A writer, I think,
is someone
who pays attention
to the world.
That means
trying
to understand,
take in, connect with
what wickedness
human beings
are capable of,
and not be corrupted –
made cynical,
superficial –
by this understanding.
Literature can tell us
what the world
is like.
Literature can give standards
and pass on deep knowledge,
incarnated
in language,
in narrative.
Literature can train,
and exercise,
our ability to weep
for those
who are not us or ours.
Who would we be
if we could not sympathise
with those
who are not us or ours?
Who would we be
if we could not forget
ourselves,
at least some of the time?
Who would we be
if we could not learn?
Become something
other than what we are?
Susan Sontag, from At the Same Time
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Published by Anthony Wilson
I am a lecturer, poet and writing tutor. I work in teacher and medical education at the University of Exeter. My anthology Lifesaving Poems was published by Bloodaxe Books in 2015. In 2012 I published Riddance (Worple Press), a collection of poems, and Love for Now (Impress Books), a memoir, about my experience of cancer. My most recent books are Deck Shoes (Impress Books, 2019), a book of prose memoir and criticism, and The Afterlife (Worple Press, 2019). In 2023 I will publish The Wind and the Rain, my sixth collection of poems, with Blue Diode Press. My current research project, with Sue Dymoke from Nottingham Trent University and funded by the Foyle Foundation, is Young Poets' Stories: https://youngpoetsstories.com/. This blog is archived by the British Library.
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Anthony Wilson 
This is profoundly true. Thank you.
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Thank you. Good wishes, Anthony
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