What is Mainstream?

I've been musing a little about the usefulness or otherwise of the term "mainstream" in relation to Scottish poetry. I think it's fair to say that, in UK terms, Hugh MacDiarmid would not be regarded as mainstream. His non-mainstream status is emphasised by the fact that he turns up in the marvellous PENNsound archive, which focuses on the more experimental/avant-garde end of American poetry, and the fact that Eliot Weinberger considers his work in an admiring essay in Karmic Traces. And yet MacDiarmid is a hugely significant figure in 20th century Scottish poetry by anyone's standards. This surely makes him mainstream in a Scottish context, which perhaps emphasises his contention that Scottish literature is a separate tradition to the so-called English literature canon and market.

An analogous situation obtains with Gael Turnbull. Gael's role in injecting postwar modernist American poetry and poetics into the British scene was highly significant. He was an unceasing experimenter and his work sits comfortably with Shearsman Books, who published his Jacket tribute also fitted easily into the much more mainstream arena of Shore Poets, of which he was a valued (and is a much missed) member. Is Gael's work mainstream or experimental? Why should I (or anyone else) care? It's full of inventiveness, wit, insight, beauty, energy, playfulness and seriousness. It's simply worth reading.

Does this mean that, in Scotland, we have less of a distinction between the mainstream/accessible and the experimental/difficult? I'd like to think so, but I'm not convinced. After all, the poetry scene in which I'm involved is pretty much the main stream. But then, where do writers such as Frank Kuppner, David Kinloch or Price sit in relation to this supposed dichotomy? They have all appeared and/or are appearing on the bill at Shore Poets and other mainstream poetry readings, but they certainly don't row down the main current of the main stream, as indicated by the fact that Kinloch and Price both appear in the Archive of the Now.

Gists and Piths

Gists and Piths is a newish British poetry and poetics blogzine, which seems to lean towards the experimental. I haven't read the poetry on the site, but I enjoyed "Some thoughts on the mainstream" and the review of Daljit Nagra's book (which I also haven't read yet). Should be worth following this blog's development.

A Brief Note on Translation, Politics and Art

Today's Guardian Review includes a reasonable piece by Jennie Erdal on literary translation. It has no especially profound insights to offer on the process/art/act of translation but is more concerned with the profile of translators and translation in the world of books in the UK (woeful, but improving slightly). However, I liked the final sentence:

"Translators let us see another way of life, other possibilities, other matters, other manners, increasing the understanding between nations far better than politicians."

This is a significant function not only of translation but of much art of whatever form.

A Little Respect

If you missed David Martin's recent exhibition at the RSA, don't despair, because there are images of the work from the show (including the "studio wall" collage) on his blog.

I managed to get along to the RSA for a quick visit just before the exhibition ended. What struck me about the work was its depth of colour and depth of seeing, by which I mean not least the respect I sense towards the people and places Dave encountered on his journey. That deep respect is not new in his painting--I remember it from his degree show about seven or eight years ago--but, by the time it came to his last but one show, it seemed to have dissipated somewhat. It was there in his previous exhibition, but the slightly alegorical nature of the work diluted it, so it's good to see it back in full force. That respect made it seem a timely, even essential, exhibition because there is too little visible in our culture that treats the middle east in such a manner.

Rob For President

Rob A Mackenzie has been nominated for poet laureate of the blogosphere! Thing is, he says he doesn't want it, which is tough, 'cause I've never heard of the other nominees. I don't know much about what the accolade entails, either. First I heard of it was when Ron Silliman said his stint was now over, so at least one predecessor is hardly an insignificant name, which makes it all the more something to celebrate that Rob has been nominated.

The Trouble with Normal

is, as Bruce said, it always gets worse.

Dark Matters

I managed to scoot up to the Ingleby Gallery on Thursday to catch Alison Watt's installation "Dark Light" on its last day. Her shift from white canvases to black is logical: a further step in the stripping down that is represented by her progression from full-blown portraits to paintings of fabric to paintings of purely white fabric. White is a combination of all the colours of the spectrum, so a move to black marks a removal of that underlying richness.

Thursday was, of course, Maundy Thursday, one of the days on which it is traditional in some Christian demoninations to hold a tenebrae service, in which the light in the church is gradually extinguished--another stripping back to black. The churches in Linlithgow held a joint tenebrae service on Good Friday, but experiencing Watt's piece was a tenebrae for one: standing in the cube waiting for the paintings to emerge from the dimness was highly contemplative, not unlike waiting for God to emerge from the gloom of prayer. It put me in mind of the closing stanza of Henry Vaughan's poem "The Night":

There is in God (some say)
A deep, but dazzling darkness; As men here
Say it is late and dusky, because they
See not all clear;
O for that night! where I in him
Might live invisible and dim.

