Wednesday, February 12, 2025

Dream Diary Wednesday 12 February 1975

Wednesday 12 February 1975 

Dreamt of holding a recording session in front room. Ted there, Chris and cretinous friends. UEA residencies in Joe’s garden [next door].

Tuesday, February 11, 2025

Dream Diary Tuesday 11 February 1975

Tuesday 11 February 1975

Dreamt of Phillipa sexually assaulting me at a wall in crowded room.

Monday, February 10, 2025

Dream Diary Monday 10 February 1975

Monday 10 February 1975 

Mum and Dad come and visit me at UEA. Dad (walking with a stick). ‘Went to a dance the other day. Everybody was such a good dancer, and the professor made a good speech.’ (I’m walking through a downland track.) ‘You’d better teach them Chase Charlie!’ he said, running.

            Climbing up steps. I [illegible] up walls. Get Dad to remove an old mug and cup from a coal bunker (indoors, like in council flats).

I’m looking at the attic hatch.

[The dialogue from this was used as part of the introduction to the second issue of my tape magazine 1983 in 1976.]

Tuesday, February 04, 2025

Dream Diary Tuesday 4 February 1975

Tuesday 4 February 1975 

Dreamt of there being TWO me’s. As in ‘William Wilson’ by Poe. Also Lee Harwood admonished me.

Saturday, February 01, 2025

And now more prose is published in International Times (and I reflect on that too).

It never rains but it pours. This morning, I posted about my new prose pieces on Litter, which led me into a consideration of the varieties of non-fiction and non-non-fiction prose I have produced, with lots of links to online examples. That post may be read here: Pages: Three pieces of prose in Litter. Are they prose poems or not? In short, I back away ambivalently from the term ‘prose poetry’. 

As if in answer, but actually in further complication, I’ve had another prose piece published in International Times. Again, I must thank poetry editor Rupert Loydell for including this piece. It is entitled ‘A Royal Arbor of Loyal Poesie’. It's a piece written during the ceremony for the King’s Coronation last year (was it?). In a way it continues the tone of the last poem in British Standards; in another way it doesn’t. It is not based on sonnets, it is in prose, and it is a wild piece of satire, slightly more narrative than the pieces in Litter.  

It may be read here: A Royal Arbor of Loyal Poesie | IT.

I’ve sat on the piece for some while because the (not my) King has been receiving cancer treatment, and I thought the gesture potentially dubious. I had the same problem with the sonnets of British Standards when Bo(ris Johnson) was in hospital with Covid. If either of them had succumbed to illness (in a fatal sort of way) my poetry (or prose) would be buggered. Both recovered – and literary product may be released into the world without fear. So, roll on Britanocles the Great and Good (lines borrowed from Davenant, as lines were borrowed from Marvell; guess which poem of his? Hint below!).



My previous contribution to International Times may be read here (not prose, a poem about Ukraine and Gaza), with links to all the other writings I have published there, for which I am grateful. Pages: 'Pretend-sleep' published in International Times. There’s a video there, too.    

Three pieces of prose in Litter. Are they prose poems or not?

I’m very pleased that three pieces have been published by Litter: see here: 

Robert Sheppard - Three Prose-Poems | Litter

They seem to work quite well together, though ‘The Wager’ was written after the other two, which belong to a cluster of prose pieces called ‘The Weekend of Miracles’, but ‘The Wager’ seems not out of place here. You’ll notice that the pieces are dubbed ‘Prose-Poems’, which both in my critical work (particularly with reference to the prose used by Roy Fisher and Lee Harwood) and in any delineation of my own work, is a term I’ve resisted. No, more than that: I don’t use it; I don’t see much use for it. I know the term is terribly popular at the moment, and there seems to be a lot of formal heart-searching, but I find this odd. I have simply thought of them as ‘poems’ or as ‘prose’ but never as the verbal hybrid. ‘The Ship’s Orchestra’ by Roy Fisher, or ‘The Old Bosham Birdwatch’ by Lee Harwood, or my own ‘Sudley’ (see below) seem to be ‘at home’ without the term, however unlocatable. I’m sure there is a phenomenological difference between reading a block of prose and a lineated poem, but I’m not sure what it is. In the late 1990s I wrote a kind of ‘lineated prose’ (as I called it), and both before that date (and after) I’ve written prose works like ‘The Cannibal Club’ and ‘Mesopotamia’ which are in prose (though they have an element of narrativity (and, at times, narrative) in them); but ‘Sudley’ (for example) doesn’t, and it’s sparing in these three new pieces, I think. Narrative is not the deciding factor, if one is needed, because my ‘verse-novel’ (out in November) can carry such things, and so does many a poem.

