On the Line

1
In contrast to prose--which, being continuous, pretends to a form of wholeness--poetry, because it is divided into lines, is equipped in its structure to reflect and deal with the brokenness of the world. This it holds in tension with a more intense and therefore more whole scrutiny of language.

2
How can someone accept the monostich and not the single-line stanza? The latter's acceptability is surely a logical extension of the former's or of the assertion that the line is the basic unit of verse. The two amount to the same thing at the end of the day.

3
The line has this equivalence to harmonic progression and cadence in music: it is the place where tension is created and resolved. Good line breaks create and resolve (or not, as necessary) tension in the poem's sense, rhythm or meter and consonantal/vocalic music.

4
Each poem--each line--must find its own balance of tension and release. If the poem--if the line--is unsuccessful, are the tension and release out of kilter?

5
I said "Good line breaks create and resolve ... tension", but tension and resolution can take place within a line. Otherwise, how could the monostich be anything other than tedious?

LBF Website

The Linlithgow Book Festival website has experienced a few--ahem--technical problems, but we've fixed 'em. If you've tried to access it and failed, all should now be well. The programme on the front page has also been updated with a little more information about the renga and the Wallace event I'm involved in. And you can now subscribe to the site's feed.

Picasso on Paper

One of the pleasures of living near Edinburgh is being able to see the major Festival-time exhibitions once the biggest crowds have gone. Although family circumstances are not the most conducive, I had the opportunity yesterday to see "Picasso on Paper" at the Dean Gallery. And I'm extremely glad I went.

As the title implies, the exhbition consists of works on paper: drawings, etchings, lithographs and linocuts from throughout Picasso's career*. It is simply stunning. I knew that Picasso changed style and approach with similar alacrity and innovation to Miles Davis in jazz, but to be presented with the development so clearly and richly was a revelation.

Some people think Picasso overrated. Personally, I found the work by turns beautiful, intriguing, vulgar, moving, funny, tender, disturbing and exciting. One can dislike the style and even the content, but there is no question about the man's astonishing creative imagination and technical ability--he was almost constantly innovating techniques, even in processes he'd only just learnt. Such emotional, stylistic and technical range is surely one of the things that makes for greatness in art.

Picasso's combination of endless reinvention and technical genius must be a challenge to any creative artist who encounters it. It could be enervating--you might think "How can I ever match that creativity in my field?"--but I came away from the show exhilarated and fired up. Of course, it remains to be seen whether that comes out in my writing. Discernable effect or no, I'm glad of the stimulus.

Incidentally, "Picasso on Paper" is apprently the first major Picasso show in Scotland. Let's have more! There is an accompanying exhibition, "Picasso: Fired with Passion", at the National Museum of Scotland. I haven't yet seen it, but it's on a bit longer. I hear it consists mainly of ceramics, as the title might lead you to think.

*I really mean throughout: the earliest piece was made when he was 17, the latest when he was 90.

More on Orkney

The visit to Orkney with the Shore Poets exchange in October is beginning to shape up. It looks like it will involve one reading--on Saturday 13th along with Christine De Luca and local writers in the Pier Arts Centre, Stromness--and at least one school visit the previous day. There might be other visits to schools and/or writers groups, but I'm sure there'll be plenty eating and drinking whatever else happens! Diana Hendry and Ian McDonough are scheduled to read on Friday 12th October at Orkney Library, Kirkwall. They'll also be doing some school/writing group visits. I'm looking forward to it.

Speaking of the Shore Poets, don't forget the next reading: Polly Clark, Jilly Garnett and Ian McDonough, with music from Bob Murray and Friends, on 30 September in Mai Thai Cafe Bar.

Great Grog Gig

Readers of Rob A Mackenzie's blog Surroundings might recall a comments thread a while back about the idea of a Nov 4th reading with Roddy Lumsden, AB Jackson, Rob and myself. Well, the gig is confirmed. It should make for a good night, though I expect I'll be frazzled by the end, what with it also being the weekend of the Linlithgow Book Festival. Hope to see some of you there. Here are the details:

Roddy Lumsden, AB Jackson, Rob A Mackenzie and Andrew Philip

7.30pm, 4 November 2007

Great Grog Wine Bar, 43 Rose Street, Edinburgh (50 metres left from Hanover Street if walking from Princes Street)

Entry is free.

Remember "poems on pillows"? (New readers start here then follow the trail to here and here.) Well, I don't know why I should further humiliate myself by saying this, but there's a page for the project on the Ten Hill Place website. It features my commissioned poem just about legible on the postcard (not one of my best by a long way) and one of the publicity shots of Richard, Elspeth and me. Oh dear.

