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

Reviews of my edition of the Selected Poems of Mary Robinson

ONE 

I’m pleased to say there has been a first review of my Shearsman edition of Mary Robinson’s poems, by MC Caseley in the very solid online magazine Litter, which I link to in my ‘blogroll’, and which I recommend. (For example, there’s a great review of Sarah Crewe’s brilliant new book, which I saw her reading from last night, and I’ll be sharing an online reading with her next week!).

Back to Mary. I particularly liked MC Caseley’s paragraph on ‘Sappho and Phaon’, which he (correctly) regards as the masterwork here, and says, ‘Much of the value of this collection and reassessment, however, must rest on her sonnet sequence Sappho and Phaon, published in 1796, the first such since the Renaissance. This is undoubtedly powerful and revolutionary, taking freely from Pope and Ovid, but imposing a narrative frame around the events.’ (This seems more succinct than my introduction.) He continues, ‘In her introduction, Robinson also places Sappho among the other lovers traditionally associated with the sonnet form, such as Petrarch and Laura – a confident act of rewriting and appropriation,’ which is also nicely put. He calls my introduction ‘helpful and comprehensive’, which is gratifying. MC Caseley finds the early work too Augustan and Mary’s epic ‘The Progress of Liberty’ too Wordsworthian, but these reflect, of course, the poetic paradigms she worked between. I think there is a case for ‘The Progress of Liberty’, but it is good to see this review of my considerable and (I must admit) slightly surprising labours, particularly this week in which I have finally seen the three portraits of Mary Robinson in the Wallace Collection! So, thanks to MC Caseley and to Alan Baker, the editor of Litter.

Read the whole review HERE: Review - The Selected Poems of Mary Robinson | Litter

TWO

The second review is in a print magazine: David Caddy, review of Mary Robinson’s Selected Poems edited by Robert Sheppard in ‘Afterword’, Tears in the Fence 82, Autumn 2025. It is largely a descriptive notice of the book, its scope, a little of her life (which is, as Caddy says, 'extraordinary') with a reminder of her importance as 'a versatile poet', which is apt. Thanks for this unexpected review. 

The book may be purchased HERE: Mary Robinson - Selected Poems (shearsman.com) 

 

There’s quite a lot about Robinson on this blog, too, branching from a hubpost, here:  Pages: Selecting for a Selected: The Poems of Mary Robinson 1

It’s worth saying I got ‘into’ Mary Robinson during the composition of my transpositions of Romantic sonnets, and ‘Sappho and Phaon’, which, as I say, Caseley rightly sees as a highlight of her work (which is voluminous), was subject to my satirical method in ‘Tabitha and Thunderer’. It’s a parody in some ways of the Ovid-Pope-Robinson narrative of Sappho and her obsessive love for hapless Phaon, but I refused to follow the sequence's tragic ending. Tabitha/Mary/Sappho takes back control of the plot, and the poem, and ‘Thunderer’/Phaon (and dare I say /Boris Johnson) is rebuffed, big time. I write about my poem here, Pages: My Transpositions of Mary Robinson's sonnets 'Tabitha and Thunderer' are now complete (hub post), a post posted seemingly well before this present volume was a twinkle in Shearsman editor Tony Frazer’s eye.

He suggested the task to me, after spotting ‘Tabitha and Thunderer’ in the manuscript of British Standards, which he has also published. (See here: Pages: British Standards published by Shearsman - out now; this post has full contents and a video of a sample poem.) I dithered for a while (not being a critic of Romantic literature, but having read a fair bit, not least of all in preparing British Standards) - and then said 'Yes!'

Details of Readings this Autumn (set lists and comments)

Readings this Autumn (set lists and comments)

During this autumn I have had, to my delight, six readings to perform, some full readings, others short contributions to larger events. (There were some earlier in the year too, bucking the post-Covid trend of fewer reading opportunities, though two of them were online, as was one earlier this year.) They are all quite different, with different work read, often from different books, or from no books (yet)! Sometimes with, or alongside Patricia Farrell, sometimes not.

As they 'passed', I converted my announcements of them on this post into 'set lists' and commentaries. I must admit it's rather taken up more of my time preparing than I expected, and time away from writing. I'm sure Taylor Swift thought the same about the Eras Tour!  

*

1. Liverpool 24^th October 2024: for Liverpool Poetry Space hosted by The Open Eye Gallery (on the dockside). 

I read with Mandy Coe (I don't know how I haven't met her before) and Maria Isakova-Bennett (who I have seen develop as a poet over the the last decade into a fine writer who always keeps the analogy of her visual art practice to the fore). Eleanor Rees was ill, unfortunately. So we had to add an extra 5 minutes to our readings. 

