TEN KEY MOMENTS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE POETRY IN 2013

2013 was a very good year for poetry, and also, in some ways, a sad year.

EYEWEAR SAW EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENED IN POETRY IN 2013 AND SAID IT WAS GOOD

Here are Eyewear's ten key events, publications, or poets, of the year, from an English-language - AND British blog - perspective. I offer the headlines alone. You can fill in the blanks.

1. GEOFFREY HILL PUBLISHES HIS COLLECTED POEMS.

2. SEAMUS HEANEY DIES.

3. HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN INVITES HUNDREDS OF POETS TO BUCKINGHAM PALACE.

4. POETRY MAGAZINE IN AMERICA GETS A NEW EDITOR DON SHARE.

5. CHARLES BERNSTEIN PUBLISHES RECALCULATING.

6. HELEN MORT SHORTLISTED FOR TS ELIOT PRIZE AND THE COSTA.

7. PATRICIA SMITH WINS THE LENORE MARSHALL POETRY PRIZE.

8. MATTHEW DICKMAN ARRIVES IN UK ON TWO LEADING MAGAZINE COVERS IN ONE MONTH.

9. DAVID SHOOK TRIES TO GET A POETRY DRONE OFF THE GROUND.

10. EMILY BERRY DEBUTS WITH FABER, WINS FORWARD.

note: other events that would have made a possible top 15 would include SALT STOPS PUBLISHING POETRY LIST; STARNINO COVER STORY IN CV2 IGNITES CONTROVERSY; DANIEL HOFFMAN DIES; STAG'S LEAP BY SHARON OLDS WINS TS ELIOT AND PULITZER PRIZE; MAURICE RIORDAN BECOMES EDITOR OF POETRY REVIEW.

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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. What do I mean by smart?

"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...".

THE SWIFT REPORT 2023

I am writing this post without much enthusiasm, but with a sense of duty. This blog will be 20 years old soon, and though I rarely post here anymore, I owe it some attention. Of course in 2023, "Swift" now means one thing only, Taylor Swift, the billionaire musician. Gone are the days when I was asked if I was related to Jonathan Swift. The pre-eminent cultural Swift is now alive and TIME PERSON OF THE YEAR. There is no point in belabouring the obvious with delay: 2023 was a low-point in the low annals of human history - war, invasion, murder, in too many nations. Hate, division, the collapse of what truth is, exacerbated by advances in AI that may or may not prove apocalyptic, while global warming still seems to threaten the near-future safety of humanity. It's been deeply depressing. The world lost some wonderful poets, actors, musicians, and writers this year, as it often does. Two people I knew and admired greatly, Ian Ferrier and Kevin Higgins, poets and organise

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

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