John Donne: Poetry in the Cathedral

Queue outsie St. Paul's for the John Donne event

Watching St. Paul’s cathedral fill up with an estimated one thousand five hundred people for John Donne was a very special moment indeed!

Last night was Poet in the City’s biggest event to date, and it couldn’t have been in a more spectacular surrounding than under the dome of St. Paul’s cathedral, in the presence of John Donne’s effigy: the only item to survive the great fire of London in 1666.

With beautiful readings of John Donne’s poetry and sermons by actors Rosalie Jorda and Tom Deveson; illuminating talks from poet Jo Shapcott, Canon Treasurer Mark Oakley, and professors Peter McCullough and Mary Morrissey; and Benjamin Britten’s settings of Donne’s sonnets performed by world-class singer and Director of Music at St. Paul’s, Andrew Carwood, we were truly immersed into the life and work of this great poet.

In all of their talks, the speakers refuted the clear division that is often made between ‘Jack Donne’, young author of erotic and sensual poetry, and ‘Dr. Donne’, Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral and writer of sermons and spiritual poems. In both his earlier and later writings you encounter the same fierce intellect and passion for language. Mark Oakley also gave a very honest talk on what John Donne means to him as a fellow clergy member at St. Paul’s, drawing on Donne’s own admissions of the inner conflicts and uncertainties of being a priest, including being easily distracted from prayer: “I neglect God for the buzzing of a fly, for the creaking of a door, for the rattle of a coach in the street”.

The whole evening was made extra special by the setting itself: watching the light gradually change as the sun set outside, in one of London’s most magnificent buildings, and looking up at the spectacular dome.

The writer Arnold Bennet once claimed that poetry could “empty buildings that had been full”. With around 1,500 people turning up to St. Paul’s for a poetry event last night, I think we proved him wrong!

Disease, infanticide, and pest control…why do we love a dark fairytale?

Everybody loves a fairytale. They have been reinterpreted again and again in poems, books, and films. And just a quick look at what’s coming out at the cinema – Mirror Mirror, Grimm, Snow White and the Huntsman – proves that there is a real appetite for the darker side of fairytales.

On the surface, Robert Browning’s Pied Piper is a lively, rhyming poem for children, with a cautionary note at the end, to “keep our promise” if we offer anyone payment. It’s hardly the most gruesome of fairytales, yet the ending is devastating. An entire city robbed of its children – apart from one lame child who couldn’t keep up.

If fairytales are a way of confronting social or psychological fears, as has often been suggested, then what is the Pied Piper about? Mass death of children, a charismatic figure, rats, disease…

One theory is that the tale is inspired by The Children’s Crusade – itself a dubious historical event in which a young visionary boy leads a group of children on a crusade, expecting the sea to part for them when they reach the Adriatic. When it doesn’t, they accept a ride from a merchant ship and are instead sold into slavery. While modern historians argue that the ‘children’ may actually have been bands of wandering poor from France and Germany, who found their way to eastern Europe, the Crusade tale is a powerful and tragic one. And it also explains the version of the Pied Piper that has the children reappearing to populate Transylvania.

Robert Browning’s version of the Pied Piper was published in 1842. This was a time of high infant mortality rates, overcrowded cities, mass poverty, and rife diseases such as typhus and cholera. The idea of an entire city losing its population of children would have been a very imaginable fear.

Monday’s Robert Browning and the Pied Piper event will delve into the history and social context behind this disturbing tale, with a line up of writers, professors, and of course the wonderful actress Harriet Walter reading the poem. As well as 2012 being Robert Browning’s bicentenary it is also the octocentenary of the Children’s Crusade, so it’s the perfect year for exploring dark tales of mass infanticide…

The story continues to resonate today. I came across a creepy video that likens the Pied Piper to Hitler, putting Browning’s words to videos of the Hitler youth….

On a lighter note, I asked Rentokill yesterday if they would like to promote our event. They very firmly said no and told me that they are always getting people ringing them up about the Pied Piper!!!

Tickets are £9.50 and can be purchased via www.kingsplace.co.uk

The Perils of Public Art

Two weeks ago I found myself utterly inspired by Poet in the City’s ‘Writing on the Wall’ series at Camberwell College of Art and Design, exploring the relationship between poetry and art. As an avid admirer of both poetry and visual art, this is something I’m particularly interested in, and all three events provided thoughtful insights into how these two art forms can interact.

So I was particularly upset when I heard the news that Gordon Young – the acclaimed public artist who spoke at our first event – recently had part of his Comedy Carpet destroyed by Blackpool Council due to its proximity to the tramline. The Comedy Carpet, which featured quotes from over 1,000 comedians and comedy writers, stood below Blackpool Tower and took Gordon Young four years to make. The council didn’t even consult Gordon before ruining his work, although they are now working with the artists to resolve the issue.