Reading, Do You Find Yourself ... ?

I've been thinking about the way that I and other writers use the pronoun you in poems and realising how strong an antipathy I have to its being used to stand in for the first person. I'm not talking about the colloquial use of you as a replacement for the often bothersomely formal impersonal pronoun one, but about poems that seem to address the reader/hearer when they're actually telling us about what the writer/speaker is doing.

For an example, listen to the poem that set me off on this train of thought: Jacob Sam-La Rose's aubade "Waking, You Find Yourself ...". Certainly not a bad piece of writing, but it suffers from this problematic you.

And here's the problem: This you pretends to generalise a particular experience; it tells the reader "you do/see/think this" when, in fact, they don't and quite possibly wouldn't or couldn't for any number of reasons. It attempts to steer around the ambiguities and problems of the poetic I; it neither steams ahead with the first person nor engages with postmodern games and doubts about the self. It can't decide whether it wants distance or intimacy and, instead, opts for something that purports to provide both.

Is this approach mainly an affectation of younger writers? I used to do it now and again, but I don't think I've fallen into that trap for a good six or seven years at least. In the flush and overconfidence of youth, is it too easy to think that something we experience is universal? Or is it a lack of confidence that leads the younger writer to push for universality by slipping into the second person?

Whatever the answer to those questions, it seems to me that you would be best reserved for instances in which there is a clear addressee--a named dedicatee or one unnamed but obvious--or for use as an impersonal pronoun where standard grammar would require one. It is possible to use you to address oneself in a poem if that's made clear in the title, for instance, as in my poem "Notes to Self".

Poems like Sam-La Rose's are probably best rendered using the first person or, if the poet wants more distance, the third. Of course, the third person in English (and many other languages) ties down the gender of the character in the poem, which might or might not be an issue. Then again, the you I'm arguing against also gives the question of gendered poetry a bodyswerve, and is that really acceptable?

Mr Mackenzie's Manuscript

If you've been following my and Rob A Mackenzie's posts about our manuscript swap, you'll probably be waiting for the more detailed comments I promised on Rob's poems*, so here they finally are.

There's a lot of very good stuff in Rob's MS, with a few really fine poems. Think of Rob A Mackenzie, and you're likely to think of surreal, ironic, witty narrative poems. Many of the strongest and most distinctive pieces in the manuscript are just such. They are fresh and contemporary and their level of irony is just right: never arch, too knowing or clever-clever but playful, even though the material is serious.

These poems support Rob's statement that his writing follows "the softer side of the New York School and ... European surrealism". Nonetheless, his voice also sounds distinctly Scottish to me. It's not particularly a matter of vocabulary, as there's almost no Scots in his MS**. Nor is it necessarily a matter of geographical or cultural references. The Scottish flavour comes, I think, from the way Rob deploys his wit and irony, mixed often with genuine passion and commitment. I'd go so far as to say that it feels quite Glaswegian, a subtle reflection of the best parts of that city's distinctive character and humour mingled with the European and transatlantic influences.

Here we have that good old Scottish internationalism again, which also puts me in mind of Edwin Morgan, whom Rob has cited. I can hear echoes of Morgan's voice in the mixture of international influence, Glasgow exuberance and formal variety but Rob's voice is still very much his own.

All in all, Rob's work is a highly entertaining, stimulating read. He has decided to keep writing for a few more months before sending an MS out. To judge by the present selection, he's going from strength to strength, so I'm sure those few months will bring some excellent poems into being. I'm looking forward eagerly to putting his first collection on my bookshelf (and, of course, to taking it down). Meanwhile, if you haven't already bought a copy of The Clown of Natural Sorrow, what are you waiting for?

*You can read his comment on my MS here.

**The confectionary and culinary terms "soor plooms" and "bridie" are the only instances I can think of.

Folk Festival Reading Update

A quick update: Jennifer Williams will now be reading with me at the Linlithgow Folk Festival gig. I'm also trying to organise some music for it, but that's not confirmed as yet.

On Joining the Ranks of the Poetcast

I now have an entry on Poetcasting. Click here to go to the page and play or download MP3s of me reading "The Invention of Zero", "To Bake the Bread" and "Tonguefire Night" as well as my Scots translation of Rilke's "Der Panther". It's a long time since I heard myself reading my work, and I'm pretty pleased with the way it sounds. Hope you like it too, if you care to listen.

Recordings of a few more folk from the Arvon course will be added over the coming weeks, apparently. I'll keep an eye out and post when it happens. At the moment, the only other Lumb Banker to be found on the site is performance poet Mim Darlington. I particularly like her "English Lesson".

