London launch for Whatever You Do, Just Don't

London launch of ‘Whatever You Do, Just Don’t’, jointly with Mat Riches, who’ll also be launching his pamphlet, ‘Collecting the Data’, Tuesday 7^th November at The Devereux pub (7p.m. to 10p.m.). Free entry!

This is a HappenStance/Red Squirrel event with a rare chance to meet both publishers in person (Sheila Wakefield and Helena Nelson), plus readings from three exceptional guest poets: Maria Taylor, Hilary Menos and Eleanor Livingstone.

Poems to make you smile and make you think

Over at The Friday Poem, they're running an series of features about poems to make you smile and make you think. And then, of course, to ponder the relationship between poetry and humour.

In today's slot, I look at Maria Taylor's ‘Hypothetical’, which is ace. You can read the poem itself, along with my take on it, via this link.

Review of Maria Taylor's Dressing for the Afterlife on Wild Court

As mentioned in my previous post, I've been working on an in-depth review of Maria Taylor's excellent second full collection, Dressing for the Afterlife (Nine Arches Press, 2020). It's now up at Wild Court (see here), and comparisons and contrasts with other reviews elsewhere of the same book make for interesting reading!

Review in Under the Radar

Having long been an admirer of Jane Commane's project at Nine Arches Press, having read at the launch of Issue One of its magazine, Under the Radar, and having witnessed its steady growth into excellent full collections since then, I'm especially pleased to report that a lovely review of The Knives of Villalejo has just been published in the latest issue of the afore-mentioned mag.

I'm grateful to Jane Commane, to Maria Taylor (the reviews editor at Under the Radar) and, of course, to the reviewer herself, Deborah Tyler-Bennett, for these generous words about my first full collection:

"...Matthew Stewart's...poems were, for me, moving, sensual and poignant with a rare poetic outcome, at least for this reader - they made me want to go and cook..."

Out-of-body experiences, Maria Taylor's Instructions for making me

If I liked Maria Taylor’s first full collection, Melanchrini (Nine Arches Press, 2012), I love her new pamphlet, Instructions for making me (HappenStance Press, 2016). She has somehow made the almost impossible leap from being a very good poet to being an outstanding one. The question is how.

At first sight, Maria Taylor’s verse can seem disconcertingly heterogeneous. In fact, even the blurb on the back cover to this pamphlet states “There’s no telling what she’ll do from one poem to the next, which is one of the things that makes reading her such a pleasure”. Of course, the potential drawback is we might also consequently struggle to come to identify Taylor’s work. Even in the space of the seventeen poems that make up the chapbook, she employs numerous different forms and deals with all sorts of thematic concerns. And yet, somehow, it all hangs together. These days, I immediately recognise a Maria Taylor poem when I encounter one in a journal, long before spotting her name at the bottom.

So what is the specific aspect that Taylor has most developed since Melanchrini? What element makes her poetry different? Well, it was already present and discernible in certain poems from her full collection, but it’s becoming her defining quality and shines throughout this pamphlet: I’m referring to her knack for out-of-body experiences. It’s now more surefooted and powerful than in the past, as in the following example from “Hypothetical”:

“A friend of mine asks if I’d sleep with Daniel Craig.

Before I have time to answer, I’m in bed with Daniel Craig…”

... and from “The Invisible Man”…

“My daughter pushes

The invisible man on a swing

under the apple tree.

I’ve know him for years.

I recognise him by the dust motes.

I ask him out. He stood me up…”

and from “My Stranger”…

…He’s the only stranger I can afford,

a middle-aged man in a plaid shirt

smiling for an artist. Nothing to me,

but I still hang him in the hallway

and call him “Dad”…”

Taylor’s primary underlying technique and concern is the nature of self, the blending of identities, the interweaving of voices, the merging of fact and fiction through ever-shifting perspectives, never allowing the reader to rest on solid ground. The result is verse that’s laden with highly specific intensity and insight, all this in language that flows naturally and never seems forced. Sentences, expressions and line-ending are inevitable yet surprising.

Pamphlets between collections are often under-reviewed and under-read. Maria Taylor’s Instructions for making me deserves an opposite fate. It’s a pivotal landmark in her development, our chance to encounter a set of poems that have her unique stamp running through them. They show us a poet who’s hitting her stride and reaching maturity. Her second full collection will be a mouth-watering prospect, but in the meantime we have these delicious morsels to relish. 

