What does Carl Tomlinson say?
It's hard to remember a time when poetry didn't delight me. I'm enchanted by the possibilities of language ...
Archive
What does Bruno Cooke say?
While studying Comparative Literature at Queen Mary University of London I regularly performed on the spoken word circuit in London, competed in poetry slams ...
What does Hilary Menos say?
I like poetry that keeps the lid on AND lets the pig out ...
What does Chris Edgoose say?
I've enjoyed poetry since studying it at school — the War Poets and Elizabeth Jennings left a particular impression ...
What does Maggie Mackay say?
I found poetry through the Open University creative writing courses which I studied after retirement from teaching ...
I’ll Know I’ve Made It When Going to a LongHorn Steakhouse on a Sunday Evening in the Dead of Winter Doesn’t Depress the Hell Out of Me
by Christine Naprava — There’s tremendous hurt / in knowing / that in this booth / I will never be complete.
What does Charlotte Gann say?
I loved it studying English at school. I remember being cast as First Voice in Under Milk Wood in the school play ...
What does Steven Lovatt say?
How did I get into poetry? Externally, having librarians for parents helped. Temperamentally it’s more complicated ...
What does Rory Waterman say?
At primary school, we had a teacher who encouraged us to write poems, and I realised I was relatively good at putting words into action ...
Everything You Always Wanted To Know
by Mark Granier — At 15, I found Burt Reynolds in my mothers bed, / stowed under her pillow in a Cosmo centrefold. // Impossibly hairy, recumbent on a bearskin rug
Poems of witness
Emma Simon reviews The Underlook by Helen Seymour (Smith|Doorstop, 2021) and The Thoughts by Sarah Barnsley (Smith|Doorstop, 2021)
Castaway Companions
Castaway poet Sarah Wimbush chooses poems by Ted Hughes, Liz Berry and Paul Bentley to take to a desert island