Showing posts with label poet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label poet. Show all posts

Friday, 14 May 2021

Marking #DylanDay 2021


 

Some of you will know that I lived in Swansea for twenty years, so #DylanDay is always an opportunity for me to remember visits to Cwmdonkin Park and Number 5 Cwmdonkin Drive (plaque above). 



 

I also like to recall carefree hours spent on the waterfront at Laugharne. You can see the Dylan Thomas Boathouse in the photo above and Dylan's Writing Shed perched somewhat precariously on the cliff in the photos below. 

 



 

There is often a Grey Heron on the shore, and not infrequently a Curlew or two.

 

 

This bird's eye view of Laugharne (below), with its tidal estuary, castle, boathouse and writing shed, brings back a number of particular memories, including a day when I attended a Creative Writing workshop facilitated by Aeronwy Thomas as part of the Laugharne Festival. 

 



The southern and western areas of Wales are not, of course, the only locations linked to the poet. Dylan visited New York on four occasions in the 1950s. I spent a few days there in 2012, enjoying a meal in Greenwich Village and the long elevator ride up the Empire State Building as the light began to fade. 

 


This year I am delighted to have a poem on Lidia Chiarelli's Immagine e Poesia #DylanDay website and also to have a letter addressed to DT and a poem in a new anthology called Dear Dylan, edited by Anna Saunders and Ronnie Goodyer, and published by Indigo Dreams Publishing. 

Dear Dylan is published today, and you can purchase a copy and read more about it here. I am looking forward to the 'Dear Dylan from the Birthplace' Zoom event this evening. 


Wednesday, 14 November 2012

Poetic People: Wendy Cope at UCS, Ipswich

Waiting our turn at the book table, with Dr Antonella Castelvedere and Dr Paolo Trimarco ...

Wendy Cope with Dr Paola Trimarco

Wendy Cope with Dr Paola Trimarco and David Gill

Book signing ...

... and conversations.

University Campus Suffolk, view from the Waterfront Building

I have just come in from University Campus Suffolk on the Waterfront in Ipswich, where staff and students in the English subject area were hosting an event with Wendy Cope. The reading was open to all who had applied for a ticket, and it was good to be joined by members of my Gainsborough Community Library Writing Workshop and by friends from the monthly Poetry Cafe at Arlington's.

I have heard Wendy Cope once before - some years ago at the Hay Festival in a massive tent. This afternoon's event was a much more intimate occasion. The reading included a selection of Christmas poems, for example 'Cathedral Carol Service', to launch us into the festive season. I was interested to hear the poet introduce one of her poems with the almost thow-away line, 'It's a Sonnet - I think it's much easier if you know.' We also heard a Pantoum, and talked about Villanelles and Triolets in the post-reading question session.

Wendy Cope explained how she had used words from Alain de Botton as an epigraph, words about the artist Edward Hopper and his landscape of transit and threshold spaces 'in which we are aware of a particular kind of alienated poetry.' I found this very resonant with the themes in Edgelands by Michael Symmons Roberts and Paul Farley, a book I have just finished reading.

Wendy Cope listed A.E. Housman and the Russian, Marina Tsvataeva (through the translations by Elaine Feinstein) among her favourite fellow poets. She drew inspiration from their work, but added that it was too soon for critics to say who had been the major influences on her own output. There was plenty of time at the end for questions about form in poetry, about commissions and various aspects of the writing process. 

Wendy Cope came armed with books, including Family Values (Faber 2011), and there was a steady stream of enthusiastic followers at the book table. Thank you to all concerned for a stimulating afternoon - and to Tom Owens for his photographs of the event, which you will find here

*
Postscript: Wendy Cope mentioned Valerie Eliot, wife of T.S. Eliot, who has just died ...   

Monday, 29 October 2012

Poets on Poet: Matthew Hollis on Edward Thomas

Matthew Hollis

I have been thoroughly gripped by 'Now All Roads Lead to France' by Mattthew Hollis. It is an excellent study of the years and days leading up to the Great War. I have almost finished the book, and was delighted to have the chance to hear Matthew presenting his subject in an illustrated talk for the Suffolk Poetry Society.

Book-signing time ...

You will not be surprised to hear that the presentation included 'Adlestrop', a place I visited many years ago on a frosty morning. After Matthew had finished speaking, members of the audience were invited to ask questions and to choose a favourite Thomas poem. David and I selected 'Swedes', a poem we had written about way back in 2003. We ventured to show how this poem emerged from prose. You can find a link to our 'Note' in OUP Notes and Queries here.


'Adlestrop - The name' Edward Thomas

Wednesday, 25 July 2012

Poetry Matters (21): Poets and their Websites

I have been visiting a number of contemporary (or recent) poets' websites and blogs recently, and thought the links below - in alphabetical order - might also be useful for others. I may add to the list as time goes by, but I wanted to start with the ones I have visited up until now. I hope you may enjoy these. And perhaps you have come across some interesting sites, too.

Dylan Thomas, Swansea

You will find more poet sites here, courtesy of John Field.

