John Agard reads his poem Half Caste and talks about race children's books...
Listen to John Agard read his well known poem Half Caste and talk about how his Guyanan upbringing helped him become the writer he is today Continue reading...
View ArticlePoem of the week: Once there came a man by Stephen Crane
The 19th-century American poets free-verse parable about a nonsensical war reminds us that conflict rouses desire as powerfully as loveStephen Cranes poems are distinctive. Typically, theyre short,...
View ArticleA Dylan Thomas Trilogy review Coriglianos Mahlerian-scale vision
Brangwyn Hall, SwanseaSingers and orchestra rose well to the challenge of the composers work, more secular oratorio than song cycleJohn Corigliano felt an immediate affinity with the poetry of Dylan...
View ArticleNational Book Awards shortlist honours cartoonist Roz Chast
Chast is first cartoonist ever to make it onto the adult nonfiction prize, while fiction shortlist stacked with newcomersComment: Doerr should win, but Robinson willFor the first time in the National...
View ArticleDylan Thomas: beer and loafing in Fitzrovia
Think of Dylan Thomas and you think of Milk Wood and the endless green of Carmarthenshire. But was he as much a London writer as a Welsh one? Fellow Fitzrovian Griff Rhys Jones raises a glass to the...
View ArticleGiving a musical voice to wars unsung victims
Composer Sally Beamish has turned one of Andrew Motions war poems into a new oratorio. The former poet laureate explains their tribute to the damaged livingOne of the best things about my laureate...
View ArticleOde to Didcot Power Station by Kit Wright review joyful experimentation with...
This jaunty collection of light verse is also a conspicuous formal accomplishmentIn "Blemish", Kit Wright quotes 19th-century visitors who came to Tintern Abbey with preoccupations rather different...
View ArticleThe Saturday poem: My Father's Wardrobe
by Pascale PetitIn the late afternoon he begins his toilette he has limestone pyjamas threaded with fossils,a nightshirt of catacombs through which his dreams drip.He has a dressing gown woven with...
View ArticleOn my radar: Laure Prouvosts cultural highlights
The acclaimed conceptual artist on Hampstead Ponds, Mexican sculptures and the connection between raspberries and artFrench artist Laure Prouvost moved to London aged 18. After graduating from Central...
View ArticlePoem of the week: Lament for Stinie Morrison by Kit Wright
The British poet tells the tale of a Russian-Jewish immigrant sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of an unpopular landlord in 1911Kit Wrights work is a bracing reminder that rhythm is a...
View ArticleA Modern Don Juan: Cantos for These Times by Divers Hands review a fun Byron...
Rhyming Minervas Owl with Simon Cowell, 15 poets have fun hauling Byrons hero into the modern ageLord Byrons original poem stops abruptly in its 17th canto, after enough words to fill a fat novel,...
View ArticleThere was once a campaign for good limericks
The founders of the Omnificent English Dictionary in Limerick Form are seeking a limerick for each meaning of every word in the English language by 2043. Have long have you got?Thanks to Neil Gaiman...
View ArticleMercury nominees 2014: Kate Tempest
Bookies favourite Tempest has awards for her poetry but with hip-hop album Everybody Down she has moved towards the mainstream and the Mercury judges love a female MC Mercury nominees 2014: Jungle...
View ArticleEzra Pound: Poet Volume II, The Epic Years, 1921-1939 review
In this second volume of A David Moodys biography, the controversial poet, creator of The Cantos, is preoccupied by music and MussoliniTheres a gut-wrenching moment about 100 pages into this latest...
View ArticleTS Eliot prize shortlist joins conflict and reconciliation in the Middle East
Ruth Padels exploration of religious understanding, Learning to Make an Oud in Nazareth, and Kevin Powers Letter Composed During a Lull in the Fighting, drawing on his Iraq war service, among the...
View ArticleFrank Miller obituary
Frank Miller, who has died aged 86, was a well-known poet and jazz musician in New York, although wider public recognition evaded him. Whereas his contemporaries and, in some cases, his friends, such...
View ArticleCerys Matthews on setting Dylan Thomass poems to music
It was a Christmas in South Carolina that reawakened the musician and Radio 6 DJs love for Thomas and inspired her to mark his centenary with her most ambitious project yetDylan Thomas, whose centenary...
View ArticleHappy 100th birthday, John Berryman
Despite a lifetime of chaos and alcoholism, John Berrymans poetry is brilliantly funny. Sam Leith toasts his pal, whose work he has adored since he was a teenagerThe great American poet John Berryman...
View ArticleKristen Stewart will take acting break to 'make some stuff with my hands'
One-time highest-paid female actor in the world has announced shes swapping front of screen work for a stint pursuing other creative endeavours such as directing and poetryKristen Stewart, the Twilight...
View ArticleWars of words: literatures most powerful portraits of the battlefield
On St Crispins day, historically a day of battles, we look back at some of the literary canons most vivid depictions of the heroes and hell of combatToday is St Crispins day and, as such, the...
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