I decided to launch British Standards (the first of two launches) and I read a bunch of Wordsworth 'transpositions', including this one:

. Then my version of Southey's 'Poem on the Slave Trade', which led, the slavery theme continuing, onto my versions of Mary Robinson, a few verses of 'Tabitha and Thunderer' (there was to be more of her at my November 12th London reading, see below); a bunch of John Clare; and the final final poem of the book, 'After Shelley' as I called it, slightly shortening its title.  

This seemed to go down well. Lots of laughter I was informed by some friends in the sizeable audience. However, the set was designed for sudden swings of mood, so that we were suddenly thinking about slavery or Covid deaths amid the capering of Bo, as the hubris of Brexit hit the mismanagement of public health during the Pandemic.  

2. London: Friday, 25^th October 2024 

The Cock Tavern, 23 Phoenix Rd, London NW1

Friday night, it was great to see so many old friends and comrades of our London days, all still thrusting and vital. Here's a brief itinerary of the evening, mainly launches. 

Part One

Bob Cobbing/Robert Sheppard, Collaborations (Veer/Writers Forum): performed by Patricia Farrell and me. We read 'Blatent Blather/Virulent Whoops', my 2001 collaboration with Cobbing. Thanks to Patricia for all the rehearsing and hoarse throats!  

Karen MacCormack, Quaquaversal (Veer): a fascinating unwriting of an earlier text into non-existent words, which were then discovered (mostly) to mean something in other languages. 

Steve McCaffery, Alice through the Working Class (Blazevox) (What a great title!) A wonderful or outwonderlandish version of Alice.

Break

Ulli Freer, Transition Pulse (Veer): Ulli pulsed this way through this new text, somewhat bucolic in places, excellent as ever.

Adrian Clarke, Walhalla (Veer): a few sequences from this excellent new book, plus a new sequence inspired by Bob Cobbing's decaying photocopier, now in Hugh Metcalfe's garden! This was in part an introduction to another 2 books relaunched that evening: Bob Cobbing, the five vowels & Third ABC in Sound (Veer/Writers Forum), two of his major works back in print. Get on the Veer website and find all these books (and more): Veer Books. (I wrote about the 'Third ABC' some 19 years ago on these pages: here: Pages: Robert Sheppard: Bob Cobbing: Two Sequences )

Although my Collaborations with Bob Cobbing was published by Veer in 2021, there wasn’t a launch (Covid, again) of this splendid box of pamphlets, reprints of Codes and Diodes and Blatent Blather/Virulent Whoops from 1991 and 2001, respectively. On the box: Pages: COLLABORATIONS (Bob Cobbing - Robert Sheppard) published in a box by Veer - out now. There is an earlier performance on video here (somewhere in this Cobbing tribute: OR 35 | Bob Cobbing: a celebration | Videos | 

 

Here's a very short video of me demonstrating how the 'box' of Collaborations is constituted. (The new Third ABC of Sound is similarly in a box.)  

Saturday morning, bag pretty heavy with all the new Veer publications, Patricia and I walked to the Wallace Collection. They have 3 portraits of Mary Robinson:

 

Romney, Reynolds and Gainsborough (the latter a huge canvas). This was connected to my editing of her work in Mary Robinson Selected Poems and my transposing of it in British Standards. Other specialities: a wonderful Poussin, two Rembrandts, some Boningtons, and an Icelandic drinking horn! Back to Euston... Liverpool ... home.

3. Wednesday November 6^th: 7.30. An ONLINE reading from Aquifer Books

I read one part of my finely-designed Aquifer volume, Doubly Stolen Fire, introducing 'Malcolm Lowry's Land' with these words: ‘My book, Doubly Stolen Fire, which I’m so pleased Lyndon has published, is an exploration of various modes of authorship: actual and fictional. The last part, though, collects my contributions to the Liverpool celebrations of the Merseyside born author of Under the Volcano, Malcolm Lowry, [like this one 2024: Pages: The Lowry Lounge 2024 - an account and links] and I’m going to read most of one of these. It tracks a 1979 notebook which itself tracks my visit to Lowry’s grave in Sussex. [Holds it up]. It mimics Lowry’s own writerly methods as it re-narrates the notes for a long-abandoned poem.’

