Saturday 26 February 2011

Nine Arches and CCC at The Western, Leicester

There's a lot going on in Leiecster, all sorts, connected with the world of poetry and spoken word, such as WORD!, Pinnngk! (spelling may well be wrong), the LPS and others. Last monday I found myself compering half of the Nine Arches/Crystal Clear shindig at the Westen in Leicester, not entirely sure how this happened. Anyhow, a very packed venue in which many open mic veterans and virgins took to the floor as well as guest speakers Myra Connell, Mark Goodwin, Pam Thompson and Will Buckingham - who read prose, yes prose, remember that? Actually I've got an itch for Madame Bovary, but that's another story.

As seems to be the tradition at Nine Arches events another animal became guest of honour, this time Splat the dog, who was brought along by Susan (don't know surname, who also read, Susan, not Splat. At the November Shindig there was a parrot, so I shall be holding a sweepstake for a guess of the next animal. It was great to hear so many speakers and wonderful to have a new venue for Nine Arches in Leicester.

Friday 4 February 2011

The best events I never went to: Jan, 2011

Hello again. This is a special blog post dedicated to being absent. Last week the Nottingham Poetry Series hosted a evening with Matthew Welton, Carol Rowntree Jones and Simon Turner. Would have gone but twins off colour.
I'm very interested in Matthew Welton's work, he puts a lot of emphasis on metre in a sort of arithmetic driven way. He makes the form work hard and it's quite a unique style. At a previous reading he was telling us (the audience) about it all, whilst concentrating very hard. The result is lines like this:

Vodka, she likes. Whisky also. And plums. And limes.
And lemon-peel. Fried fruit. Dry beans. Deep soup. Warm cream.

I find myself over the dishes with this in my head sometimes, creeping in. Also wanted to hear Simon Turner as I find his work very interesting too, I'm very partial to a poem of his called 'The Ruined Chapel' on Hand and Star.

I should also say that I'm reading with the Nottingham Poetry Series in April. I will be going to that one.

There was also the Spoken Word All Stars which looked like a jolly evening too, with Andrew Graves and Lydia Towsey.

Signing off now.