At Fragments: Text Based Art, the first of our ‘Writing on the Wall’ events, we heard from both Gordon Young and Sue Hubbard, a poet and art critic known for her public poems. Sue Hubbard is no stranger to having her work destroyed by public authorities, as her celebrated poem, ‘Eurydice’, displayed in the underpass between Waterloo and the Imax, was painted over by Network Rail in a bid to ‘clean up’ the tunnel in 2009. Thankfully, after an online campaign the much loved poem has now finally been restored.

It seems to me that these incidents are just examples of the huge undervaluing of public art. Gordon Young even observed that, while in the rest of Europe he is considered an artist, in the UK he is only ever invited to speak as a ‘designer’. Yet in both their talks, Sue Hubbard and Gordon Young demonstrated that public art can do something that art displayed in a gallery cannot. Public art is unexpected; it can take the viewer by surprise, trip them up, and make them view their surroundings differently. Whereas you only encounter art in a gallery or poetry in a book if you decide to.

I also feel that there is an important difference between simply displaying a poem or a piece of writing in a public place, and creating a work specifically for that place. In her public poems, Sue Hubbard carefully considers the space before writing the poems, resulting in a creative interplay between words and setting. (See her poems set in windows.) Gordon Young’s work also reflects a strong sense of place, and the incredible furore surrounding his Cursing Stone in Carlisle – on which is inscribed a medieval curse by an Archbishop on the local Border families – is evidence of the impact that public art can have when it has a close relationship with the place in which it is displayed.

I was lucky enough to get the chance to interview both speakers before the event, and you can hear them elaborate further on the relationship between text and public art on our audio page. I think good quality public art can play an important role in the community, particularly if it is challenging and not merely decorative – so it’s shocking to see how little public art is valued when it comes to local authority decisions.

Tagore: a myriad-minded man

As part of the New Audience’s series, I was excited to put together an event on Rabindranath Tagore,  the Nobel laureate poet, writer, philosopher who was the ambassador of Indian culture to the rest of the world. Safina Akram, a Poet in the City volunteer, kindly wrote about her experience of the event:

A glimpse into the depths of Rabindranath Tagore’s mind, work and life was very successfully explored on Monday the 26^th of March 2012, at Poet in the City’s event on Tagore in partnership with Network Bangla and Clyde and Co.

In the sumptuous surroundings of the St Botolph Building, with a magnificent view of the London skyline in the background, Sulthana Begum, Chair of New Audiences for Poet in the City, introduced the evening’s entertainment to a packed room where every seat was occupied.

Senjuti Das and Aindrila Ghosh opened the event, dancing to ‘Nrityero Taale Taale, Hey Nataraj’, a song by Tagore, and mesmerising and transporting the audience to another place, another time through the music, the lyrics and the dance.

Tagore’s varied abilities were highlighted by Dr Kalyan Kundu, Chair Person of the Tagore Centre UK, an organisation engaged in promoting the works of Tagore in the UK and beyond.  In his informative, biographical talk, Dr Kundu showed how the range and extent of Tagore’s works was breathtaking and included music, poetry, painting and even political, social and educational work.  It was inevitable then that Tagore would receive the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Anna Perera, author of the critically acclaimed Guantanamo Boy, brought a personal story to the evening’s event by recounting the effect of finding Rabindranath Tagore’s signature in her father’s birthday book. She also explored Tagore’s interest in educating the whole child, using creativity and the imagination before reciting some of Tagore’s poems.

The event came to a close with the popular and often quoted ‘Chitto Jetha Bho Shunya’, ‘Where the mind is without fear’.  This was recited beautifully in both Bengali and English by Senjuti Das while Aindrila Ghosh performed a dance.

Rabindranath Tagore was certainly a myriad-minded man with many talents and abilities. It is no wonder that his work still resounds through the ages and captivates audiences around the world.

It is particularly fitting that we celebrated the work of a Nobel Prize winner, considering we had Seamus Heaney at our Forward Prize event earlier this month and we will also be hosting the Swedish Nobel Prize winner Tomas Tranströmer next month.

Spoken Word: Bringing Words to Life

While lots of people might primarily associate poetry with books and quiet reading, anyone that’s been to a live poetry event will know the joys of hearing it read out loud. So why is Spoken Word any different?

Although I don’t think there is a clear line between poetry, performance poetry, or spoken word, the key difference would have to be in the fact that a spoken word poem is written to be performed. It isn’t spoken word until it’s being spoken. And that’s what makes a spoken word event different from hearing a published poem read aloud at a poetry reading.

So, with this in mind, I’m very excited to be helping Poet in the City set up a Spoken Word event at Waterstones Notting Hill on the 19th April. If the event is a success, we’re hoping to programme a whole series of monthly themed Spoken Word workshops – so please come along and show some support!!

This isn’t the first time Poet in the City have been involved with Spoken Word – as their very successful 2010 Spoken Word All Stars tour shows. But it will be great to have regular spoken word events happening throughout the year, and to work again with some of the amazing artists from the tour.