Details of the whole book: Pages: Reviews of my book DOUBLY STOLEN FIRE (robertsheppard.blogspot.com)

This Zoom reading was of new and forthcoming collections by Sarah Crewe, Mélisande Fitzsimons, Allen Fisher as well as myself. More info at: Glasfryn Project. It was good to hear the other readers, and I had Sarah's book to hand, to follow her reading. 

4. London 12th November 2024: 7.30: A Shearsman launch of 4 new Shearsman books. 

This reading took place at the Swedenborg Hall, 20/21 Bloomsbury Way, London WC1A 2TH, hosted by Tony Frazer, publisher of Shearsman Books. The building has a painting of the religious sage painted by P. Louthenburg (the subject of one of Mary Robinson's finer earlier poems, and the designer of 'light shows' from when she was an actor). I noticed too late to tell the audience!

I read from British Standards but pointed to The Necessity of Poetics AND to my edition of the Selected Poems of Mary Robinson.

My notes and set list

I’m very greedy – but very grateful (to Tony) for Shearsman publishing three books this year. I will only read from one of them, but I’ll sketch links between them. The Necessity of Poetics, which collects various works on, of, about and around ‘poetics’ as a speculative and anticipatory writerly discourse, also contains a treatise on poetic rhythm, an inaugural lecture, notes on the meaning of form, and some ancient documents which stretch back to the 1980s and 90s, but it comes up to date with a couple of pieces on the poetics of the book I will be reading from, British Standards.

British Standards, book three of ‘The English Strain’ project, was completed in September 2022. Brexit was originally the continuing theme of the project, but in early 2020 the Pandemic intervened to alter its trajectory, although the government's enthusiasm for the former contributed to its tardiness in the face of the latter, as celebratory hubris collided with the failure of Johnson’s government (he’s called Bo in my poems) to take sensible public health measures. Formally speaking, these are transpositions of sonnets of the Romantic period (Wordsworth, Keats and Shelley, but also Mary Robinson and Hartley Coleridge, and others, as you’ll hear), and I’m paying faithless homage to it.

I read three 'Wordsworth' poems. This one below (shown here from the pages of Shearsman magazine), and on video.

Then 'O Friend I know not which way I must look'. (See the other video above for a reading of it.) Followed by 'Vanguard of Liberty, Ye Men of Kent.' 

Then a shift to Robert Southey and his 'Poem on the Slave Trade'.

After that, I said (more or less): 

The third book launching today is my edition of the poems of Mary Robinson, which might seem a surprising departure for me, until it’s realised that I first came to her work through writing a transposition of her 1796 sonnet sequence ‘Sappho and Phaon’, an extraordinary work that (even at the time) was read as analogical of her relationship with Banastre Tarleton, Liverpool slaver referenced in the street name of the previous poem. I call them Tabitha and Thunderer, but Thunderer seems to become Boris Johnson at several points. Mary called herself ‘The English Sappho’ on occasions. My sequence is a corona, 14 sonnets, with a volta at which I’ll pause, to change the hapless narrative, to allow her, in Brexit-speak, to ‘take back control’. Sappho is hetereosexual in Ovid’s version of her life that Mary followed, though she has a troupe of women following her: they become the weather girls, registry girls and Mamas of this poem, written just after the first lockdown, summer 2020. Here is a video of me reading one of the sonnet-verses, the one which refers to Mary-Tabitha-Sappho having read Coleridge's 'Kubla Khan' long before it was published.

I finished with one of the 'final' final poems to the book: 'After Shelley, After Sheppard, which I wrote about when I wrote it, here: Pages: Robert Sheppard: A final final poem for British Standards! With pictures of some of the poem's weird contents.

Details of all three books: Pages: British Standards published by Shearsman - out now (robertsheppard.blogspot.com) and Pages: Selecting for a Selected: The Poems of Mary Robinson 1 (robertsheppard.blogspot.com).

Details of two of the books: Pages: British Standards and The Necessity of Poetics published simultaneously (robertsheppard.blogspot.com)

 

I was reading with Elaine Randell, which was very exciting. I'm never ceased to be moved by her accounts of working with children, AND by her affective lyricism. She was launching her Collected Poems. 

It was good to see some old friends, including those not associated with the poetry world.

5. Patricia and I had a very small part in From the Grooves of Vinyl at the Bluecoat on Saturday 16th November 2024 (Nobody said, but 15th November was Phil's birthday!)

As a tribute to Philip Jeck who died in 2022, the Bluecoat presented an evening of film and performance in celebration of the life and work of this remarkable composer and artist who wrought exquisite sounds from the worn grooves of old records. [I'm quoting the copy for the evening, and amending it.] An internationally renowned pioneer of experimental ‘turntablism’, he brought old record players and vinyl together with electronic effects to create expansive sonic landscapes.

