A Manhattan Project

The Manhattan Review (founded and edited by poet Philip Fried) is one of the best serious little magazines for poetry in America - and one of the only ones to that keep its finger on the pulse of contemporary British poetry.

Its latest issue, Fall/Winter 2006-7 (vol. 12, no. 2) features poems and/or translations by marvellous poets such as Mahmoud Darwish, Marilyn Hacker, Polly Clark, Pascale Petit, W.N. Herbert, Yang Lian, Penelope Shuttle, Ruth Fainlight, Hal Sirowitz, and many more.

It also has a review of the Oxfam CD, Life Lines, which I edited this summer and which has so far sold over five thousand copies since its launch four months ago.

The reviewer, Frank Beck, says: "it is hard to imagine how anyone with an interest in poetry in English could fail to find this recording fascinating."

To order this essential CD online, go to the link below:

http://www.oxfam.org.uk/shop/online/poetry.htm

To learn more about The Manhattan Review and order it, go to:

http://www.themanhattanreview.com/about.html

Comments

IQ AND THE POETS - ARE YOU SMART?

When you open your mouth to speak, are you smart? A funny question from a great song, but also, a good one, when it comes to poets, and poetry. We tend to have a very ambiguous view of intelligence in poetry, one that I'd say is dysfunctional. Basically, it goes like this: once you are safely dead, it no longer matters how smart you were. For instance, Auden was smarter than Yeats , but most would still say Yeats is the finer poet; Eliot is clearly highly intelligent, but how much of Larkin 's work required a high IQ? Meanwhile, poets while alive tend to be celebrated if they are deemed intelligent: Anne Carson, Geoffrey Hill , and Jorie Graham , are all, clearly, very intelligent people, aside from their work as poets. But who reads Marianne Moore now, or Robert Lowell , smart poets? Or, Pound ? How smart could Pound be with his madcap views? Less intelligent poets are often more popular. John Betjeman was not a very smart poet, per se....

Poetry vs. Literature

Poetry is, of course, a part of literature. But, increasingly, over the 20th century, it has become marginalised - and, famously, has less of an audience than "before". I think that, when one considers the sort of criticism levelled against Seamus Heaney and "mainstream poetry", by poet-critics like Jeffrey Side , one ought to see the wider context for poetry in the "Anglo-Saxon" world. This phrase was used by one of the UK's leading literary cultural figures, in a private conversation recently, when they spoke eloquently about the supremacy of "Anglo-Saxon novels" and their impressive command of narrative. My heart sank as I listened, for what became clear to me, in a flash, is that nothing has changed since Victorian England (for some in the literary establishment). Britain (now allied to America) and the English language with its marvellous fiction machine, still rule the waves. I personally find this an uncomfortable position - but when ...

"I have crossed oceans of time to find you..."

In terms of great films about, and of, love, we have Vertigo, In The Mood for Love , and Casablanca , Doctor Zhivago , An Officer and a Gentleman , at the apex; as well as odder, more troubling versions, such as Sophie's Choice and Silence of the Lambs . I think my favourite remains Bram Stoker's Dracula , with the great immortal line "I have crossed oceans of time to find you...".

E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG - FREEDOM MEANS BEING UNAFRAID TO WRITE WHAT YOU THINK

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