“Where’s evil? It’s that large part of every man that wants to hate without limit, that wants to hate with God on its side.” — Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night “[Contemporary] fiction is about society,” says Clare Pollard, in a short essay asking how writers can respond to the present moment. I wouldn’t have thought this […]
Author archives: shotscarecrow
Lyonesse by Penelope Shuttle
Lyonesse (Bloodaxe, 2021) presents a problem. On the one hand, it’s tricky to talk about because I don’t feel able to map out the book’s depths. Parts of it remain sunken and mysterious to me – I can claim no commanding vantage point, despite having browsed it on-off for a couple of months and read […]
I’m Naming the Swifts
Added a new version of this old (2010) poem to the website’s gashopon machine/lucky dip today:
On Starlings, with Caleb Parkin and Holly Hopkins
How does a poem mimic (or capture, or transmute) something so visual, so kinetic, so unliterary, as the sight of a murmuration of starlings? And is there any point in it trying to, when we can see the spectacle for ourselves at any time, via a brief internet search? Where is the sense in using […]
Raceme no.13 / Another Labyrinth
I have two new poems in Bristol-based journal Raceme no.13, both titled ‘Another Labyrinth’. Below is a poster I’ve made for one of them. If you find it a little difficult to understand at first, that’s likely because it’s actually a puzzle-poem based on the well-known ’15 puzzle’ — a set of sliding numbered blocks […]
Salon A, Burley Fisher Books, 21st April 6.30pm
I’m reading alongside Astrid Alben, Rose Gibbs, Sophie Herxheimer and Lucy Mercer at Burley Fisher Books in Haggerston this Thursday. Tickets are £5 and can be ordered from here. I’ll be reading a few poems from Sandsnarl, but also from a new work-in-progress which happens to be set in the same universe, in a hotel […]
Suffering / Bug / Unearthly Toys
This post can also be read on my Substack, Stray Bulletin. DIARY It’s possible to be thrilled and exhilarated at the same time as appalled and frightened – after all, this is the basis on which horror fiction operates. So one thing that’s unsettling about the current moment is the fact that, on one level, people […]
Firmament, Vol. 2 No. 1
I have three new poems in the latest issue of Firmament, a handsome magazine made by Sublunary Editions, who are a very impressive small press based in Seattle, with editorial input from the UK. I’m especially happy to have these poems published, as all three are from a new collection I’ve been working on for, […]
Detachment / Dishonored 2 / The Beetle
This post can also be read on my Substack, Stray Bulletin. DIARY I was originally planning to write on two topics: whether or not writers need to read, and disconnections at a near distance. After weighing up which to take on first, I found that the two bled in to one another. When I teach poetry […]
Tiny Library / The Sanctuary Sparrow / Toxic Journalism
This post can also be read on my Substack, Stray Bulletin. TINY LIBRARY I continue to train between Cambridge, London, Buckinghamshire and sometimes Matlock, picking up post and moving things around as I try to figure out whereabouts in the vicinity of my new job I can settle permanently, meaning in all likelihood for the […]