Throughout his career Philip worked with dance and theatre makers, visual artists and musicians and composers across the musical spectrum and toured internationally. He was also a lover of poetry (he came to a lot of the readings I organised or gave.) Over three decades, his work was released and promoted by the experimental electronic music label, Touch.

Philip also had a long association with the Bluecoat and this special tribute included a screening of an excellent film by Gina Czarnecki of him performing in the intimate surroundings of a friend’s kitchen. (This was fascinating, not least of all because I was there, and have my own memories of that performance.)

There was also the launch of a double CD tribute to Philip collated by Touch, and performances from experimental composers Chandra Shukla (US), excellent sitar and electronics work, Benjamin Duvall and Andrew Hunt (Liverpool), who (Ben told me) have a complete album of work improvised with Phil in preparation. (They are half of the band Ex-Easter Island Head. Poets Patricia Farrell and Robert Sheppard briefly read (although Patricia ‘appeared’ via tape). The bar was open till 11pm, with a disco-banger DJ set from Bryan Biggs (and then off with Bryan to the Grapes for a last two).

Click here for further information on Touch, its work with Philip and his releases.

This was a moving evening, particularly when Bryan and Mary Prestidge introduced the event, and later, when Jon Wozencroft and Mike Harding from Touch introduced the new album (which I have bought and am much looking forward to). The music was inspiring, whether on film, tape or live. 

Patricia’s poem was written especially for the event, and was untitled.

I introduced my piece, ‘Spectres of Breath’ with something like these words:

‘I’m going to read a text I wrote for Phil’s birthday in 2012. It comes out of a conversation we had about writing about music, music journalism in particular. About that time I was subscribing to The Wire – and I was particularly taken by the short reviews which tried to describe the nature and quality of certain musics in very few words. Partly mimicking this facility, possibly purloining the odd phrase here and there, and condensing descriptions and coining the odd neologism, I proceeded to compose a compilation album in words. It is not – even in the passage that mentions ‘styluses scraped’ – an attempt to describe Phil’s own music. After all it is a ‘compilation’, though the imaginary musicians of this imagined music are unnamed. As we reach side B (how could this not be a vinyl record?) the descriptions become more synaesthetic, relating to more senses than sound. I’m not being entirely serious, which is fitting since Phil was the funniest man I’ve ever known, as well as a musical genius.’

It seemed to go down well, particularly with the two guys from Touch, for whom such language is a constant torture! The poem may be read here, after my memoir of Philip: Pages: Philip Jeck 2022. When I said ‘genius’ (Bryan also used the word) I mean ‘genius’. 

6: 2nd December : Online Reading by Paul Robert Mullen with Guests:

a landmark celebration of Paul Robert Mullen’s work as we launch it’s all come down to this, a powerful retrospective spanning 25 years of poetry and prose from one of contemporary and independent literature’s most distinctive voices. This special online event will bring together readers, writers, and fans for an unforgettable evening of live readings, conversation, and community.

Hosted by: Alan Parry, Editor-in-Chief, The Broken Spine

• Readings by Paul Robert Mullen: Experience selected works from it’s all come down to this as Paul takes us through his journey from 1999 to 2024, offering insights and reflections on his evolution as a poet. This he did through short poems and a long extract from a long poem 'Vinyl Redux'. 
• Open Mic with Special Guests: specially invited readers offered an intimate chance to hear voices that resonate with Paul’s own approach to life and poetry. In my case, I decided (as I did when I last read 'with' Paul, pre-Covid, see here: Pages: Robert Sheppard: The Broken Spine reading, Southport (set list)) to read poems about music (possibly amassing towards a collection), and (I'm certain) influenced by his 'Vinyl Redux'. I read a few sections from 'Tone Poem: Starlight and Stardust', the sections relating to recent albums by Fred Hirsch, James Brandon Lewis, Brad Mehldau, Donny McCaslin, Shakti, and Miho Hazama's m_unit.    

A fine ending to a mini-tour!

Locating Robert Sheppard: email: robertsheppard39@gmail.com; website: www.robertsheppard.weebly.com NEW, note: follow me on Bluesky not on X , at https://bsky.app/profile/robertsheppard.bsky.social

British Standards and The Necessity of Poetics published simultaneously

 

If you follow this blog, you will know that I have two new books out, but you might not have known they were published simultaneously by Shearsman - and I’d like you to know about them both. One, British Standards, is a volume of my transpositions of Romantic sonnets, the second, The Necessity of Poetics, a collection of various writings about, on or of poetics as a writerly discourse. 

