I read at
the first Northern Rising event at Ernest in the Ouseburn on Monday night.
Billed as a ‘North-East Poetry Social’, and inspired by the bohemian happenings on Tyneside in the sixties
(most notably the Morden Tower poetry readings, which famously re-kindled Basil
Bunting’s poetic career and saw literary heavyweights from America pass through
Newcastle), Northern Rising was a primer for how poetry nights, tied to a wider
political consciousness, might function in the city in 2017.
Organiser
Alex Niven spoke at the start, saying how he hoped that the events would ‘draw
a circle around a moment’, allowing exciting conversations to begin, networks
to be made and voices – be they dissenting, entertaining or belonging to
categories altogether unclassifiable – to be
heard. Putting poets of various backgrounds together in this way, and
introducing them without the inflated biographical details which so often
function only to affirm a slew of prizes
or publications, Northern Rising is a democratic space for live literature and
lively discourse. Questioning who poetry is for and how it might coalesce with
the emergent socio-political paradigm, the night felt like an important one
post-Grenfell, post-Brexit, and post- well, you get the picture. As Fruela
Fernandez, the ‘featured’ poet, said: Poetry is both there and not there. In
its shape-shifting guise, perhaps it speaks best to these turbulent times.
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| L-R: Me; Ryan De Leon; India Gerritsen; Patricia Robles; Fruela Fernandez; Grace Herring; Alex Niven |
Look out
for the next instalment on 13th November as this is set to be a
regular fixture on the regional circuit: one which, I’m sure, will gather
momentum very quickly.
The
second event I want to talk about is last night’s launch of the tenth issue of Butcher’s Dog. I have been involved with
the magazine since the start: in 2012, when, along with six other poets, it was
agreed that a new magazine was needed to harness the energy of poetry being
written in the North-East. Since then, Butcher’s
Dog has enjoyed phenomenal success, collaborating with the Poetry School
and enjoying the benefit of a run of exciting guest editors, each of whom have
put an original stamp on the magazine as it's gone along. Unfortunately, not long
after securing Arts Council funding, most of the editors moved to different
parts of the country, which has meant, increasingly, each issue has been a
challenge to put together, not least for Degna Stone, indomitable Top Dog and
managing editor.
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| Butcher's Dog 10 cover by Mark Bletcher |
With
those logistical pressures in mind, and having reached a landmark issue, we
have decided to put the Dog to bed for a year. Last night was both a
celebration of the most recent issue, and a reflection on where we started out.
It was really great to see new and old Dogs taking to the stage in Culture Lab,
Newcastle, and to have the magazine so enthusiastically supported by the
director of the Newcastle Centre for the Literary Arts, Sinéad Morrissey. The
night was filled with poetic delights from contributors past and present: Roy
Marshall had made a 400-mile round poetry road-trip from Leicester, bringing
co-editor James Giddings and reader Suzzanah Evans with him; and Staurt
Charlseworth had trained it up all the way from Norwich. Poets based in the
region who’ve appeared in previous issues – Bernadette McAloon, W.N. Herbert,
John Challis, Kris Johnson, Blaine Ward and Lisa Matthews – all read, and I was
introduced to some phenomenal new voices: Lauren Garland, Rob Walton and Rowena
Knight. For me, this is the ultimate joy of events like this: that they can
stimulate community in a way that is genuinely uplifting and thought-provoking
while resisting cliquiness.
Butcher’s
Dog now enters a fallow year, but I reckon when it returns, it will be as – if
not more – vital than five years ago when it was just a glint in a workshop
group’s eye. For now, do get your hands on a copy of the latest issue, and, as
Carolyn Jess-Cooke’s poem, ‘1
day old, 6.03 a.m.’, implores, ‘hold each other close’.