    Saturday, 18 June 2011

    Fiesta Time (7): Closing Moments at the Swansea International Poetry Festival

    Festival Participants: Final Curtain Call, Photo © David Gill 2011

    The word 'triumph' comes to mind as I begin to look back on the extravaganza of events that have taken place here in Swansea at the Dylan Thomas Theatre and at the Nick Holly Studio Gallery over the last few days.

    I would like to offer my sincere thanks to the organisers, Peter Thabit Jones (of The Seventh Quarry, Swansea) in conjunction with Stanley H. Barkan (of Cross-Cultural Communications, New York).

    I would also like to thank all those who worked behind the scenes and all those who participated in various ways, enabling us to enjoy poetry, drama, music and dance from many different corners of the globe.

    N.B. Some participants had already had to leave by the time this photograph was taken.

    Wednesday, 15 June 2011

    Fiesta Time (4): International Poetry Festival opens in Swansea, 2011

    John, Robin, Caroline (me!) and Lisa

    The Swansea International Poetry Festival has begun with a swing! The festival is taking place under the auspices of The Seventh Quarry, Wales (ed. Peter Thabit Jones) and Cross Cultural Communications, New York (ed. Stanley Barkan). 

    Tonight's launch took place in the Nick Holly Studio Gallery, a superb venue. Thank you to all who made it a wonderful evening. Here's to tomorrow!

    Fiesta Time (3): International Poetry Festival in Swansea, 2011

    STOP PRESS ... starting today ...

    Swansea, SA1
    SWANSEA, WALES: 16-18 JUNE 2011


    The Seventh Quarry 
and
 Cross-Cultural Communications, New York 
    A three-day festival of poetry, drama, workshops, and music ...

    Writers and performers 
from 
    the U.K., America, Canada, Argentina, Israel, Europe, Eastern Europe, and India.
    

Hosted by Peter Thabit Jones and Stanley H. Barkan 
    
at the Dylan Thomas Theatre, Swansea. 

    Extra festival events at The Boathouse, Laugharne; 
    
Dylan Thomas House, Swansea; 
and the Nick Holly Art Studio, Swansea.
    

A commemorative chapbook is being produced 

    and several awards will be announced. 

    Dylan Thomas Boat House, Laugharne

    Wednesday, 1 June 2011

    Poetry Matters (18): Peter Thabit Jones ~ 'Poems from a Cabin on Big Sur'

    Poems from a Cabin on Big Sur by Peter Thabit Jones
    Editor-Publisher: Stanley H. Barkan
    Publishing House: Cross Cultural Communications, Merrick, New York, 2011
    Photographs: Melissa Goese-Goble, Patricia Holt, Carolyn Mary Kleefeld, Linda Parker

    Available from Cross-Cultural Communications, 239 Wynsum Avenue, Merrick, New York, 11566-4725, USA. Price $25 (hardback) $15 (paperback)

    Launch of 'Poems from a Cabin on Big Sur' (Photo © David Gill 2011)

    'I went on daily walks, alone, letting the island-like world seep into my very being ...'
    Peter Thabit Jones, Preface, p.9

    We were delighted to visit the stunning Studio Gallery of Swansea artist, Nick Holly, last Friday for the launch of Poems from a Cabin on Big Sur by Peter Thabit Jones. The work in this sparkling new collection brings us - in the apposite words of Vince Clemente - a vision of Peter, 'the man on Big Sur [observing] with the eyes of maturity, but [feeling] with the open heart of the boy on Kilvey.'

    Big Sur, on the Central Coast of California, is adorned with the stunning combination of the St Lucia Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. It is a place well-loved by writers and those who seek natural wonder and solitude. Redwood and Monterey Pine adorn this region. It is an area of wide skies and horizons, where the rugged landscape is frequented not only by mountain lions but also by rare amphibians such as the California Giant Salamander (Dicamptodon ensatus).

    In his Preface, Peter alludes to the fact that his spell as Writer-in-Residence in the Cabin on Big Sur followed in the tradition of a line of other writers and artists who had been equally influenced by this extraordinary wilderness (in the sense of 'expanse of wildness' rather than 'area of emptiness'). Jack Kerouac's novel, Big Sur, (1962), for example, arose out of his time in the same cabin.

    Many of us dream of living the Robinson Crusoe experience. Most of us occasionally manage to hunt out small corners 'far from the madding crowd'. Writers like Dylan Thomas and R.S. Hawker beavered away in huts perched high above estuary and ocean. I like to write with one eye on the keyboard and the other on the wide sweep of Swansea Bay, as it spreads out beneath my window. Few of us, though, unlike Peter, have truly experienced the life of a poet in isolation - for real.

    It is with these thoughts in my head that I plan to approach this collection as I read it more carefully and alongside the accompanying photographs in the days to come. I have already encountered poems that invite the reader to glimpse into the 'window's picture', as it conveys the poet's vision in terms of a dual sense of the 'so-close ocean' and the 'shores of the mind'.