Tag Archives: james davies

if p then q poets and others at The Surrey Poetry Festival

30 Apr

On June 2nd 2018 make sure you make it down to Guildford, just outside London, for this year’s Surrey University Poetry Festival curated by if p then q editor James Davies.

Surrey Poetry Festival year 8 V2

The event features rare readings by major American poets Tina Darragh and P. Inman, whose collected works was published by if p then q in 2014.

The festival will also inlcude Peter Jaeger performing a durational reading of his recent if p then q publication Midamble, as well as readings by other poets published by if p then q – Tom Jenks, Scott Thurston, Emma Cocker & Philp Terry.

The amazing line-up doesn’t end there. Performances will also take place from Clémentine Bedos & Sharon Kivland, Emma Bennett, Rebecca Cremin, Amy Cutler, Rob Holloway, Lila Matsumoto and students from the University of Surrey.

If you’re not familiar with any of these fine folks set yourself up for a treat. Brief descriptions and links to websites below:

Clémentine Bedos is a multidisciplinary artist whose recent shows include a solo exhibition at the Constance Howard Gallery, London ‘Contagious Hystories’. Currently exploring themes of identity, binaries and the Other. https://www.clementinebedos.com/

Emma Bennett’s recent performances include durational piano pieces, an exploration of pining for soft things, and interpreting the words of birdsong. https://emmabennettperformance.wordpress.com/

Emma Cocker is a writer-artist whose work explores the slippage between writing on page, to performance in time, between still and moving image, between individual and collective action. http://not-yet-there.blogspot.co.uk/ 

Rebecca Cremin draws on traditions of live art, Fluxus, performance writing and site-specific work using language as an object to expose, to investigate, to locate. http://www.veerbooks.com/Rebecca-Cremin-LAY-D 

Amy Cutler is a multi-disciplinary practitioner with a special interest in geohumanities – the engagement between geography and arts/humanities. https://amycutler.net/

Tina Darragh is one of the original members of the Language group of poets. Her work explores class, race and ecology. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tina_Darragh 

Rob Holloway is currently exploring sonnets and prose poems, and has been a DJ on Resonance FM. https://vimeo.com/9383523 

P. Inman is associated with language and minimalist poetry. His work has been described as ‘thick with meanings that never quite complete themselves; full of social ironies and a sly and biting humor’ http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/inman/ 

Peter Jaeger will perform a durational version of his latest book Midamble, on the lawn at G Live. The book concerns his recently completed walk on the Camino de Santiago de Compostela. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG1EUZusDTY 

Sharon Kivland is an artist who has recently been called a poet, five times, to her surprise. Her work considers what is put at stake by art, politics, and psychoanalysis. http://www.sharonkivland.com/ 

Lila Matsumoto’s poetry explores dailyness through allegory and literalness. http://www.shearsman.com/browse-poetry-books-by-author-Lila-Matsumoto 

Tom Jenks is often verbivocovisual and always hilarious. https://www.zshboo.org/

Philip Terry uses Oulipian methods and translation to examine the crimes of bureaucracy and management. http://www.carcanet.co.uk/cgi-bin/indexer?product=9781847772206 

Scott Thurston’s current work responds to ongoing encounters with various dance and movement practices including Five Rhythms, Movement Medicine and Open Floor work. http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Thurston.php 

Students from The University of Surrey have been exploring a range of poetic strategies during the workshop series Making Things Happen including the use of diaries, minimalism, Oulipo and collaboration.

Tickets go on sale April 4th – available from G-Live.

Running order TBC

An evening soiree takes place at 6.30, with the Poetry Festival joining The New Writer’s Festival (also taking place at G Live) and features a variety of readers including Tom Jenks.

 

 

 

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if p then q massive catch up – ten years (almost)

10 Nov

In April 2018 if p then q will have been publishing for ten years. In addition to a special birthday celebration reading (watch this space) it seems apt to highlight some key publications, in case you’ve missed out. Just click on the links that follow to add the title to your library

Between 2008-9 if p then q magazine ran for four issues. The first two were loose-bound and housed in envelopes with gifts – pens, postcards and CDs. Issue three came out as a set of posters, specially commissioned by The Text Festival, and included posters by P. Inman, Craig Dworkin and Anne Charnock. The final issue was a pastiche of a coffee table magazine featuring Caroline Bergvall on the front cover. Issue three is still in print and available HERE.