Nobody has commented much on my prose (I’m not talking about obvious non-fiction or fiction, of course), but I think there is something different from ‘poems’, by which I am knowingly, knottily, contradicting myself.

Healthily inconclusive as these remarks are, it just remains for me to thank Alan Baker for publishing this trio in Litter, and to point to online examples of, and references to, my past prose practices!    

[Note: see this post form tomorrow, as it were, in response to yet another and, again different, kind of prose being published, in International Times this time: Pages: And now more prose is published in International Times (and I reflect on that too) .]

My book of prose Unfinish, published by Veer is still available, and I describe it here (in academic terms):

Pages: My REF statement describing my Veer volume UNFINISH

I advertise it here, and indicate how it may be purchased:

Pages: Robert Sheppard New Book Out: Unfinish - prose from Veer Books

Some examples from the book itself appeared in Otoliths here:

https://the-otolith.blogspot.com/2015/01/robert-sheppard.html

And here’s the last state of my prose ‘Sudley’ which may one day be restored to its place in Unfinish:

Pages: Robert Sheppard: Sudley (remode of Sudley House)

An example of the 1990s lineated prose may be read here, ‘The Sacred Tanks of Dagenham’ from Twentieth Century Blues:

Pages: Robert Sheppard: The Sacred Tanks of Dagenham (re: History or Sleep, Selected Poems

An early example (printed here without italics) from the 1980s is the first two parts of ‘Schrage Musik’ from The Flashlight Sonata:

Pages: Schrage Musik (1986) - for my father.

 

Words Out of Time is narrative, but still not prose poetry: Buy Words Out of Time here.

And there is a supplement to its last part, ‘Work’, here:
http://robertsheppard.blogspot.com/2018/09/work-from-words-out-of-time-2017.html

Enjoy your poetry, prose, prose-poetry, and pieces, whatever you call them!

Dream Diary Saturday 1 February 1975

Saturday 1 February 1975 

Dopedream

Felt I was at home. Still do. Dream – reading paper. Picture of 20 year old beauty student (she was good looking) with a shot in her hand posing at a London football ground with Battersea Power Station in background. (Perhaps Tower of London too.) She was entry for putting the shot. ‘Millwall aren’t going to be too pleased!’ it commented.

Report in paper: Professor Bigsby will be teaching in Germany for a while and will be paid x francs and y marks. But as nobody knows what the exchange rate will be, nobody writing knows what he’ll be paid! Ha ha.


An introduction to the diary may be read here: Pages: Dream Diary 1975 Introduction to the project

Friday, January 31, 2025

Dream Diary Friday 31 January 1975

Friday 31 January 1975 

Got told off by Chris for not writing to him.

Thursday, January 30, 2025

Launch of Paul Robert Mullen's It's All Come Down to This, support and Q and A by me (set list)


The reading advertised above in Southport was to launch Paul's book. I wrote the introduction and I chaired a Q and A about the volume, and also read a short 10 minute set, along with others (including Alan Parry, the book's publisher, who read a long poem on masculinity, and Mary Earnshaw, a local poet, reading her 'conversations' with Leonard Cohen).  

