One Night Stanzas

Idris Goodwin (writer, performer, teacher, idea man) on the truth about poetry:

“Actually, everybody loves poetry. They’re listening to poetry on their iPods. They spout poetry on the basketball court. They watch poetry on their television. A lot of people don’t realize that poetry is all around them. Poetry is the root of all forms of non-literal expression. But most people don’t think about it this way.”

via Facebook.

(Photo by SReed99342)

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I did a big post of this ilk last year — basically a TiLT on the grand scale, saying “thanks” for all the cool stuff that happened in my life in 2008. It got a great response from all of you, and some of you even followed suit and made your own lists, which I loved reading. So without further ado, here’s my love-letter to 2009. In 2009, I…

* Started up my own small press, Read This Press, and have so far produced four chapbooks: Skin Deep: An Anthology of Poems on Tattoos and Tattooing; You Old Soak: Poems by Chris Lindores; Sharks Don’t Sleep: Poems by Eric Hamilton; and Masters: an anthology of poems by the University of Edinburgh Creative Writing MSc Poetry Class of 2009.

* Was nominated for the Scottish Variety Young Scottish Writer Of The Year Award.

* Kept Read This Magazine going throughout its second year — now plotting a total overhaul to (hopefully) turn it into a far superior publication!

* Started making recycled and upcycled jewellery out of a variety of bits and pieces (but mostly typewriter keys) in order to financially support Read This Press somewhat. I have now found that I love doing this, and set up shop.

* Helped my friend Stefa to set up the this collection project — a collaborative project designed to bring together poets and filmmakers. It’s still in the works so watch this space!

* Celebrated my 23rd birthday by moving flats (yes, I am insane) — I relocated from Edinburgh’s very central Grassmarket to Stockbridge, a little community on the outskirts of the New Town. It feels like living inside a Shirley Hughes book, I love it!

* Went to StAnza Festival for the first time, to see the tall lighthouse poets, Kevin Cadwallender, Alan Gillis, and attend a talk on young Scottish poets. All good stuff!

* Went on my first writerly retreat on the shores of Loch Tay with my MSc classmates.

* Read at five nights of the Utter! PBH Free Fringe Poetry Festival and two nights of the Underword PBH Free Fringe Poetry Festival, as part of the 2009 Edinburgh International Festival.

* Read at the Edinburgh International Book Festival 2009

* Also read at: The Bowery Book Club, VoxBox, The Golden Hour, The Golden Hour Book 2 official launch, and a bunch of other places.

* Took up the post of Residency and Education Director at the London Poetry Festival and helped to organise readers and visitors for the 2009 festival.

* Celebrated One Night Stanzas’ first birthday.

* Set up a second shop to get rid of some of my huge vintage clothing collection: Edinburgh Vintage

* Continued my work as a Lecturer in Literature and Communications at Telford College, and did some freelance English and Creative Writing tutoring in my spare time.

* Graduated from my MSc in Creative Writing with distinction, and celebrated by going for high tea at the Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh.

* Started my PhD in Creative Writing and Contemporary Scottish Poetry — if anyone has any info on William Burrough’s stay in Haddington or the Edinburgh Beat scene, let me know!

* Took Read This Press to the StAnza Poetry Market, the Scottish Poetry Library By Leaves We Live fair and the National Library of Scotland Christmas Poetry Pamphlet Fair.

* Started working on a super-top-secret but absolutely huge poetry project… I can’t wait to share it with you!

Magazine publications in 2009: Tontine, Issue 15 // Moloch, Issue 3 // Veto Magazine // Thirteen Myna Birds // The Glasgow Review // The Clearfield Review // Form.Reborn // Stop Buying Stuff // The Cadaverine // a handful of stones // The Chimaera // Tattoosday // Oxypoet // Trespass // Anything Anymore Anywhere // Umbrella

Other publications in 2009:
The Scottish Poetry Library’s 20 Best Scottish Poets of 2008 Anthology // The Scottish Poetry Library’s 20 Best Scottish Poets of 2009 Anthology (forthcoming) // 5Px2: An anthology of poetry in English and Italian // StAnza Festival’s Homecoming Haiku anthology // The Golden Hour Book Vol. 2 // Poetcasting Podcast for Pomeranate Magazine // Edinburgh College Of Art’s “DUO” anthology (collaboration with artist Lizzie Stuart) // Poetry Podcast for the Scottish Poetry Library // Poetry Podcast for Anon Magazine (under “Day 4”) // Vicious Verses and Reanimated Rhymes: Zany Zombie Poetry for the Undead Head // Edinburgh & South East Scotland: A New Edinburgh Travel Guide, ed. Vivien Devlin // The London Poetry Pearl Anthology // The Positivity Blog, // The Secret Society of List Addicts

(Image by Esther Aarts)

Don’t forget to visit The Read This Store, and its sister store, Edinburgh Vintage!