Here I 'fake' unbox them. 

You might want to buy them both. The best link for that is 

Sheppard, Robert (shearsman.com) That's 'my' page, with all of my books from Shearsman. The two new ones are on page two. 

There is information on both books, and sample pages. 

More homely are my posts on this blog, one for British Standards here: Pages: British Standards published by Shearsman - out now (robertsheppard.blogspot.com)

And another for The Necessity of Poetics here: Pages: The Necessity of Poetics - out now! (robertsheppard.blogspot.com)

The volumes meet in the first essay in The Necessity of Poetics, which is the poetics of, or for, the poems in British Standards. Otherwise, they are quite distinct. 

The Proof is in the Post (not the pudding!)

 

I can never muster the enthusiasm that I see in the faces of younger writers with their earliest books, as they open a box of books. We didn't have videos in those days (very little film of linguistically innovative poets at all, which is why I loved posting videos of the 'English Strain' poems as I wrote them, see below). I have still some proof reading to do and then British Standards and The Necessity of Poetics will both be available from Shearsman. In fact, they (and all my other books) are advertised and ready for order here anyway: Sheppard, Robert (shearsman.com)). 

This video shows me juggling with Keats, both with one of his sonnets, and, in performance, with his life mask. Enjoy. You may get British Standards here  Shearsman Books buy Robert Sheppard - When Bad Times Made for Good Poetry, (despite the title on the link, and you can read how it felt in the middle of compsing these most contemporary of poems, here: Pages: Robert Sheppard: 14 Standards from British Strandards is complete as one sonnet appears at the virtual WOW Festival 2020 (hub post) 

My edition of the Selected Poems of Mary Robinson is out now!

The Selected Poems of Mary Robinson is now out from Shearsman – edited by me!

Publisher’s details HERE: Mary Robinson - Selected Poems (shearsman.com) 

The publisher's sample of the book may be read here: mary-robinson-selected-poems-sampler.pdf (cdn-website.com)

 

Mary Robinson was born in 1758 in Bristol, and was a poet, novelist, dramatist, journalist and actor. Tutored by both Garrick and Sheridan, she had a short but dazzling career on the London stage, where she was spotted by the young Prince Regent and became his mistress. The resultant scandal was hot gossip and salacious news, brought to a new reading public by the institution of the daily paper, for which, ironically, Robinson would later write.

 

Although she had always written, her main literary career dates from a serious accident in 1783, which left her permanently disabled. In the 1790s, she produced most of her best work, with an ever-accelerating productivity, in verse and fiction, until her death in 1800 (she wrote 70 poems in that last year). Once associated with fashionable Della Cruscan poetry, in the final years of her life she was in contact with S.T. Coleridge and William Godwin, representatives of vanguards in both politics and literature. After her death, her work suffered from an almost-complete obscurity, aided and abetted by Victorian revulsion at her scandalous past. This position has now changed, and there has been considerable interest in her life, her writing, and the connection between the two, in recent years. (My fuller life may be read here: Pages: Selecting for a Selected: The Poems of Mary Robinson 2: The Life of Mary Robinson (robertsheppard.blogspot.com).)

The range of Robinson’s poetic work is astonishing: from impassioned lyrics to ‘Lyrical Tales’, from sonnets to odes, from political poetry, reacting both for and against the French Revolution, to representations of various outsider figures (slaves, madmen and political exiles), from jocular parodies of contemporary ‘Grub Street’ writers to satires on the callousness of the rich, fashionable and famous. Whether speaking or writing in her own voice (serially bidding farewell to her cropped haired lover from Liverpool, Tarleton) or in the voice of others (dramatising the distress of Marie Antoinette, for instance) she was a poetic innovator, as capable as handling Popean couplets as the freshest blank verse.

 

I’ve tried to select the best of Mary Robinson’s poetry for a general audience, while attempting to demonstrate the range of her work. I include the complete text of Sappho and Phaon (1796), which was the first sonnet sequence to be published in English since the Renaissance, and which I first encountered writing ‘Tabitha and Thunderer’ for the British Standards part of my ‘English Strain’ project, which will also be published by Shearman. I write about it here: Pages: My 'Tabitha and Thunderer' is published in Blackbox Manifold (robertsheppard.blogspot.com). I relate her late work, particularly the forceful political blank verse epic ‘The Progress of Liberty’, to the emergence of the first generation of Romantics, upon whom she was a notable influence.

Here I read one of the sonnets that I 'used' for 'Tabitha and Thunderer', from Sappho and Phaon, poem eight. 