The event will run as a workshop focusing on performance technique, followed by the opportunity to perform your own poems to the group. It should be a great chance to learn something new, get expert advice, and be inspired by others’ work. For our first event we’re very lucky to have Oneness, who is a fantastic performer and experienced workshop leader, to host the event. Check out her music and videos on her website. The theme will be ‘Bringing Words to Life’ and will focus on taking words from page to performance.

I’m new to spoken word myself, so I’m really interested to see how the workshop runs and what poems people turn up with. And I would love to see the kind of community we’ve had at the Drop-Ins build up around a monthly spoken word night too.

The Spoken Word workshop will take place on Thursday 19th April 2012, at Waterstones, 39-41 Notting Hill Gate, London W11 3JQ

Intrepid Explorers Drop-In

We explored every corner of our blue planet, and into the deep recesses of the human condition we delved. On the 7th February inside Waterstone’s Piccadilly we were all roused from our slumber through a mixture of great poets, young and old, as well as a bit of group participation. Hosted for the second time this year by Mario Petrucci we were glad to see so many new faces.

I’m sorry for the lateness of the list, I lost it. Once again be free to criticise the list and bombard us with any mistakes or omissions. The next drop-in is on the 3rd of April which as you may know is the ‘cruellest month of the year’, so the theme is on cruelty. See you then and thank you for the poetry.

Poems read at the Stone Circles drop-in on 7th February

NOTE: Our next drop-in is on Tuesday 3rd April. The theme is “Cruelty”.

When: Tuesday 3rd April 2012, 6:30pm (wine, browse, chat); 7:00pm (poetry)
Where: Waterstone’s at 203-205 Piccadilly, London, First Floor, Poetry Section
Cost: Free of Charge
RSVP: Phone Waterstone’s 020 7851 2419 or Email events@piccadilly.waterstones.co.uk

Mario Petrucci (host) – Teranauts; Alpha, Beta, Gamma
Joseph Bradsky – A Polar Explorer
Walt Whitman – The Noiseless Patient Spider
TS Elliot – Little Gidding
- East Coker
Syam Rider – Waiting on Mariam
Omar Khahhim – Embrace
Alfonson Rey – Dark Lady
Tim Ades – Lipogram of on Chapman’s Homer
Adran Raul – Sahara
Mehua Mehta – The Price of Dust
Elizabeth Danash – You Should at Times Go Out
Safina Akram – Come away with me this night
Emily Dickinson – Our Journey Had Advanced
Mary Oliver – The Journey
Stuart McNally – Give To The Poor; Burning Croydon
Sue Hubbard – Ghost Station
Elaine Feastum – Tiles Of Lisbon
T.K Page – Clarissa
Keith Douglas – On a Return From Egypt
Murial Nettman – Exploring How To Bring Up Children
John Whiting – The Last Space Tourist
Matthew Sweeney – The Appointment
Ogden Nash – Columbus
Requiem – Robert Louis Stevenson
Stephanie Finlay – Undone By Infidelity
New Year Resolution – Statka
Sir John Franklin – Spills by Lincolnshire

Looking Forward to the Forward celebrations…

I am so sorry for the title of this post. It had to be done.

But apologies aside, I really am excited about the line up we have for next Monday’s event. Celebrating 20 years of the Forward Prize for Poetry – one of the most important poetry prizes in the country – we’ve got some real poetry heavy weights reading for us.

Surely anyone who’s done GCSE or A-Level English must be familiar with Seamus Heaney? Winner of the Forward Prize for Best Collection in 2010, and the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995, Seamus Heaney is one of the biggest names in modern poetry. I certainly remember sitting in a stuffy classroom, revising for my exams, and trying to guess my way past some of the farming terminology! Since leaving school I’ve come to appreciate his poetry more and more, and I hope that hearing him live will shed a different light on his poems for me.

Jackie Kay is another fantastic poet, and winner of the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem in its inaugural year. I saw her reading live for the first time at Poet in the City’s Lost and Found event, marking National Adoption Week, in November. Although I had read some of her poetry before, I wasn’t prepared for how funny she was going to be – being at once thought provoking and hugely entertaining – so I’m very much looking forward to hearing her again on Monday.
(You can listen to an interview with Jackie Kay from the Lost and Found event on our audio page.)

As a previous Forward Prize judge, the acclaimed novelist Sebastian Faulks will be reading poems from some of the late great poets who were past winners of the Forward Prize, including Ted Hughes, Mick Imlah, and Michael Donaghy.

The winners of the Forward Prize for Best First Collection in 2010 and 2011, Hilary Menos and Rachael Boast, will also be reading from their work. They’re both excellent poets, and it’s a great chance to hear a new generation of poets, reading alongside some of the most established names in poetry. (Check out some of their poetry on Hilary Menos’ website and the Guardian first book award page.)

So it’s set to be an evening of some of the best poetry from the past 20 years – the equivalent of the ‘Poetry Oscars’! Most of all I’m hoping it will introduce me to some contemporary poetry that I haven’t come across yet.

The Forward event is taking place from 6.30 pm on Monday 19th March 2012 in Hall One at King’s Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9AG.
Tickets are £9.50 if booked online via www.kingsplace.co.uk