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Well, you’ve all done a marvellous job, putting up with me these past few weeks while I’ve angsted and carped on about my first ever book project, Skin Deep. I’m really proud to say that it’s all paid off — the book came off the presses at Forest today and it is officially amazing, even if I do say so myself.

Every copy is lovingly handmade — the covers are 200gsm cardstock with black endpapers. The contents are printed on high quality 80gsm paper and the whole thing is bound and finished off with a sweet red ribbon bookmark. When you open the book the first thing you get to is the stunning foreword — I was really honoured to have tattooed goddess and internet superstar Ms Gala Darling on board to write it. Sneak preview here…

Once you get inside the book itself, you’ll find brilliant poems from Kim Addonizio (I was overwhelmed when I received a submission from this lady!), Lucy Baker, Kevin Cadwallender, Dave Coates, Morganne Couch, Drew, Eric Hamilton, Aiko Harman, Natalia Herrero, Jason Monios, Roxanne Paris, Lauren Pope, William Soule, Christian Ward, Noel Williams and Juliet M Wilson. There is also a contribution from tattoo expert Marisa DiMattia — another person I was very pleased to hear from!

Basically, the book is fabulous, and I want to thank absolutely everyone who got involved with submissions, suggestions and offers of help — Read This Press loves you, you are part of this very cool book. You don’t have to take my word for it when it comes to the quality and loveliness… there’s more information over at our Etsy store, and you can grab yourselves a copy there if you fancy it.

If you do order a copy, I hope you love reading it as much as I loved making it!

(Photos from my Flickr!)

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So guys, if you’ve been following this blog with any kind of regularity, you’ll know that I am a HUGE believer in the power of positive thinking — and KARMA! I genuinely reckon that if you focus on the positives and make time to say thanks for the breaks the Universe hands you, you’ll not only be happier, you’ll automatically get more of those good breaks. Call me insane if you want, but this is the thinking behind my Things I Love Thursday posts… and here’s some “thanks, Universe”-thinking on the grand scale. This is basically my Things I Love 2008 list, so without further ado, here goes! IN 2008, I…

— Wrote a huge, spiralling dissertation on the early works of poet and personal guru Allen Ginsberg… which got a first!

— Became a tutor of English, Creative Writing and Drama, and had the priviledge of guiding nine smart, sweet and talented young people from bad grades to brilliance in the space of one academic term… I was so, so proud of them all.

— Won three writing prizes: The Grierson Verse Prize, The Sloan Prize for Writing in Lowland Scots Vernacular, and the Lewis Edwards Award for Poetry… totalling £1,900.

— Performed at my first ever poetry reading… in front of a room full of terrifying academics at the University of Edinburgh!

— Went on to do a huge tour of the Edinburgh poetry readings, appearing at Poetry at the Great Grog, Golden Hour (twice!), MeadowsFest, the Scottish Arts Club, Voxbox and the West Port Book Festival.

— Turned 22 and celebrated at my sister’s house in Newcastle (Italian food, pub, vintage stores, late night chattering), then went on holiday with The Boy to a tiny remote cottage on the plateau above Scarborough, cold, windy, wild and amazing.

— Kept my literary magazine running, celebrated the first six months with a huge and fabulous poetry reading

— Sat my final exams

— Started learning the art of poi!

— Spent a sweet long weekend in the Lake District with The Boy, exploring bookstores, drinking great beer, buying records and crazying about on open top buses.

— Attended a huge end-of-degree bash at which all my tutors got riotously drunk and several risked some serious impropriety! Hilarious!

— Graduated with Honours from my MA in English Literature… dress-buying, first haircut in seven years (!!), robe fittings, huge ceremony in the devastatingly grand McEwen Hall, photoshoot, afternoon tea at the Balmoral Hotel, sunset champagne on the beach = the. best. day. ever.