The working and thinking notes for my ‘life’ and my ‘introduction’ (and some of my choices for selection and de-selection) begin in a strand of posts from the hubpost here: Pages: Selecting for a Selected: The Poems of Mary Robinson 1 (robertsheppard.blogspot.com). It might be thought a little odd that I would edit such a volume, but, after having written ‘Tabitha and Thunderer’, subtitled ‘an intervention in the work of Mary Robinson’, I found myself, at Tony Frazer’s urging, embarking on this editorial project. Having just completed the editing with Kelvin Corcoran of the New Collected Poems of Lee Harwood, I might have needed a rest – but fools rush in! I’m glad I’ve done it, as a poet selecting another poet, partly as a critic, but not a critic of Romantic poetry (although after researching for, and writing, British Standards I did a lot of reading on the Romantics, focusing on their sonnets, which included Robinson, left out Blake and Byron, but was a real education, as it happens). I write about British Standards as it progressed here:  Pages: Robert Sheppard: 14 Standards from British Strandards is complete as one sonnet appears at the virtual WOW Festival 2020 (hub post).

British Standards will be out soon(ish). But back to Mary Robinson: Mary Robinson - Selected Poems (shearsman.com). She's not going to smile until you buy this book!

 

Four poems from British Standards published in Shearsman 137/138

 

I have four poems published in the latest handsome Shearsman, for which many thanks to editor Tony Frazer. They are from British Standards, the third part of my ‘English Strain’ project, mainly sonnets transposed from the ‘English’ tradition. This part contains versions of Wordsworth’s sonnets, but they also ‘document’ the transition from the hubris of brexit (exemplified in the four poems here) to the criminal incompetence of the mismanagement of Coronavirus (exemplified in the later poems of the sequence, though the subject is raised in the last poem here, as on the videos you may link to below). The motif that Britain (particularly Kent) has been converted into a huge dogging site as a brexit 'benefit' is one of the comic recurrences of the sequence. It seems history now, but here's a post from that happy time: Pages: Happy Dogging New Year via a statement from Go and a transposition of a Wordsworth sonnet (robertsheppard.blogspot.com)

Shearsman 137/138 published October 2023. Paperback, 102pp, 8.5 x 5.5ins, £9.95 / $17

ISBN 9781848619104

The second double issue of Shearsman magazine for 2023 features poetry by Serena Alagappan, Wendy Allen, Mark Byers, Elizabeth Chadwick Pywell, Peter Dukes, David Dumouriez, Marie-Louise Eyres, Dominic Fisher, Mark Goodwin, Amlanjyoti Goswami, John Greening, Finn Haunch, Neal Hoskins, Fiona Larkin, Peter Larkin, Rupert M Loydell, Valeria Melchioretto, Eliza O’Toole, John Phillips, Amber Rollinson, D’or Seifer, Natalie Shaw, and Judi Sutherland; plus translations of Kjell Espmark (by Robin Fulton Macpherson), Attila József (by Ágnes Lehóczky & Adam Piette), Lutz Seiler (by Stefan Tobler), and Roelof Ten Napel (by Judith Wilkinson). And my sonnets…

You may buy it here: Shearsman 137 / 138

https://www.shearsman.com/store/Shearsman-137-138-p573171515

Lots to enjoy here. I’ve had a quick read and a poem by Trevor Joyce and translations of Lutz Seiler are good. Both favourites of mine. 

Back to my dark pages, and to other of my sonnets.

Here’s a video of another Wordsworth transposition, and a text about it: Transposed! Robert Sheppard – Zwiebelfish

Here’s two more: Pages: Robert Sheppard: Two transpositions of Wordsworth from British Standards published on International Times

And a post (with a video) about the last of these 14 poems based on Wordsworth’s 1802-3 sonnets. I write about all of them, and how they fit into the (still-unpublished) volume British Standards, here: Pages: Transpositions of Hartley Coleridge: the end of British Standards (and of The English Strain project) (robertsheppard.blogspot.com) – and how the ‘English Strain’ project fits together. See The English Strain (Shearsman, 2021) and Bad Idea (Knives Forks and Spoons). I’m over it now! Hope you enjoy them!

*

Locating Robert Sheppard: email: robertsheppard39@gmail.com  (don’t use the Edge Hill or the supanet emails); website: www.robertsheppard.weebly.com Follow on Twitter: Robert Sheppard (@microbius) / Twitter  latest blogpost: www.robertsheppard.blogspot.com

 

Two online reviews of New Collected Poems by Lee Harwood: links and comments

There have been two online reviews of Lee Harwood's New Collected Poems that Kelvin Corcoran and I edited earlier this year. It’s a big book and, I suspect, it will take most reviewers a long time to complete even their initial readings.

