Naomi Jaffa’s ‘Some of the Usual’ (LentBlog28)

Today is Saturday, and as with other Saturdays this Lent I am reposting a favourite blog post from my archive. … More

Not a ‘thin’ year for poetry

It was one of those throwaway remarks made by one writer, male, to another, ditto, in one of those books … More

Some of the Usual Standing in the kitchen before breakfast, not including some of the usual — what to buy in … More

Some writers influence you through the pull of their imagination on your work, opening up new worlds as you read … More

I have been sorting. I have been chucking. It’s been the recurring theme over the last eighteen months. I cleared … More

This blog would be nothing without its readers. Thank you to everyone who stopped by, made a comment or a … More

In terms of my poetry world, 2015 has turned out to be a year of endings and legacies. The Poetry … More

Don’t miss tomorrow’s guest blog post by Naomi Jaffa, in which she reminisces about two of her favourite poets from … More

Artwork by Angus Joseph Alongside each poem in Lifesaving Poems is a short commentary about how I came across … More

Days Each one is a gift, no doubt, mysteriously placed in your waking hand or set upon your forehead moments … More

One of my personal, private highlights of last year’s Aldeburgh Poetry Festival was a Sunday morning breakfast hosted by The … More

My first reader was a man called Fergus. A friend of a flatmate at university, I never got to … More

I have so much to be grateful for in 2014. The year began in one of my temporary fits … More

Dan O’Brien began by saying he wasn’t really a poet, but a ‘moonlighting playwright’. Selima Hill took out her glasses, … More

Everyone who enters the stage begins by saying thank you * That silence * Mostly nearly all the time * … More

On the Saturday afternoon of the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival, Festival Director Naomi Jaffa conducted an interew with Adélia Prado, and … More

By the time you read this I will be far away from here. It has not happened yet, but I … More

Below is a collection of my blog posts for the 2014 Aldeburgh Poetry Festival. I will update it as I … More

A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. Robert Frost … More

I’m grateful to you, you see. I wanted to tell you. –Raymond Carver (‘For Tess’) A kind, wise man once … More

In February, 1999 I was sitting in a car park with Naomi Jaffa when she asked me what I … More