— Went to see the amazing Mr Eric Clapton at a one-off gig in the grounds of Harewood House… a beautiful balmy summer evening, The Boy and his lovely Dad at my side, a beer in my hand, and 200,000 other crazy fans all singing along… perfect.

— Spent a month living in Victoria, Canada with my Boy. I met the beautiful and talented Miriam Parker, swam in the Pacific Ocean, slept under the stars in a field full of elk, ate the most amazing food, drank loads of great beer, got tattooed for the first time (and started a lifelong love affair, I reckon!), read a huge stack of books, wrote some great poems, loved every minute.

— Went on an awesome road-trip / caravanning extravanagza with my poet besties… campfires, castles, hiking, lake-paddling, beer-drinking, marshmallow-toasting, song-writing, poem-writing, mixtape-making, open-top-bus-riding, up-late-staying loveliness.

— Won the William Sharpe Hunter Memorial Scholarship for Creative Writing… worth £4600!

— Was Poet in Residence at the 4th Annual London Poetry Festival; read at and compered the event for a run of three nights.

— Made my first ever trip to London (really!); spent a long weekend there with my sister, being crazy on the Tube, bouncing on hotel beds, eating sandwiches and being mobbed by pigeons, exploring Leicester Square and falling in love with Camden Town.

— Enrolled (thanks to the scholarship!) on the University of Edinburgh’s MSc in Creative Writing.

— Set up my own blog (you’re reading it) with loads of support, brilliant submissions, great reviews and incredible reader-contributions. I love you guys so so much! Thank you!!

— Teamed up with gorgeous artist Lizzy Stewart for the “Two Heads” creative writing/illustration project… more info soon!

— Was interviewed by Jim! Hardest interview questions EVER, but worth it!

— Worked as a Poetry Terrorist for the opening week of the Scottish Poetry Library’s Scottish Poetry Gardens.

— Spent Halloween stalking the Newcastle suburbs dressed at Medusa, alongside Black Frost, Sweeney Todd and a very vampish Helena Bonham-Carter!

— Celebrated the first birthday of Read This in huge style with an amazing poetry-and-music bash and a special, beautiful anniversary issue!

— Watched on in joy and with huge pride (up until 6am, and so worth it!) to see Barack Obama elected as President of the United States.

— Watched on in further joy as the truly legendary Lewis Hamilton became the first black Formula 1 Champion, the youngest ever Formula 1 champion, and basically the luckiest ever Formula 1 champion… nail biting! (yep… closet motorsport geek!)

— Became Poetry Co-ordinator for forthcoming poetry-and-film festival “this collection.”

— Was employed as a Fiction Reader for the James Tait Black Memorial Prize… a stack of free books to read, and paid to do it? Hells yeah!

— Was offered a book deal by the lovely Kevin Cadwallender of Red Squirrel Press… and accepted! My first collection will be available soon! Eeee!

Publications in 2008: Pomegranate Issue 3 // The Journal // The Herald Newspaper // Poet’s Letter Magazine // The Delinquent Issue 5 // Dash Literary Journal Issue 1 // Snakeskin, May ’08 // The 4th Annual London Poetry Festival website The Edinburgh Review 123 // Scottish Poetry Library Reading Room // Poetry News Summer ’08 // Gloom Cupboard Issue 43 // Bottom of the World Issue One // Textualities // Bolts of Silk // BBC Radio Scotland: Days of our Lives // Poetry Scotland Issue 57 // Spark Bright Issue 1 // The Positivity Blog a handful of stones // The Scottish Poetry Library’s 20 Best Poems of 2008 Anthology

I seriously recommend that you make a huge long list of all the cool stuff you’ve done in the past year. It can be something as trivial as writing a poem you were really proud of or something as massive as winning the lottery. Everyone’s list is different but we all have things to celebrate and be thankful for… so try it! It’s seriously cathartic!
(and, of course, link back if you can. I am Little Miss Nosy!)

(Photo by panic-embryo)

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For those of you who have just arrived, this is an advice blog. I use it to help young and confused writers with everything from writing a cover letter and submitting to magazines to protecting their work from copyright theft and dealing with rejection. However, I’m not the only one out there who wants to help you guys with your writing, reading and publishing… so I’ve been scouring books, magazines, blogs and sites to find the best advice from poets, writers and industry insiders. Check it out!