Linlithgow Book Festival now has a website. Drop by and check it out. Note the additional event on the Sunday afternoon.

Lithgae Folk Festival Gig

Readers of this blog and Rob Mackenzie's might remember the reading that we did last year in Linlithgow as part of the Celebrate Linlithgow! arts festival. This year, I'm reading as part of the town's longest running festival: the Linlithgow Folk Festival. At the moment, it looks like I have the bill to myself, despite my best efforts to get others to share it with me. But watch this space. Here are the details:

Date: Friday 7 September 2007

Time: 8 pm

Venue: St John's Christian Centre, Bryerton House, 129 High Street, Linlithgow

Entry: Free but ticketed. Opportunity to donate on the door. Tickets available from Blast-off Books, Linlithgow

A Civil Note on the Press

Imagine my surprise, on flicking through this week's Guardian Review to find that the book of the week is not only a collection of poetry but a new book by Geoffrey Hill, A Treatise of Civil Power*. At last! The Guardian has been supportive of Hill for a while, but I don't remember the last time the Review gave that accolade to any volume of poetry. Nonetheless, I was disappointed to find no other poetry reviews in the paper. A ridiculous situation. After all, you wouldn't expect there to be no further fiction reviews if the book of the week was a novel.

*Strictly speaking, this isn't really a new book as far as I can gather, given that a volume of the same title was published by Clutag Press in 2005. Penguin's page for the book doesn't show the contents, so I can't ascertain whether the volumes are identical, although the titles mentioned in the review seem to indicate that they are at least substantially the same. The Clutag edition is now sold out; I wasn't quick enough on the mark to get a copy, but I think it was signifcantly dearer than the Penguin edition anyway!

At last: a note on Lumb Bank

Some kind of note on the Arvon course of a few weeks ago is certainly overdue. Matthew Hollis and Colette Bryce both gave useful and encouraging feedback and advice alongside interesting, stimulating workshop discussions and exercises. As the course was billed as being about working towards a collection, it is a tad irritating that they opted to hold the session on assembling a manuscript and approaching publishers on the Friday morning. Since I went to Lumb Bank to focus on forming a manuscript rather than to write new work, the course would have been even more beneficial for me if that session had been held earlier in the week. Nonetheless, it was invaluable. I mean, how often do you get to hear about that process from someone who knows it from both sides--poet and publisher--as Matthew does?

Still, it was a great week. The other participants were a lively, fascinating, varied bunch and I suspect several of us will keep in touch. Among them was Lorraine Mariner, whose wonderfully funny, warm and moving pamphlet Bye For Now was published by The Rialto in 2005. Lorraine, who has the privilege of working at the Poetry Library in London, is also shortlisted for this year's Forward prize for best single poem. Gaun yersel Lorraine!

The crew of the good ship Lumb Bank also contained Alex Pryce of Poetcasting note. Alex--the youngest*, cheekiest and sparkiest of us--recorded as many of us as would brook the microphone, so watch out for a familiar face appearing on Poetcasting some time in the reasonably near future.

Visiting reader for the course was Clare Shaw**, whose collection Straight Ahead is published by Bloodaxe. I hadn't heard or read her before the course. She's an energetic, engaging reader for all that her work covers some quite harrowing, intense ground.

Lumb Bank is also a beautiful place. It's set in a gorgeous heavily wooded valley which looks down towards Hebden Bridge. My paltry set of photos from the week might give you some impression of what it's like. There are more to be found on Lumb Bank's own Flickr photo stream.

Suffice to say it was an extremely useful and hugely enjoyable week. Recommended.

*The oldest had his 81st birthday during the week.

**The front page of this link is a garble of code at the moment but the rest is fine.

Order! Order!

I have it: a draft collection-length manuscript with an order I think works! Now to garner a few second opinions before I start seriously thinking about what to do with it. Rob Mackenzie and I will be swapping back on Monday, so I'm looking forward to reading his comments on my work.

Courting the Fringe Audience

I'm planning to take part in the Scottish Poetry Library's courtyard readings tomorrow, Monday and probably Tuesday. Like all open sessions, they can be extremely hit and miss but they're good fun and an interesting opportunity to read to an often entirely new audience. It'll be a good opportunity to plug Postscript as well.

The Marvellous Madness Begins

It's August, there's a downpour a day and Edinburgh has brigadooned into the Radio 4 consciousness once again. Must be festival time. Of course, by "festival" I mean not only the Edinburgh International Festival, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the Edinburgh International Book Festival and the Edinburgh International Film Festival, but the Festival of Spirituality and Peace, the Edinburgh book fringe (which seems to be so unofficial this year that it lacks any separate publicity), the Edinburgh Art Festival and probably several other festivals I've heard nothing about yet.

