven on the same CD. A poetry anthology can have a crazy mix. Don't expect to like it all.
• Not all poetry was written for you - Some poets perform only for poets, writing books only for poets. They don't feel the need to justify their poems word by word to unbelievers.
• Books aren't everything - Book runs don't often exceed 300. Running a workshop for a day will earn a poet more than years of royalties. Most poems appear in magazines you'll probably never see.

Publishing - Web or paper?

Speak to science academics and librarians and you find out that the paper/electric choice is a big issue more generally, particularly for periodicals. Why publish anyway?

• Announcing - To announce that you've written (or discovered) something - the web's good for this.
• Distributing - So people can read your work. Online publications are read far more than paper ones, especially amongst the young. But will prospective readers be able to find your work? Web magazines tend to disappear.
• Archiving - So your work can be preserved. Books may be kept by libraries but do copyright libraries take many paper magazines nowadays? Are e-book repositories reliable?
• Ambition - To gain status. The gain depends on the status of the publication, which in turn depends on longevity and the quality of the contents. Paper publications from a university used to be reliable, but they're disappearing fast. Academic journals often have an "impact factor" indicating how worthwhile publication in them is. Some online academics journals are gaining fast on the established ones. The same could be said for literary magazines. "Best British Short Story" pieces come from online and paper sources. Some paper sources (Stand?) seem rather neglected. Clifford Garstang's list is a literary start at building an impact league table of US magazine.

All in all it's not clear to me that paper publication is much more reliable than web publication either in terms of impact or archiving. One option for archiving is to store your work in the cloud. It's free, and you can use it as a backup. You can keep it private, putting alongside your will some instructions on how to make it visible to all. If that's what you want.