On writing and publishing:

“More often than not in poetry I find difficulty to be gratuitous and show-offy and camouflaging, experimental to a kind of insane degree—a difficulty which really ignores the possibility of having a sensible reader.” – Billy Collins

“The impulse to write has to do with making something, with capturing, recording, preserving, honouring, saving…” – Sharon Olds

“I wish I was better at ignoring praise and criticism in equal measure. I’d be a better poet.” – Anonymous, from Magma magazine.

“The first draft of anything is shit” – Ernest Hemingway.

“Follow the submission guidelines. To the letter.” – from Happenstance Press‘ “Dos and Don’ts”.

“Keep resending! I had one poem accepted on the 15th attempt.” – Tim Love

“Today there are thousands of poetry blogs – ranging from the completely serious to the completely not. It provides for a more effective & diverse way for poets to discuss matters of direct interest to one another without going through the funneling influence of an academic review process… This is really an absolute necessity.” – Ron Silliman

“Sooner or later, if you don’t give up and you have some measurable amount of ability or talent or luck, you get published.” – Neil Gaiman

“Be ambitious for your poems. Aim to make them better and better and better. As good as you can get them in a lifetime.” – from Happenstance Press‘ “Dos and Don’ts”.

“Poems are not easy to start, and they’re not easy to finish… But I’d say the hardest part is not writing.” – Billy Collins

“f I had to give young writers advice, I would say don’t listen to writers talking about writing or themselves.” – Lillian Hellman

“There’s little point sending to [major book publishers] unless you have won some major competitions and/or have appeared in some major magazines. Even then, it may well be better to try a smaller publisher first.” – Tim Love

“Don’t give up hope. If you believe in your writing, keep on reading and developing your skills. Keep on building your profile. Spread your enthusiasm.” – Chris Hamilton-Emery of Salt Publishing.

“Once it’s done, to put it away until you can read it with new eyes… When you’re ready, pick it up and read it, as if you’ve never read it before. If there are things you aren’t satisfied with as a reader, go in and fix them as a writer: that’s revision.” – Neil Gaiman

On poetry readings:

“Turn up at writers events. Be seen. There are quite a few free or reasonable events. Be seen buying books!” – Sally Evans of Poetry Scotland.

“[Poetry readings provide] companionship. And pleasure: musical pleasure, in hearing it… And recognition: ‘Someone else has felt what I’ve felt.’ And surprise: ‘I never thought of that.'” – Sharon Olds

“At a poetry reading you get one shot at it and it’s never enough.” – Jim Murdoch

“I hate when poets over-read [at poetry readings]. Anyone can time themselves reading (including intros and asides). It does them no good as the audience become first bored then annoyed. Better to leave them wanting a little more.” – Anonymous, from Magma magazine.

“It’s an unnatural act, getting up in front of a crowd of people. It’s what a lot of nightmares are made of, whether your pants have fallen down or not.” – Billy Collins

“In the States they have a term, Poetry Sluts. These are people who leave after they’ve read their own poems and aren’t polite enough to stay for the others [at the reading].” – Anonymous, from Magma magazine.

On dealing with your fellow poets:

“It’s hard to give out negative comments…without generating a lot of ad hominen tsouris [without sounding prejudicial and causing upset] in return. There are so many good books of poetry, that I see very little need…to focus on the negative.” – Ron Silliman

“Don’t give loudly critical opinions of other poets. It’s not possible to be objective, as we’re all competitors in some respect. And it sets you up for a helping of the same.” – Anonymous, from Magma magazine.

“The world of poetry can be a bear pit, and like any industry it is competitive and has moments of confrontation and even dirty tricks. Be prepared to take some knocks along the way.” – Chris Hamilton-Emery of Salt Publishing

“Never write ill of anyone. It will come home to roost.” – Sally Evans of Poetry Scotland

“The writer’s job is not to judge, but to seek to understand.” – Ernest Hemingway

“Courtesy gets your name remembered. You want your name to be remembered. You want to be a person, not just print on a page.” – from Happenstance Press‘ “Dos and Don’ts”.

“It’s so easy to sneer, so easy… [but] much better to just get on and DO something, WRITE something.” – Rachel Fox

Other stuff to read:
Find more advice from Ernest Hemingway at The Positivity Blog.
There are more words of wisdom from Ron Silliman here, and on his brilliant blog.
Billy Collins offers up more poetry know-how here and here.

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