I write about my Introduction (and therefore about the book!) here Pages: it's all come down to this by Paul Robert Mullen is out, with an introduction by me. and here: Pages: On a passage of Lutz Seiler and a lift from Billy Mills

Paul's book may be purchased here: it's all come down to this: a retrospective [selected poems & writings 1999-2024] - Paul Robert Mullen - The Broken Spine.


The venue, Royales, is a little gem in Southport and the vibe felt positive. Paul read well and our Q and A seemed to be coherent. We discussed how he felt about having such a big book out of 25 years' work. I particularly wanted to ask him about something I noticed, and commented upon in my introduction, about the clarity and imagistic acuity of his work and its contrary pull to withdrawal, leaving gaps for the reader, etc., and I quoted this enigmatic passage about poets from his 'Preface': 'Often wrapped up in webs of our own doing, we seek to unravel ourselves with explanations that, often, we're not prepared to deliver with any sort of direct and immediately decipherable intention.' I'm not sure we plumbed the depths of this one, but the importance of travel for his writing, the importance of music (and his knowing the difference between a poem and a song-lyric) followed. I noted that the prose pieces in the book move from being vignettes to short stories, and asked (offhand) whether he is writing a novel. He is! I was surprised to hear. A crazily-processed pic of our talk:




I read a short set, featuring the final poems in British Standards. 




As I read I indicated that I had serial problems stopping writing the book (the force of the political madness I was writing about) which is why the poem 'To Laughter' is followed by a section called 'After Laughter' which features the poems 'Afterword', 'After Image', 'Aftershock', and finally finally finally 'After Sheppard After Shelley: England in 2022', which got the book done!


 Here's a video (not from last night!) of me reading 'After Image'. 


The various stages of the 'ending' of the book may be read about; it's quite a journey, and pretty funny as I try to divest my work of Bo(ris Johnson) in a number of posts on this blog. Unlike some of my work, the whole book was revealed as I progressed on these 'Pages'. Here's a few of the 'endings': for to end yet again!

The first is here: I said goodbye to Bo(ris), here, with a poem:

https://robertsheppard.blogspot.com/2022/08/final-extra-last-poem-of-english-strain.html

The second here:

Pages: Goodbye to Bo through the Medium of Jake Thackray’s masterpiece (not a book review) (robertsheppard.blogspot.com)

And then, here, finally, finally finally, here here here: Pages: Robert Sheppard: A final final poem for British Standards! But, of course, it wasn't the final final. I think this is:

Pages: The Horrible Thought that Bo mioght be back: only The Bard could save me now! Though I do leave open a fourth book of sonnets if Bo ever returns to frontline politics. Good help us, we've enough with convicted felon Trump at the moment.

I had to leave to catch the train (and bus) to get home and thus missed the music. I think Paul played. He also has an album on the way. Talented lad, that Paul. A good friend, and for the record, a former MA student in Creative Writing at Edge Hill where I taught him. He was part of a cohort where nearly everybody was a Dylan fan and a whole load of us went to see The Man at the (then) Echo Arena. Paul recommends the new film.  

Oh, and here's a report on the first Broken Spine reading, in March 2020, days before the lockdown. That seemed a different world, and here's a glimpse of it: Pages: Robert Sheppard: The Broken Spine reading, Southport (set list).


Dream Diary Thursday 30 January 1975

Thursday 30 January 1975 

Dreamt that bloke next door (Lennon, N40 [student block, Norwich]) smiled and I talked to him. I was selling things.

[Years later he’s the model for the political neighbour in my short story ‘Love Life’. See 'The Only Life' by Robert Sheppard (41 pages) | Knives Forks and Spo]

Monday, January 27, 2025

Dream Diary Monday 27 January 1975

 Monday 27 January 1975

David, Me, and an unidentified girl walking down by a rough seashore. He disappears. She too. David has subtly left me to my masturbation. There is a tower there. Water sprays in. Suddenly a strange wave appears, bursting on the top [of the tower. There’s a diagram]. It falls through the tower to the ground as fire. I think David is inside. 