Maria Taylor in The Manchester Review

Maria Taylor's first collection, Melanchrini (Nine Arches Press, 2012), was excellent. However, she's stepped up her game still further since its publication. These days, there's an immediate surge of anticipaton whenever I spot a new poem by her in a journal. Moreover, her work has developed to such an extent that it's now highly distinctive in texture, tone and emotional impact.

For all the above reasons, I very much recommend you read her two pieces in Issue 15 of  The Manchester Review. While you're there, why not also have a look at other excellent poems by the likes of Roy Marshall and John North?

Roy Marshall and The Sun Bathers

I met Roy Marshall for the first time at a HappenStance reading back in 2011. Maria Taylor introduced me to him and mentioned he was one of the winners of the Crystal Clear Creators pamphlet competition. We shared a couple of beers that night and I was immediately struck by his terrific passion for poetry. At that stage, he'd just started a blog and had also got a few initial acceptances from small magazines.

Roy Marshall published the pamphlet, titled Gopagilla, not long afterwards, and I gave it an excellent review here on Rogue Strands, mentioning that "Gopagilla is a satisfying and poetically coherent first pamphlet. It delivers a lot and promises even more. I very much look forward to reading more of Roy Marshall's poetry in the future."  However, he didn't stop there. Let's fast-forward four years. Not only has he won several prizes for individual poems and had acceptances from many of the U.K.'s leading magazines, but he's also published a full-length collection, titled The Sun Bathers, with Shoestring Press.

And then this last week came the best part: The Sun Bathers has been shortlisted for the Michael Murphy Memorial Prize alongside books from major players such as Bloodaxe. This is terrific news, not just for Marshall but for other late starters, for those that have taken alternative routes, for small publishers who believe in a poet and back their work to the hilt.

In short, congratulations, Roy! Oh, and while I'm about it, I very much recommend a visit to that afore-mentioned blog. It's packed with poetic tales, interviews and original verse. What's more, I've suddenly realised it's somehow still not on my Blog List to the right of this poet. Time to put that right...

Poets and their games

One could argue that poetry itself is a game. Many poems certainly play games with their readers, and poets often use games as a metaphor: Paul Farley's piece on Monopoly is a personal favourite. Other genres, meanwhile, also get involved: Julio Cortazar has a terrific novel called Rayuela (Hopscotch), which invites the reader to tackle it in one of two ways - as a linear progression from start to finish or by playing hopscotch, jumping from one chapter to another as per his instructions. The concept's brilliant, but the execution is better.

Very much in that tradition, Maria Taylor has an intriguing set of poetry bingo cards out from HappenStance Press. The website explains them as follows:

"These cards (essential apparatus for readings and festivals) will encourage completely the wrong sort of concentration, possibly even an inappropriate response (BINGO!).

The set of four different cards can also fulfil a useful slot in terms of entertaining postcards for poetry friends. A5 in size, they contain the key words on the back as well as plenty of space to scribble messages, poems or aphorisms.

In terms of extreme left-field writing, each card is a poem in itself."

I'd not only pay good money for the cards themselves (three quid, see the link here), but even better money to be in the audience while certain poets played with them!

Maria Taylor on Tasting Notes

Over at her Commonplace blog, Maria Taylor has written very generously about Tasting Notes. You can read her post here.

Review: Melanchrini, by Maria Taylor

Maria Taylor is a poet with a keen sense of identity. By that, I don't mean that she's fond of attaching labels to herself. In fact, the opposite is true - she's only too aware of the shifting, ambiguous nature of identity, and her verse does an excellent job of exploring its vagaries.

Her first full collection is titled Melanchrini (Nine Arches Press, 2012), in itself a word - meaning "dark-featured young woman" - that hints at one of the book's main concerns. This is British poetry with a Greek Cypriot background. Copellas and levandes are juxtaposed with a park off the Uxbridge road, Pebble Mill and a dance at the Palais Hall.

Taylor explores the co-existence in her upbringing of two languages, two cultures and two set of social attitudes. At times, her husband is "English", at others "englezo", his acceptance into her family under scrutiny, as she portrays the blending and clashing of British and Cypriot ways of life. This double perspective undoubtedly enriches Taylor's writing, enabling her to write about both countries with a critical eye. She acts simultaneously as an insider and outsider.

The extra counterpoint is crucial to the development of Taylor's skill at exploring the ambiguous qualities of identity as mentioned above. In that respect, Kin is a key piece:

"...You won't need a passport or papers,
there will be a glint in your eyes
which is recognised or understood...

...remember
there was no second or third country,
just a place where people came from,
where once before maybe you did too."

This poem begins in an authorative tone, identity being clearly above mere documents. By the end, Taylor is purposely undermining all that came previously. The "maybe" of the final line is reminiscient of the "almost" of Larkin's An Arundel Tomb.

