It Is Easy to Be Dead five-star review – requiem for a forgotten war poet
Finborough, LondonNeil McPherson pays tribute to Charles Hamilton Sorley in a beautifully orchestrated production with songs by Schubert and George ButterworthRobert Graves considered Charles Hamilton...
View ArticleThe brilliance of writing poetry on napkins
Brazilian poet Pedro Gabriel started writing poems on napkins when he ran out of paper - now, two books and millions of online followers later, his breathtaking designs are set for international...
View ArticlePoets' tour hits Bath: strawberry moon in a honey-dipped city
The Shore to Shore diary makes a second stop, where we are treated to warm enthusiasm and opinionated bookselling – and find more reasons to writeDay two of the Shore to Shore tour: summer solstice, 17...
View ArticleTranslation Tuesday: Next, a poem by Jing Xianghai
Still largely unknown to western readers, Jing Xianghai is the best-selling Taiwanese poet of his generation, combining comedy with heroic pathosBy Jing Xianghai and Lee Yew Leong for Translation...
View ArticleMike Hart obituary
Singer-songwriter who sang with the Roadrunners and was a member of the Liverpool SceneThe singer-songwriter Mike Hart, who has died aged 72, sang with the Liverpool band the Roadrunners, and was a...
View ArticleThe world’s first door-to-door poet: 'I thought people would tell me to piss...
At this year’s singularly muddy Glastonbury, Rowan McCabe explained why he was delivering bespoke poetry to bedraggled campersOn a damp Saturday afternoon in late June, a man wearing wellies and a...
View ArticlePoets' tour: Je suis haggis, we're all Scottish now
As our Shore to Shore adventure reaches Scotland, the authors’ spirits riseMonday 4 July, Jackie Kay: Boris Johnson has resigned and we are off to Scotland: things can surely only get better. The love...
View ArticlePoets' tour: reaching the 'unsure shore'
Our progress across Britain, watching unhappily as the country changed and sharing the consolations of poetry, has reached its final stop. Home will be different when we get thereAn hour before we...
View ArticleLord Evans of Temple Guiting obituary
Publisher who turned Faber & Faber into a champion of the best contemporary writingMatthew Evans, who has died aged 74 from leukaemia, was a great publisher who also happened to play a decisive...
View ArticleMichel Faber: 'I would have been a different writer without my wife'
Since his wife Eva died in 2014, Michel Faber has emerged a changed writer. The author of Under the Skin shares how he charted his grief through poetry and why he carries Eva’s shoes with himAt...
View ArticleLetter: Sir Geoffrey Hill obituary
While I have always struggled to appreciate the poetry of Sir Geoffrey Hill, I remember him well as a lecturer at Leeds University. A reading of some of his poems to a smallish group of students one...
View ArticleEdward Lear's Nonsense Songs and Stories - archive, 9 July 1888
9 July 1888: The gift of writing precious nonsense as that which came from the pen of the late Edward Lear is denied to most authorsNonsense Songs and Stories. By EDWARD LEAR.London and New York:...
View ArticleRowan Williams remembers Geoffrey Hill
At a time when the UK has experienced one of its most shameful periods of dishonest collusiveness, Hill’s loss should be felt all the more acutelyThe Saturday poem: verses from Oraclau/Oracles‘Nonsense...
View ArticleThere is more to war poetry than mud, wire and slaughter
Poems about the first world war have defined the genre for decades. It is time to hear from new voices that reflect a wider view of conflictsWhen we say “war poetry” today, the sort of writing that...
View ArticleThe Saturday poem: verses from Oraclau/Oracles by Geoffrey Hill
Remembering the poet, who died aged 84 last weekWhether to blaze out – trumpets to Eryri – Or to go down with final rampage – Why not (b)? This is the Ramp Age Yet all too often damp-fiery. Think,...
View ArticleBest holiday reads 2016
From gripping fiction to history, brilliant poetry to biography, our guest contributors offer their recommendations for the beach and elsewhereThe Guardian’s summer books special: Julian Barnes, Sarah...
View ArticlePoem of the week: The Days That Forced Our Lives Apart by Jill Furse
Although very short, this is both a vivid account of wartime separation and the most perfect of love poemsThe Days That Forced Our Lives ApartThe days that forced our lives apartAre shut up like a...
View ArticlePaco Peña review – music and dance blend poetically for Lorca
Sadler’s Wells, LondonPatrias, the flamenco guitarist’s tribute to the Spanish writer, features superb dance solos but the multimedia projections intrude on the spectacleFederico García Lorca is known...
View ArticleMichael Rosen and Sarah Crossan share children's poetry prize
CLiPPA children’s poetry award for 2016 honours Rosen’s collection for youngsters, A Great Big Cuddle, and Crossan’s much-praised verse novel OneMichael Rosen and Sarah Crossan are the joint winners of...
View ArticleThe Very Quiet Foreign Girls poetry group | Kate Clanchy
When Kate Clanchy began teaching the children of refugees, she sought out those silenced by trauma and loss. Their weekly sessions released a torrent of untold storiesIt all came from Priya’s poem, and...
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