Now that this blog is well and truly underway, I can relax. Hope you enjoy reading some of those reviews.
This is a little old now, but I see Carol Ann Duffy has been made Poet Laureate. That she's the first woman, and the first openly gay person, to have held the position, are cool firsts, but more to the point she is an amazing poet.
I'd never read any of her stuff - at a conservative all boys school, she didnt come up on the curriculum, surprisingly enough. When I heard the news, though, I sought out the five or six of her poems that are available online. What a turn of phrase she has. It's unbelievable. I have to get a copy of 'The World's Wife'.
How about this from Mrs Lazarus:
'I breathed/his stench; my bridegroom in his rotting shroud,/moist and dishevelled from the grave's slack chew'
More, more. I want more.
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Very well done - at first I thought you'd secretly had a blog for a long while, before I realised you were just re-posting stuff. ;)
ReplyDeleteGlad to read some of my old favourites again. You do have a brilliant review style - the right mix of open-minded and catty, casual and erudite. And it's nice to see how many of these were things we've attended together! XD (Or at least, both seen.) I'm refraining from reading your Godot review until I've been there, though!
As for Carol Ann Duffy, sorry for not responding sooner to your message, but YES. As both the Token Feminist and Token Lit Student in some of the groups in which I am known to spend time (*sigh*), this has come up a lot. ;)
I have thought her poetry is fab for ages - I nearly did my 'folklore and female sexuality' A2 coursework on 'The World's Wife', before being told I couldn't because it was taught at GCSE at my school (even though I hadn't been taught it - I'd done Larkin instead). OTOH, being denied Duffy meant I discovered Emma Donoghue, which has to be a plus! Anyway, given that, I'm surprised I hadn't recommended her to you before! If you haven't already nabbed a copy of TWW, I think I have two. Want one? Anyway, most people I know seem to dislike her without having really read her stuff, which annoys me - yes, she's quite abrasive at times, but being put off by the sex and swearing means they also miss some moments of extraordinary beauty and sensitivity. Or maybe they just hear 'lesbian feminist' and run for the hills. *shrug* I don't think Duffy is anywhere near as one-sidedly vitriolic as people think.
Anyway, two strands of thought re: her new Laureate status:
1) Yay, awesome! Woman! Gay! Visibility! Excellent art being recognised! Anti-establishment poet Laureate, bwahaha!
2) Have they even read her poetry? Or will they faint when, at her first public reading, she reads aloud a vivid description the meek uselessness of Prince Philip's weeping wrinkled cock and the Queen having to pleasure herself with a sceptre instead? Is this tokenism without thought on their part? Or is Duffy going to tone down her poems (and/r lose her inspiration as Motion did)? She's said she's taken this position because she wants to be a role model for kids, I think - will that mean censorship of some kind, whether externally imposed or self-imposed? *annngst*
I presume they *have* read her poems. I guess the idea is that she will seperate herself a bit, producing anodyne stuff about royal tea parties and celebrating the day buckingham palace had the windows cleaned, and then producing 'private' collections of what she's always done.
ReplyDeleteAs for losing her inspiration, it's impossible to predict, but it seems plausible that she will find so much time with the establishment a little difficult.
... The idea of a Poet Laureate seems so very bizarre, these days. Sigh. I hope she does us proud. ;)
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