Melanchrini stands out among first collections for its coherence. Maria Taylor's achievement lies in having generated a deeply personal thematic and poetic drive that runs throughout the book. I very much recommend it.

Maria Taylor's first collection

Maria Taylor's first collection, titled Melanchrini, is now available on the Nine Arches Press website. You can read an extract and purchase a copy here.

I first met Maria last year when we read together at a Nine Arches Shindig in Leicester, and I very much enjoyed listening to her work. Bearing in mind my own interest in identity and belonging as channelled throughout nationality and upbringing, I was especially drawn to the way she wove together her Greek-Cypriot background and U.K. based life. Melanchini will definitely be on my summer reading list!

Crystal Clear Creators

I met Jonathan and Maria Taylor, the driving forces behind Crystal Clear Creators, when they jointly organised (along with Nine Arches Press) the reading at which I launched Inventing Truth in Leicester last April. Their enthusiasm was clear from the start, as was the quality of their magazine, Hearing Voices. In fact, I was delighted when my first poems since my pamphlet appeared in Issue 4 a few months ago.

However, Crystal Clear Creators are now taking a further major step with their  "Crystal Pamphlets," a new series of individually-authored chapbooks, published 1 March 2012, by Roy Marshall, Charles G Lauder Jr, Aly Stoneman, Jessica Mayhew, Hannah Stevens and Andrew "Mulletproof" Graves. They look great, and you can see the covers on the Crystal Clear Creators website here. Of the six poets, I'm most familiar with Roy's work in magazines, and very much look forward to seeing how his verse shapes up in the format of a pamphlet.

The collections will be launched  on Friday 2nd March, 6-7.30pm, at De Montfort University, Leicester. I won't be able to make it there from Spain, but I wish all involved every success. This is another example of the emergence of a dynamic new paper-based poetry publisher in the U.K. - terrific news!

Last week

Last week saw a 2-0 win for Aldershot Town over Maidenhead United, plus two terrific readings in London and Nottingham. In other words, I had a great trip!

I'm very grateful to Declan Ryan for organising the Days of Roses event in London last Thursday, where my personal highlight was Rory Waterman's reading of some excellent new work - I'm really looking forward to his first collection from Carcanet next year. In the meantime, however, I've made do with a copy of the New Poetries V anthology, which features a good selection of his poems.

As for Nottingham, meanwhile, thanks are due to Robin Vaughan-Williams for bringing it together. It was a great opportunity to meet up with a number of other Happenstance poets and see Helena Nelson read for the first time. "Enthralling" would be an understatement! Maria Taylor, who has a full collection forthcoming next year from Nine Arches Press, has posted a review of the evening on her blog here. I'm especially pleased with her remarks about my own slot:

It was great to hear Matthew again, as I so enjoyed his pamphlet ‘Inventing Truth.’ He has a deeply engaging style. He read his poem ‘Instructions for Coming Home’ at the beginning and end of his reading. The perspective altered when he mentioned at the end that the poem was written from the point of view of a widower, the preparation of a simple meal is given a certain gravity by the final line ‘Now confront the day, bite by bite.’

These readings have certainly given me the taste for more - I love the feeling of bringing Inventing Truth to life for an audience - and I hope to take part in further U.K. events in 2012.

Edinburgh launch and Leicester reading

I'm heading down to Seville tomorrow morning to catch a flight over to the U.K., ready to enjoy a couple of days with my parents and then two extremely promising nights packed with poetry.

This coming Sunday (17th April) I'll be launching Inventing Truth in Edinburgh at "Poetry at the...", reading alongside Steven Waling and Ryan Van Winkle. The three of us should represent a pretty broad spectrum and range of poetic approaches, so I'm really looking forward to the evening and am grateful to Rob Mac for offering me the chance to take part. The venue is The Store (formerly the GRV), 35 Guthrie St, Edinburgh (just off Chambers St) from 7.45-9.45pm. Entry £4.00, concessions £3. What's more, I gather I'll even get the chance to meet Helena Nelson, my editor at Happenstance, for the first time!

Meanwhile, the following evening (Monday 18th April) should see me in Leicester. Nine Arches Press have kindly asked me to appear at their Shindig! with Matt Merritt, Maria Taylor and Kathleen Bell. I've long looked forward to hearing Matt read, so it's a real pleasure to participate in an event with him. The venue in this case is The Western on Western Road. Entry's free and proceedings are scheduled to begin at 7.30 p.m..

It would be great to meet any readers of this blog who could get to either event!