David on phone with his mother, trying to phone his father. When he gets through he talks but I ring the phone off. I apologise; he accepts my excuse of an accident. They then forget the phone number because his dad changes his job so often.

An exterior scene of Southwick Square launderette. 


Wednesday, January 22, 2025

Dream Diary Wedneday 22 January 1975

 Wednesday 22 January 1975

 Mother is to be hanged. (Hawthorne.)

            Driving around in car with Dad. She is in an estate of ruined houses, worn smooth like Yves Tanguy objects. An estate of dead houses with deadsky above.

Monday, January 20, 2025

Dream Diary Monday 20 January 1975

Monday 20 January 1975 

With Tony, looking at pictures of Student Power of 3A.

Student Power of 3A. [This was a real thing. See my 1969 diary: Pages: Wednesday 19th November 1969: and here: Pages: Tuesday 25th November 1969: and other posts from around that time.]

Sunday, January 19, 2025

Dream Diary Sunday 19 January 1975

Sunday 19 January 1975

In some sort of queue. Turning, I recognise Paul (balding). Then on beach with Paul’s friend. They say Josie Dunn’ll be coming. I rush to catch a train.

            Bruce Forsyth or Tony put in jail for a long time.

            My girlfriend goes to buy sensual underwear.

 

 

Climbing a ladder to get across railway; boy on top topples it. I yell

            and WAKE UP.



Saturday, January 18, 2025

Dream Diary Saturday 18 January 1975

Saturday 18 January 1975 

Somebody told me I was going bald.

            Dad nearly caught me looking at dirty magazines.

            Rhubarb.

Thursday, January 16, 2025

Dream Diary Thursday 16 January 1975

Thursday 16 January 1975

Dreamt of TRUDY. I leant forward to kiss her, but she tried to put me off but finally succumbed.

            Coincidence: ‘If You are But a Dream’ by Frank Sinatra on tape as I write!



Wednesday, January 15, 2025

Reviews of British Standards

I'm pleased to say that there has been a positive review of the third part of The English Strain project, British Standards, which was published late last year. It is by Billy Mills and he reviews it with the experience of having reviewed the first two volumes. Here's his account of those volumes: The English Strain and Bad Idea by Robert Sheppard: A Review – Elliptical Movements. 'This third and final volume focuses on the Romantic period and is structured as a number of sets of poems writing through well-known, and some not so well known, sonnets of the era, much like a jazz musician reimagining standard songs (one of the layers on which the book title operates).' 

'The tone is wildly satiric, as far from Wordsworth as one might imagine,' he says, before plunging into an account of how I have variously transposed Romantic sonnets. 'Sheppard moves towards a more measured mode, the humour giving way as the poetry realises the limitations of satire in the face of the unthinkable, which requires a different response: "Not everything true is funny. Laughter is slaughter".' I'm glad he registers this shift, which I try to reflect on performing the poems, a shift I'm not sure an audience follows (retaining the stuff they've laughed at. 'Now that he has reimagined and expanded the entire canon of the English sonnet,' Billy notes, too kindly, 'I can’t wait to see where he takes us next.' Yes, where next? Thanks for the push, Billy!

The review may be read here: (it's the second of my two books): The English Strain and Bad Idea by Robert Sheppard: A Review – Elliptical Movements.

The book may be purchased here:  https://www.shearsman.com/store/Robert-Sheppard-British-Standards-p661920471

And I say a little about the book here (and there are a lot of posts on this blog about the collection; its progress was exhaustively chronicled): Pages: British Standards published by Shearsman - out now



Dream Diary Wednesday 15 January 1975

Wednesday 15 January 1975 

Woke up with ‘MILTON’ on my lips.

Monday, January 13, 2025

Dream Diary Monday 13 January 1975

Monday 13 January 1975 

Stephen in wheelchair. He runs but feels numbness. He’s been a terminal cancer patient for years.

            I pity him. He meets another like him.

Sunday, January 12, 2025

Dream Diary Sunday 12 January 1975

Sunday 12 January 1975

Julian and his wife. [Southwick publicans] Talk of ghosts. She goes white.