Ecce Choco

David Taylor at Diary of an Arts Pastor has a very good post on the stoushie about the

The Cusp of Fame

Something else I had to miss because of Eilish's sense of timing was the opening of the new show by painter David Martin: "The Cusp of Change: A Journey Through the Middle East". This is Dave's RSA show of work arising out of his Salvesen scholarship. There's a lot of stuff from it appearing daily on his blog, so take a look. I hope to get down to the RSA before it finishes. I missed his last show entirely, even though I'd written poems to accompany some of the work.

What I Missed

Looks like the 100 Poets Gathering at StAnza was a pretty incendiary event! You can catch up with some more of what went on at the festival with Rob Mackenzie's series of StAnza postings at Surroundings. Rob, a fellow HappenStance poet, read at a pamphlet poets event this year, as I did last year. He even gets a plug from George Szirtes, who delivered this year's StAnza lecture, which I must read at some point. Jorie Graham, didn't make it apparently, so at least I didn't miss her.

Readings Update

Due to family circumstances, I've had to pull out of the 100 Poets Gathering at StAnza and won't be able to make it to the festival at all. This means that my next scheduled reading is at the Shore Poets event in May, when I'll be appearing alongside Kate Clanchy and my fellow HappenStancer, Rob A Mackenzie. The music that evening will be provided by the excellent young Northumbrian singer-songwriter Richard Dawson.

The Scottish Cultural Academy

The Scottish Executive has finally announced a little more about the Scottish cultural academy that the Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport promised us months and months ago in the Executive's response to the Cultural Commission's report.

There has been some muttering about the fact that the academy, which is based somewhat on the Irish Aosdána scheme, wasn't mentioned in the draft culture bill, so the announcement--made ahead of the results of this year's Creative Scotland awards--is certainly welcome. Scotland has been bad at acknowledging and supporting its creative artists, so any increase in recognition is a step forward for our society. I wish, however, that more was also being done to encourage those of us who're still wrestling to establish ourselves.

Edwin Morgan, Scotland's first official Makar, has been appointed the academy's first member. He is an obvious and appropriate choice, given his literary standing and his popularity. Morgan is still writing away with remarkable energy, in spite of his advanced age and cancer. I'll keep a close eye out for who joins him in the academy. It will be interesting to see how the membership develops.

This might be very funny ...

... but I couldn't possibly comment.

The purpose of the poem ... is to change the world.

Thank Heaven: the world is too much as it was.

Listening Pleasure

I discovered some more rich seams of poetry recordings on the web this week. First off, there's the Internet Poetry Archive, an American site not to be confused with Britain's Poetry Archive. The Internet Poetry Archive very small, with recordings from only seven poets so far, but some significant names. I was pleased to find some recordings of Robert Pinsky, whom I've read but never heard. I clicked on his wonderful poem "Shirt" and was surprised to hear how slowly he reads it, as the structure and rhythm had always struck me as quite strong and driving.

By contrast, PENNsound is a vast respository of online audio and video. The authors represented are a mixture of prose writers and poets. It looks like most are American, but there are some significant exceptions: imagine my surprise and delight to find Hugh MacDiarmid there! It's the man himself reading, among other things the entirety of A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle (in four sound files).

While MacDiarmid is represented by a handful of files, some writers, such as Robert Creeley, have piles. I can see I'll be going back to PENNsound again and again and again. (Anybody know of some cheap storage?!)

StAnza: The Gathering

Just received confirmation that my reading slot at the StAnza 2007 100 Poets Gathering on Sunday 18 March will be some time between 12:30 and 2:15. It's quite a gathering, as you can see on the StAnza site.

A Cure for Somnia

Roy Hattersley defends the notion that poetry should be difficult, though not necessarily with reference to poets usually described as difficult.

Words on War

Read this, by Eliot Weinberger, and weep.

Then read this, also by Weinberger, and weep some more.

Finally, read this, not by Weinberger, and smile grimly.

Some Freshly Refreshed Websites

1
My recent visits to the HappenStance site have revealed that a lot has been going on behind the front page. The publications and chapbook reviews sections have been completely overhauled, with a very swish look and a good deal of new features.

2
The website of Chapman, the grande dame of Scotland's literary magazines, had been out of date for such a length that I'd given up looking at it a long time ago. Imagine my surprise to find a completely new website when I wandered over in that direction a few days ago. Not only that, but it looks gey youthful, unlike the previous, rather stale version.

3
More than you needed to know, the dream blog of my colleague Diarmid Mogg, which I mentioned before, has flitted to TypePad and looks superb. It's also easier to navigate than the old version.

A Rare Item

Helena Nelson, in her HappenStance guise, e-mailed me yesterday to let me know that, apart from the small handful of sale copies I have myself, Tonguefire is officially sold out!

For all sorts of reasons, it feels good to have reached that landmark at this point. I'm in a good position to appreciate it at the moment, and it can only strengthen my hand and resolve as I build towards a first full collection.

Speaking of which, I've booked a place on an Arvon course about working towards a first collection this summer. It's led by Matthew Hollis and Colette Bryce. Should be good. I'm hoping it'll spur me on in the next few months.