 

Billy Mills, in his review of New Collected Poems – Lee Harwood (eds. Sheppard and Corcoran). https://ellipticalmovements.wordpress.com/2023/03/30/lee-harwood-new-collected-poems-a-review/  30^th March 2023, was the first off the blocks (as Billy often is; I link to his blog on my blogroll to the right of this post, so you and I can keep pace with him). He tells us straight off:

'This new edition of Lee Harwood’s poems, edited by Kelvin Corcoran and Robert Sheppard, adds a not inconsiderable 200 pages to the 2004 collected edited by the poet himself. In part, this is due to the addition of the poet’s first collection, Title Illegible at the start and an additional 60-odd pages of post 2004 work. The remaining additions are poems excised by Harwood from the earlier book but here restored in their rightful chronological positions.'

In fact, there is one new section of work not collected in commercially-available book form. He notices how much of the book consists of work from the 1960s and he concentrates on this earlier work, while ‘my excuse’ – he does not need one – ‘is that there is a rare sense of consistent continuity about Harwood’s writing, with a kind of blueprint laid out in the work of the first 10 years which the later work builds on.’

Adam Piette, in his review of Lee Harwood New Collected Poems (and Mark Hyatt, with whom Lee's work has been associated before, in Geoffrey Thurley's forgotten critical book The Ironic Harvest) and Emma Bolland), published in Blackbox Manifold 30, https://blackboxmanifold.sites.sheffield.ac.uk/issues/issue-30_1/adampiettebm30 - takes a look at the poetry of plain statement and, in a long and detailed essay (it’s more than a review) says, ‘The plainstyle discovered here on the surfaces of the world is closer to post-Romantic practice, and is grounded in a ego-less ‘we’-persona that is constructed as though in touch with the powers of ‘this earth’, and with the ghosts of the dead ‘surrounding us with a tenderness’. Adam is talking about ‘The Long Black Veil’, Harwood’s long plainstyle (cavalier rather than puritan, in Lee’s own terms) notebook poem, a text I keep coming back to. (See here: Pages: Robert Sheppard: HMS Little Fox by Lee Harwood republished (My reading of 'The Long Black Veil') for what is basically an excerpt from my book The Poetry of Saying, which Adam mentions.) Notably, there’s hardly a metaphor in Harwood's piece.

Thanks to both writers for their time and attention to this volume!

Here’s a hub post about our new edition:

Pages: Lee Harwood New Collected Poems: the best audio and video recordings (robertsheppard.blogspot.com)

You may order New Collected Poems from Shearsman here: Lee Harwood - New Collected Poems (shearsman.com)

 My review of the earlier part of the ‘old’ Collected Harwood (2004), as it were,

http://robertsheppard.blogspot.co.uk/2005/12/robert-sheppard-review-of-harwoods.html
and a review of the rest of the book,
http://robertsheppard.blogspot.co.uk/2006/01/robert-sheppard-review-of-harwoods.html

are to be found at these links.

I will add other reviews here as and when. Or perhaps only the online ones, so you can link to them immediately.

 

*

Locating Robert Sheppard: email: robertsheppard39@gmail.com  website: www.robertsheppard.weebly.com Follow on Twitter: Robert Sheppard (@microbius) / Twitter  latest blogpost: www.robertsheppard.blogspot.com

 

The Poems of Mary Robinson 6: Lines to Maria, MY Beloved Daughter (1793) - deselected & a note about notes

This post: Pages: Robert Sheppard: Selected Poems (History or Sleep) - the de-selected poems and the next Pages: Robert Sheppard: How I selected History or Sleep: Selected Poems talk about the problems of putting together my Selected Poems, History or Sleep, still available from Shearsman. There are different problems in selecting the work of another poet, and I talk about some of the problems I had with the poems of Paul Evans, whose selected, The Door at Taldir is also published by Shearsman: Pages: Paul Evans' Selected Poems and Lee Harwood's Collected (robertsheppard.blogspot.com) . 

Now I am selecting poems by Mary Robinson, and I’ve been sharing some thoughts as well as very rough drafts of texts for the book's intro in various posts beginning here, where you will find links to all the other posts: Pages: Selecting for a Selected: The Poems of Mary Robinson 1 (robertsheppard.blogspot.com). (Also for Shearsman!) Do have a look after reading this one. 