            ‘What, upstairs?’

            ‘Yes.’

            Julian says it’s not at the Pilot, but at their training house for managers. Which is Grandma Sheppard’s old house in Melrose Avenue.

Friday, January 10, 2025

Dream Diary Friday 10 January 1975

Friday 10 January 1975 

Talking to Maggie in a pub. Getting angry like I do at her for smoking, about the political torture abroad.

Wednesday, January 08, 2025

Dream Diary Wednesday 8 January 1975

Wednesday 8 January 1975 

Fighting for the Anglo-Saxons against the Normans. Down a ditch [diagram of ‘Me’ in a ditch and the two armies at each side]. Had to get back without getting killed. Go, I lit a fire, disappearing under cover of smoke.

Tuesday, January 07, 2025

Dream Diary Tuesday 7 January 1975

Tuesday 7 January 1975 

Granny here. We say we want to watch a programme on the TV. She says she ‘doesn’t mind watching intelligent stuff’ though she’d rather watch ‘the funny coloured man on the other side’.

            I go along another path to avoid washing up.

            I’m at a crossroads. Forward the road continues. I turn right. I see a mud path through woods leading up a steep path to top of hill.

            Could be half a mile high.

Sunday, January 05, 2025

Dream Diary Sunday 5 January 1975

Sunday 5 January 1975 

Walking through brothel area of town, I see a man under a bus shelter with an erect penis; it’s hard, looks hairy. Nearing, I see it is tobacco. There are lots of [derogatory word for gays].

            Somewhere ‘ten little black children’ singing praises to the Union Jack.

            Jonathan [cousin] confesses as to having opened somebody else’s presents from [Uncle] Bob.

            Following a female to my room (at university) she is dressed in white (like ‘Vision’ [a poem of mine]). I can’t climb as fast as her. She shouts back. Suddenly there is a small railway crossing. I get caught. She doesn’t. She lobs me a coat and goes her separate. I go alone to my block. Vague now. David and Paulus in there somewhere, I think.

Saturday, January 04, 2025

Dream Diary Saturday 4 January 1975

Saturday 4 January 1975 

In a Victorian room, a waiting room for my room upstairs. But the Norwich Hell’s Angels [actually called Satan’s Slaves!] are out there in the lift or upstairs.

            In a garden David Findon is gardener, in shorts, working at an incredible pace.

            Waiting again for the lift, but in a smaller, different room.

            Look in the glass and see TWO reflections of myself.

Friday, January 03, 2025

Dream Diary Friday 3 January 1975

Friday 3 January 1975 

Two doors. David or Chris (and/or possibly) goes to one. It opens. A prostitute. I go to the other. David or Chris asks for a cup of coffee. She laughs. He goes in. I knock on the other door. Another prostitute. I go in. I do not want a cup of coffee.

Thursday, January 02, 2025

Dream Diary Thursday 2 January 1975

Thursday 2 January 1975

Holding a baby.

            Aunt Marjorie laughs.

Wednesday, January 01, 2025

Dream Diary 1975 Wednesday 1 January 1975

 Dream Diary 1975

 


On the night following the day of

Wednesday 1 January 1975

Co[incidence, not a dream, I think]: Paulus said ‘What do you need an umbrella for in the middle of winter?’ and a light shower started – looking briefly – as he said it. | Taping Tony’s new year eve poem yesterday. | Dreams: Chris and I in some sort of dark graveyard. I lie on a grave with four names from four different periods embossed upon it. Chris is standing. Then a group of fourth year girls – two black girls on swings – it is some sort of art lesson. I talk. I am attracted to one of them (a white girl) behind me. Then Mr G. pushing an old figure in a wheelchair pushes his way through the crowd. Then I’m alone on a bus. (Going up Overhill?) (Was the playground in Downsway?) Also somebody said ‘Ezra Pound is rubbish.’

An introduction to the diary may be read here: Pages: Dream Diary 1975 Introduction to the project