I long ago abandoned hope of navigating the seven circles of the Fringe programme* and now tend to focus my attention on the Book Festival first, then the International Festival and the Film Festival with glances at Fringe reviews. However, my first taste of Edinburgh's 2007 festival vibe, courtesy of a tip-off from Rob A Mackenzie, was a chunk of Luke Wright's Poetry Party on Saturday night. I won't repeat what I said here and here about performance poetry. Not all the names on the bill were performance poets as such, but that was the overall style. I heard only a small selection of them: Joe Dunthorne, Tim Turnbull, Tim Wells and Martin Newell, as well as Luke Wright, who performed one piece in between each set. Tim T was the best for my money**--he's always entertaining. I'd expected Dunthorne's stuff to be more interesting than it was, but didn't know what to expect from the others.

Still, it was a great opportunity to chat with Rob and catch up with Roddy Lumsden and Andy Jackson, neither of whom I'd seen in ages. And I managed to make it to the pub for one drink with Rob, Roddy, Andy and co. The pub in question being the Meadows Bar***, there were faint shades of the student hours spent drinking with sundry student and grownup poets.

By sober contrast, I dipped into the Book Festival on Sunday morning for a reading by Nick Laird, launching his second collection, On Purpose, and Daljit Nagra. Despite costing £7.00 and starting at 10.15 am, it was as well attended as the poetry party. Nagra read first. Much of the work he read demands a good performance, which he certainly gave, but it also has a much more interesting linguistic texture, signficantly greater depth and a greater awareness of the literary tradition than the animal known as performance poetry. Laird is a more straightforward lyrical, literary poet, a voice emerging from the Northern Irish tradition in the line of Heaney and Muldoon. Some lovely writing. He had a nice line in self-depricating commentary on his own introductions to the poems. I'm looking forward to reading Nagra's and Laird's collections. I have Nagra's Look We Have Coming to Dover! and Laird's To A Fault on hold at the Scottish Poetry Library and bought On Purpose.

*Comedy, Music, Events, Comedy, Theatre, Visual Arts and Comedy.

**Not that any money was involved, as the event was free.

***Which served a watery pint of the usually marvellous Caledonian 80 with no head to speak of.

A Brief Note on Wednesday

Wednesday's interview for the Scottish Book Trust mentoring scheme seemed to go well, but I'm not really one to read aright the entrails of a 40-minute chat with two strangers, so who knows what the outcome will be? Two SBT staff grilled me in the nicest manner possible about my "project", my expectations of being mentored and any impediments to my participation. I applied for a mentor to spur me on to finishing off a full collection of poetry, which is also why I went on last week's Arvon. There are only five places on this round of the programme, so I'll be extremely pleased with myself if I get one, but it feels like these opportunities are coming along at the right time. I don't know when I'll hear, as there were a few people who couldn't make Wednesday's interviews and no decisions will be made until after they've been grilled. Time to get those tenterhooks out.

Back and Looking Forward

Just back home today from a few days with the in-laws either side of the course at Lumb Bank. A fine week, but more about that later. At the moment, I'm trying to apply my rather travel-weary mind to the fact that I have an interview for a place on the Scottish Book Trust's mentoring scheme tomorrow afternoon!

Gearing Up

I'm off to a course with Matthew Hollis and Colette Bryce at the Lumb Bank Arvon centre tomorrow, so this online tongue will stop wagging for the next five or six days at least. Still, there's a reasonably amount for you to enjoy in the virtual cupboard under the stairs.

It should be a fun week. I know Matthew Hollis from his days at Edinburgh University, when he was president of the university's poetry society. He was a couple of years ahead of me and was largely responsible for making EUPS an interesting place to be. I last saw him when he read for the Shore Poets in November. Colette Bryce I met and chatted to briefly when she read for the Shore Poets in, I think, 2003. The course is about working towards a first collection, so it comes at just the right point in time for me.

Speculating as to what kind of people the other course participants might be is always* fun but a little less necessary in this instance, as it transpires that Alex Pryce of Poetcasting note is going on the same course. She'll have her podcasting gear with her, so it looks like I'll be recorded and cast ahead of the expected schedule**. Poetcasting is an impressive project, all the more so given that it's the brainchild of a 19-year-old student. It's one of the most interesting and vibrant UK poetry websites--unique in its mix of emerging and established voices, performance poets, mainstream literary poets and more experimental writers--and I'm looking forward to meeting the person behind it.

*I say "always", but I've only ever been on previous Arvon course, which was way back in 2002.

**Alex is planning a Scottish recording trip early next year.