One poem has been removed from my list already. This I’d hoped to keep, partly because another selected Robinson doesn’t have this poem in it. I have read all of Robinson’s poems in her 1806 three volume Poems, only to select many of the poems also in the Judith Pascoe selected (see my bibliography), although I have distinct plans for the long political poem ‘The Progress of Liberty’, which is usually represented by the excerpts Mary Robinson published as separate poems. I also include two late elegiac poems at the end of the book, writing in illness and close to her death, which I've not seen elsewhere. 

Here’s the poem, lines to Robinson’s daughter (who remained loyal to her mother, and is partly responsible for collecting Robinson's work, ultimately, for us).  I thought it rather affective, but I think the theme of parenthood is covered more movingly in her ‘Lamentation for Marie Antoinette’ and in her poem on the birth of Coleridge’s son (Derwent, by the way). I don’t want the poem to completely disappear, so here it is. Its absence frees up space for more of ‘The Progress of Liberty’, which can only be a good thing, in terms of my appreciation of Robinson, and for the originality of my selection, which is the focus of this post.   

 Lines to Maria, my Beloved Daughter

Written on her Birth-Day, Oct. 18, 1793

 

To paint the lust’rous streaks of morn,

Along the pale horizon borne,

When from AURORA’S opening eye

Effulgent glory gilds the sky;

Or yet a softer theme to sing

Of purple evening’s humid wing;

To trace the crystal car of night

Along the plains of starry light,

Where the chaste Goddess bends her way,

Diffusing round a trembling ray; –

No more shall charm my pensive Muse,

With transient forms, or varying hues:

This hour my tenderer task shall be,

Sweet darling Maid, to sing of thee!

 

Attend my strain, and while I blend

The Guardian, Parent, Poet, Friend,

Believe, as each my verse shall prove,

A picture fraught with truth and love,

And every candid line impart

The feelings of a Mother’s heart!

 

Oh! form’d to soothe the wounds of Fate,

Dear solace of my mournful state!

Thou, only blessing Heav’n bestows

To shed meek Patience on my woes!

Know – that in life’s disast’rous scene,

Whate’er my chequer’d lot has been,

No hour was yet so dear to me

As that blest hour which gave me THEE!

 

From infant sweetness still I’ve trac’d

Thy mind, with ev’ry virtue grac’d;

Still have I mark’d Time’s ceaseless wing

Some new endearing treasure bring;

While Hope, soft-whisp’ring, bid me gaze

On bright’ning scenes of distant days’

When, more matur’d, these doating eyes

Should see the lovelier woman rise,

Adorn’d with all the modest grace

That beam’d about thy infant face;

Yet with a mind more passing fair

Than all that Nature pictur’d there!

 

With such a mind, so richly stor’d,

Still may’st thou live, admir’d, ador’d!

Through life enjoy the bliss divine

That waits on innocence like thine!

Still greet the morn with conscious smile,

With tranquil scenes the hours beguile;

And, when the busy day shall close,

Still find a couch of sweet repose!

 

For me, so long ordain’d to trace

O’er life’s dark wild a thorny space –

Still ev’ry sorrow doom’d to share,

Still shall my heart those sorrows bear,

Nor will I mourn at Fate’s decree,

If Heav’n, in pity, spares me THEE!

 

NOTE ABOUT NOTES: I've been writing the notes for the edition, and I won't detain anyone with details of this time-consuming and fiddly task, best done, I think, the way I did it, in a rush of activity. Now I've put the whole manuscript away for some weeks, perhaps for the summer. 

This editorial project came out of my own (mis)use of Robinson’s sonnets ‘Sappho and Phaon’ (the whole of it is in my selection) in my ‘English Strain’ project, which I explain here: Pages: My 'Tabitha and Thunderer' is published in Blackbox Manifold (robertsheppard.blogspot.com), and here, where you will also find lots of images relating to her life: Pages: My Transpositions of Mary Robinson's sonnets 'Tabitha and Thunderer' are now complete (hub post) (robertsheppard.blogspot.com).

June 10th: The Selected Poems of Mary Robinson is now out from Shearsman – edited by me!

Publisher’s details HERE: Mary Robinson - Selected Poems (shearsman.com) 

The publisher's sample of the book may be read here: mary-robinson-selected-poems-sampler.pdf (cdn-website.com)

*

Locating Robert Sheppard: email: robertsheppard39@gmail.com  website: www.robertsheppard.weebly.com Follow on Twitter: Robert Sheppard (@microbius) / Twitter  latest blogpost: www.robertsheppard.blogspot.com