Conversation on-line with writer Sarah Hymas
I have been having a really fruitful conversation about my work with poet Sarah Hymas this week, shortly to appear on her blog. http://sarahhymas.blogspot.com/
It has made me think about the roots of my own writing, and be able to articulate more clearly what I am trying to say in poetry, particularly around the idea of writing about the environment.
She has asked me about my first pamphlet collection - Slug Language.
If you would like to read some reviews of this collection, here is a sample:
A Sample of Feedback from Poets and Readers of ‘Slug Language’
‘We also enjoyed reading Slug Language - we both spent a happy hour on
Saturday morning reading it. It really is excellent, Anne, you’re an extremely talented writer, teacher, performer …’
Kaye Tew MMU
‘Congratulations. You’ve got a book of treasures in print. Such wonderful words coming from Slug Language – some making me goose-pimply – slime also very much appreciated!’
Susan Heyhurst
‘I’m so enjoying ‘Slug Language’ I think it’s a very strong pamphlet. I particularly liked
‘Touched’…Lovely’
Alicia Stubbersfield
‘What a stunning reading and luscious book!’
Mandy Coe
‘Love the chapbook. It is beautiful. Enjoy it’
Amanda Dalton
‘A strong collection. Takes your work to a new level’
Sarah Corbett
‘Just read your book cover to cover and think it’s genuinely beautiful. I haven’t read poetry I enjoyed so much in years.’
Beverley Ward
‘I love your poetry – sensuous, delicate, delicious’
Cheryl Moskowitz.
‘I very much enjoyed ‘Slug Language’. I have a terrible habit of turning down the corners of pages so that I can easily find my favourite poems again and your lovely pamphlet is sadly defaced. My favourite poems were Feral; My Mother’s House Falls into the River, Kist, Longing is Opened by the Wind and Mid Summer II. So glad Nell decided to publish this excellent collection.’
Maggie Butt.
‘I’ve read your pamphlet – and I really like it, especially the poems about your son (the reference to chisels and light bulbs was familiar/chilling!).’
Jonathan Davidson
Two events coming up this summer
I have just had a poem published in Magma no.44 and I am delighted as I think it is such a good magazine. I am going to its launch event at The Troubadour in London 8pm on the 22nd June. Please come and join me if you are around that evening. I will post up the poem once the magazine is in production.
I am also doing an event with Nell Farrell, Char March and others at the Lowdon Literature Festival on Saturday 20th June at 6.30pm. We are reading from ‘Some Girls’ Mothers.
I have been following quite a lot of material in the papers about the Poet Laureate and want to congratulate Carol Ann - this seems a very important step forward for women and poetry in particular and I am really pleased to see the raised profile the art form has. I just hope the actual Laureate post does not have a detrimental affect on her work. I wonder if there is a better way of celebrating poetry in this country? It seems such an archaic institution. I would prefer something that did not focus on one person and had a wider spread. I would be interested to hear what other people think.
Working in Schools
I have been doing quite a lot of new residencies this year -both with animation artist Jack Lockhart and by myself. A lovely primary school in Wetherby called Lady Elizabeth Collingham employed me to work over a number of days with their pupils on the theme of the second world war - which was quite a challenge. A year three class wrote fantastic poems on the theme of evacuation and a creative teacher called Pauline Ross came up with the idea of putting these poems inside suitcases made of paper:
I have also been working in a primary school in Oldham on the theme of encouraging boys to read more books where the boys have worked separately from the girls. This process was interesting, as the boys freely admitted they were keen readers without the girls present!
New 2009 poetry
The River Ure in Spate, January 2009
I have just been on an amazing visit up Wharf dale in search of waterfalls. I had not done that trip in winter and the landscape was very bare, beautiful and most of the rivers were near to flooding point. I do not think this photograph does the scene justice!
I seem to have had a dry period over the festive season when it comes to writing, but here is something that I have managed to finish. I began this poem in a workshop run by the fabulous Ann Sansom at a National Association for Writers in Education’s retreat last year. Ann asked the group to write in the first person from the point of view of a baby about to be born, and read us a poem by Sharon Olds. I hope this is not too derivative of Sharon Olds (who does this kind of intimate poem so well it is difficult to know where you start yourself after reading her work, I think!). Please leave me a comment if you have a view on this topic.
Worcester Park General Hospital
I’m kept in a box. I blink.
Smell hot plastic. Stretch out my hand
to watch a pattern of light redden.
I’m a glow-in-the-dark; half-fish
with slithery lungs in a ribcage supple as a slipper.
My skull’s pointed, yet to harden.
My hold on life is lax.
Mother’s face rises like a full moon
and her eyes cloud over with green.
I’ve lost her metronome heartbeat.
I’ve no idea of the comfort of her milk-tipped
nipple, nor the crook of her arm,
nor the rhythm of a walk in the park
with sycamore leaves to soften the sun’s stare.
Anne Caldwell
Happy New Year
I have done very little writing over the Christmas Period but lots of reading. I would recommend two new books of poetry that I have really enjoyed for different reasons.
The first is Womens’ Work (seren) with a great introduction by Eva Salzman/Amy Wack and the other is ‘Answering Back’ edited by Carol Ann Duffy - which includes poets responding to another published poet and was a great way in to re-thinking some old favourites as well as discovering new work by people really enjoy reading.
I have also just read ‘Waterlog’ by Roger Deakin and absolutely loved it. That’s it on the holiday reading front. I am back to work tomorrow.
