"I’ve never set foot in a pub without boxing gloves and a can of socialism"
New poetry from Laura Stanley and Arel
(photo by Aaron Kent)
Hello my dear friends,
What’s the weather like where you are? How the hell have you been?
I’ve been to no poetry events this week, which has been a relief. Sometimes being so heavily invested in poetry can get too much and you have to take a break before you burnout. When the well is dry, you have to wait for rain to replenish the well. Oh well. This week we’ve got a photo and a quote from my friend Aaron Kent, the later of which comes from one of my favourite of his poems Bone Idol.
HLR just handed me a coffee for getting the newsletter done early on a Sunday morning before. HLR started her own newsletter this week, the diary of a hot mess poetess, which I’m duty bound to mention, but the real reason I’m mentioning it is because it’s a chuffing good read and I’m hoping she'll make me breakfast.
I’m considering this newsletter done, and so should you.
This week on Anthropocene
Sunday: Laura Stanley
Wednesday: Arel Wiederholt Kassar
Book recommendations from Richard Capener
Richard:
“All my books are in boxes due to my move to Glasgow next week…
Notes Towards No Subject - Ian Macartney (Fathomsum Press); The Infinite Fury and Other Stories - Ian Macartney (Strange Region)
2023 has seen two releases from SPAM Press’ Operations Editor, Ian Macartney. His poetry release - Notes Towards No Subject - is the perfect companion to his debut short story collection, The Infinite Fury. Both snapshot scenes of queer Scottish life with good humour and lyrical dexterity. Ian said it best at his book launch for The Infinite Fury, held at Good Press: “Not experimental fiction, but a fiction that experiments.”
Conversations with Film-Makers: Movie Journal Columns 1961-1975 - Jonas Mekas (Spector Books)
While at Ian’s book launch, I picked up one of Good Press’ Jonas Mekas books. I knew Mekas worked as a journalist alongside his pioneering output as a filmmaker, but hadn’t read any of his writings. His interviews (informed, incisive, personable...) become crucial documents for anyone interested in the New York avant-garde. Good Press also stocked collections of his diaries, which will be of particular interest to me since Mekas’ films were so diaristic.
Blackity Black Black is Beautiful - Fay Victor (Northern Spy Records)
I’ve long said the best contemporary sound poetry is being done in music and performance, and Fay Victor’s most recent album shows this. Putting aside the obvious civil rights imperatives (“We will see your governorship and we will take your senate. How about that?”), Victor layers her heritage of black oratory, spoken word and jazz singing alongside American avant-garde vocalisation. My album of the year.
If I Had Not Seen Their Sleeping Faces - Christina Tudor-Sideri (Erratum Press)
Through a book length collection of prose-poems, writer/translator Christina Tudor-Sideri exhumes the lyricism of death and decay by staring at them without flinching. Unrelentingly beautiful, If I Had Not Seen... exists at the junction of personal and literary ancestors. Highly recommended.
THAT IS ALL THANK YOU”
Shout to Richard’s substack La Bête and his independent publishing venture originally based in Birmingham, soon to be based in Glasgow, Hem Press.
Thanks for reading - I hope you have a glorious Sunday,
That’s all from me,
Charlie