Inpress Newsletter
Synopsis
John Harding remembers Ralph Hodgson's contacts with T.S. Eliot and Mark Thompson presents the life of Danilo Kiš. Anis Shivani regrets the state of current US poetry. Patrick Wildgust finds Michael Winterbottom's film capturing the true spirit of Tristram Shandy and David Andrew Platzer surveys the anarchic work of Dada. Anne Stevenson reviews U.A. Fanthorpe, Carol Rumens & Carole Satyamurti. Fiction by Loree Westron and John Herdman. FICTION 'Los Milagros', Loree Westron 'The Monkey', John Herdman POETRY 'Scarecrows', 'Statement', 'Demented' & 'Spring', Anthony Thwaite 'Electronocuted', Michael Hamburger 'Paternity', Maureen Duffy 'Valentinus', 'Bicycling, with Birds', & 'De carne Christi', Robert Nye 'The Mnajdra Temples', Myra Schneider 'Martenitsa', Andy Croft 'Let Us Pray', Gary Allen 'After the Stroke', Patrick Clinton 'Stairs', Rosalynde Price 'Seeing the Light', Frank Dullaghan 'The White Ship', Niall McDevitt 'The Gifts', Tobias Hill 'For Winter' & 'Almost-Weds', David Cameron 'Forty Years On', Wes Magee Four photopoems by James Sutherland-Smith & Shamil Khairov 'East River', Ian Parks FEATURES David Andrew Platzer on Dada John Harding on Ralph Hodgson & T.S. Eliot 'The Sad Case of American Poetry', Anis Shivani 'A Cock And Bull Story', Patrick Wildgust 'More Biblical than Balkan', Mark Thompson REVIEWS Christopher Middleton on Hilary Davies Francis King on Michael Mewshaw Toby Lichtig on Ron Ramdin Ian MacFadyen on Terry Wilson Anne Stevenson on U.A. Fanthorpe, Carol Rumens & Carole Satyamurti Cover images: L'oeil cacodylate, Francis Picabia (1912, oil with photomontage and collage on canvas); The Graminious Bicycle Garnished with Bells the Dappled Fire Lamps and the Echinoderms Bending/the Spine to Look for Caresses, Max Ernst (c. 1921, gouache and ink on botanical chart with ink inscription) Gary Allen was born in Ballymena, County Antrim. Poetry Languages (Flambard / Black Mountain 2002); Exile (Black Mountain 2004); North of Nowhere (Lagan Press 2005). Cillin, a novel (Black Mountain 2005). David Cameron, Scottish poet living in Kinlough, County Leitrim. Patrick Clinton lives in Gorey, County Wexford. Late Harvest (Roundstone 1998). Andy Croft's most recent collection is Comrade Laughter (Flambard). He edited the anthologies Red Sky at Night (with Adrian Mitchell) and North by North East (with Cynthia Fuller). Frank Dullaghan edits the poetry magazine Seam. One of the organisers of the Essex Poetry Festival. Published in Magma, Poetry London, The Rialto. Maureen Duffy, 29 books, 5 of them poetry. She lives in London. Michael Hamburger. Recent poems Wild and Wounded. Recent translations Hölderlin: Poems & Fragments (2004, 2005); Peter Huchel: The Garden of Theoprastus (2004). All from Anvil. 150 publications, 2 honorary doctorates. John Harding lives in Crouch End, London. Teaches creative writing and writes on boxing, football, sailing, and flying. His biograpy of Ralph Hodgson will appear in 2006. 'The Last Blackbird' and Other Poems, Ralph Hodgson, edited by John Harding, Greenwich Exchange, 2004. John Herdman, b Edinburgh 1941, educated at Cambridge, lives in Perthshire. His novels, short stories, and criticism include Imelda (1993), Ghostwriting (1996), Four Tales (2000), and The Sinister Cabaret (2001). Tobias Hill lives in London. Three collections of poetry, three novels, and one book of short stories. Shortlisted for The Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award in 2004. Dr Shamil Khairov, Department of Russian, Trinity College, Dublin. Member of the Russian Union of Photographic Artists. Francis King CBE, FRSL, b 1923, novelist, short story writer, and critic. Toby Lichtig is a commissioning editor at the TLS, where he writes regularly on fiction, theatre, and contemporary culture. He also reviews for The Observer. Ian MacFadyen's essays include Machine Dreams: Optical Toys & Mechanical Boys (Codex 1996); Ira Cohen's Photographs: A Living Theatre (Cynthia Broan Gallery New York 2000); and The Blood of the Poet: Lorca & the Duende (Chanticleer 2005). He is completing Souvenirs of Terrestrial Paradise on the poet Jeremy Reed. Wes Magee. Recent poetry Starfall (The Happy Dragons Press). Poems for children The Very Best of Wes Magee (Macmillan). Niall McDevitt was one of Ken Campbell's Pidgin Players in their Bislama version of Shakespeare's Macbeth. He teaches Bislama and was Pidgin Consultant on John Peel's Home Truths. Bislama is the Pidgin English on Vanuatu (formerly the New Hebrides in the south-west Pacific) and the official lingua franca in that part of Melanesia. Christopher Middleton, poet & critic. Palavers and A Nocturnal Journal were reviewed in our April/May 2005 issue. Robert Nye FRSL, poet & novelist. Poetry critic at The Times for 25 years. The Rain and the Glass: 99 Poems, New & Selected (Greenwich Exchange 2005). Ian Parks lives in Mexborough in South Yorkshire. Shell Island (Waywiser 2005). David Andrew Platzer writes for Apollo, History Today, and British Art Journal. Rosalynde Price, b Fulham, London. Lives in Norwich. Gestalt psychotherapist. Myra Schneider. Insisting on Yellow: New & Selected Poems (Enitharmon 2000); Writing My Way Through Cancer (Jessica Kingsley 2003); Multiplying the Moon (Enitharmon 2004). Anis Shivani writes for The Iowa Review, Confrontation, The Antioch Review, Denver Quarterly, and Meanjin. James Sutherland-Smith, poet & essayist, British Council, Belgrade, Serbia. Anne Stevenson, who lives in Durham, was the inaugural winner of the Northern Rock Writers' Award in 2002. A Report from the Border (Bloodaxe, 2003). Poems, 1955-2005 (Bloodaxe, 2005). Mark Thompson's book A Paper House: The Ending of Yugoslavia was pubished in 1992. A biographical study of Danilo Kiš is in preparation. Anthony Thwaite OBE, FRSL, b 1930, poet & critic, published by Enitharmon. Loree Westron grew up in Idaho, where she studied at university. She dropped out and cycled to Mexico with an Englishman. She has lived in the UK since 1988. Non-fiction in travel and cycling magazines. 'Los Milagros' was short-listed for the V.S. Pritchett Memorial Prize in 2005. Patrick Wildgust is the curator of Shandy Hall in Coxwold, Yorkshire - a registered museum open to the public. http://www.asterisk.org.uk.
The latest issue of The London Magazine is now available (it's the Dec/Jan issue, unavoidably delayed somewhat). One of the most irrepressible publications in British history, the mag is well worth a look for its fiction, reviews, and poetry. Find it at the London Review Bookshop or, better yet, get it straight from the source.
Have you read The London Magazine - December / January 2006 by Sebastian Barker? - Add your own review