Happenstance Launch Dec 08
It gave me great pleasure to take part in a wonderful event up in Edinburgh in December alongside a fantastic range of other poets published by Happenstance. Helena Nelson was a great compere and the event took place in a Thai Restaurant just down from the Scottish Poetry Library (that was experiencing flooding!)
I felt in the company of some great new friends and was amazed by the range and quality of the work. It felt invigorating to hear poetry from all over the UK at the same event. 
‘Some Girls’ Mothers’ Tour
I am half way through a pre-view tour of the book, ‘Some Girls’ Mothers’ will my fellow writers, Char March, Clare Shaw, River Wolton, Nell Farrell and Suzanne Batty. We have been to libraries and venues in the North West so far, and audience response has been great. Lots of discussion about the book, and feedback from people. We have sold quite a few too! Here is a link to a fantastic short video that Ian Daley from Route made of the first gig:
It has been a challenge for me to think about performing with a group of people, instead of by myself. We have used props, a plinth, and had coaching from radio/drama director Polly Thomas. All this has really helped the shape and structure of the piece. I think I enjoyed performing in Oldham the most so far, because I was confident, didn’t fluff any lines, and people laughed! I could not quite believe that. We are hoping to do a much larger tour next year in 2009. Route have published the book, and we have also had support from a great group of librarians and Jane Mathieson from Time to Read. I have also run workshops as part of this project and people have written some cracking material. The workshop punters have been very diverse and had a great deal to say about family relationships. It has been a careful path to tread through peoples’ memories, and one that has delighted and saddened me at the same time. How do we all get through being parented, and then being parents ourselves?!
A sample of poems
Here is a sample of three poems from ‘Slug Language’ to whet your appetite. I am not sure whether appetite and slugs fit well in the same sentence.
I am having a busy week this week. I am launching the poetry book on Friday in Chorlton in Manchester and done a preview event on the collection of creative non fiction stories, ‘Some Girls’ Mothers’ on Saturday in Little Sutton Library. Wish me luck!
Slug Language
I am delighted to hold a copy of my first collection of poetry from Happenstance Press in my hot little hand and weep! Please forgive me for having an emotional moment but it has felt such a long time since the gestation of this work began. Probably when I was eight years old and now? Well, I am much much older than that and probably not much wiser.
The design of this chapbook is great, and the editing with the support of Helena Nelson has been a process of refining and polishing. At times it has felt like shaping a well loved piece of furniture. French Polishing and Poetry? This sounds like some-one’s PHD thesis. The first person I gave a copy of the collection to was my good friend and work colleague Beverley Ward. Beverley is a writer and literature consultant from Sheffield. She read the book home on the train from a meeting we had together and texted me to say the book was ‘genuinely beautiful’ and added ‘I haven’t read poetry I’ve enjoyed so much in years’. As you can imagine, I am thrilled to bits. Here are details of my launch and you are very welcome to come:
manky poets
Anne Caldwell - Friday 17th October 2008
7.30-9.30pm
25 to 30 minutes guest spot, from 9pm.
£2/£1
Location
The readings are in the backroom of Chorlton Library 0161 881 3179
Manchester Road, Chorlton cum Hardy Manchester M21 9PN
For a map and directions, type the postcode into multimap.com
(or the aa, or google maps)
Launch of ‘Slug Language’
(Happenstance Press)
www.happenstancepress.com (can buy on line)
Anne Caldwell’s poetry has a strong lyric voice. Her tone is sensuous, earthy and full of wisdom. Many of her poems pay homage to a tradition of nature writing but pose a new sense of urgency: balance is threatened with floods, storms and heat. This is a poet with something to say. Her poems about childbirth and parenthood achieve the ‘difficult combination of intimacy and universality’ (Michael Symmons Roberts). Firmly rooted in landscapes of the North of England, this confident first collection explores the unspoken territories between siblings, parents, children and lovers.
Anne Caldwell is fascinated by bones and music, sea and stone. Theses elements form a backbone of imagery in her work as solid as the Pennine hills in which she now lives.
‘Pain and joy are equal contenders in these poems, but delight is what wins through-delight and tenderness.’
Helena Nelson
Journal of a Trainee Editor part 2
I had expected the summer months to be quieter and less busy, but with two books now on the go this was always going to be unrealistic! I have been working with Helena Nelson from Happenstance Press on my first poetry chapbook, and we have finally decided a title ‘Slug Language’. The process has been one of very fine tuning, looking at grammar, imagery and finding the exact words for poems. I have also continued to work with Ian Daley from Route on ‘Some Girls’ Mothers’ - a collection of non fiction on the theme of mothers and daughters. It is now flowing in a good order, and is ready to be proof-read. A cover has been discussed and I have had the difficult task of writing an introduction and blurb for the back of the book.
Helena Nelson shares Ian Daley’s attention to detail but the process of working on a poetry collection as apposed to creative non-fiction feels very different. There is less emphasis on narrative, more on concise use of language, and rhythm. I have enjoyed both processes immensely, and both have been very personal because of the subject matter of my poetry and the story I have written for ‘Some Girls’ Mothers.
I have always been a very visual person, as interested in art as in writing, so looking at images for the cover of both these books is something I relish. It feels like they suddenly acquire their own place in the world and are much less attached to me!
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About
Anne Caldwell is a poet and literature consultant. She works for NAWE and the Open University, Bolton University and runs workshops in schools and community settings.
Contact Tel. 07818 052108
email a.caldwell@nawe.co.uk
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'A Wilder Vein' edited by Linda Cracknell