The first if p then q perfect bound collection, 2008, was Tom Jenks’ A Priori which includes his much-lauded poem 99 Names for Small Dogs. Many other perfect bound collections have met critical acclaim. Holly Pester’s Hoofs and Chrissy Williams’ Epigraphs have both been featured on BBC Radio 3’s The Verb, Peter Jaeger’s A Field Guide to Lost Things was long-listed for The Guardian’s Not the Booker Prize and many other titles have received multiple and positive reviews. Here they are: Lucy Harvest-Clarke’s exhilarating Silveronda, Tim Atkins’ minimal sonnet sequence 1000 Sonnets, David Berridge’s search for the ‘thing’ in Bring the Thing, Derek Henderson’s poignant, systematic erasure of Ted Berrigan’s The Sonnet titled Thus &, Stephen Emmerson’s almost blank page Family Portraits, Geof Huth’s collected one word poems ntst, Tom Jenks’ follow ups to A Priori – the almost sonnet sequence * and the barmy Items, seekers of lice’s text version of Encyclops., Philip Terry’s Advanced Immorality – including his rewrites of Queneau – & Nathan Walker’s tome of web generated one-liners Action Score Generator.

In 2014 if p then q reached new heights by publishing the collected works of the great P. Inman, Written 1976-2013. This work not only collects his work in an inexpensive format but allows his work to been seen as something which both changes and, paradoxically, remains consistently constant, as Craig Dworkin points out in his lengthy and fascinating introduction.

In amongst all these titles there was still time to publish obscurities, some sold out – Michael Basinski’s Dog Music postcard, Nick-e Melville’s leaflet Junk Mail, as well as the still in print set of trump cards What’s the Best? by Joy as Tiresome Vandalism and Stephen Emmerson’s automatic poetry templates – Poetry Wholes.

2015 saw the first publication of a critical work – derek beaulieu’s captivating essays on concrete and conceptual poetry The Unbearable Contact with Poets, which also offered readers the chance to buy as a print bound copy or obtain as a pdf.

This year if p then q has pushed forwards with a new house front cover design and two new titles – Tim Allen’s re-imagining of The Columbia Granger Index to Poetry called Under the Cliff Like and Simon Taylor’s conceptual photo project of imaginary university lecturers Prospectus.

Look out for new titles in the near future from Peter Jaeger, Tom Jenks, Emma Cocker and others.

If you’ve missed any of these titles you should really check ‘em out.

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Under The Cliff Like by Tim Allen – out in 6 days

10 Sep

Under The Cliff Like’ is constructed from the ‘Title And First Line Index’ in the 1962 edition of ‘Granger’s Index To Poetry’ (Columbia University Press. U.S.A.) which I found in a junk shop. It was written in 1996. In alphabetical order all entries beginning with ‘Like’ are juxtaposed with the equivalent number of entries beginning with ‘Under’. There are no alterations other than elimination of commas and the capital letter of the juxtaposed line plus the insertion of full stops at the end of each pairing.

Some samples will appear over the next 5 days.

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Poetry Wholes blog piece at Nice Cuts

7 Jun

The very lovely people at Nice Cuts have published a blog post in which Stephen Emmerson and James Davies reflect on Poetry Wholes. Here’s a snippet –

I often perform using the Poetry Wholes. I ask members of the audience for a book. I need five in total. I ask for prose books (not poetry), and I get novels, textbooks, newspapers, instruction manuals and other interesting textual artefacts. I then place each of the Poetry Wholes over a page in each of the books and improvise a poetic reading. By that, I mean I use rhythm. I love doing it. I’ve done it scores of times since they were first published in 2014. I never know what I’m going to get.

The Poetry Wholes act as windows into a poetry that surrounds us. It’s everywhere, but we can’t always see it. Often a poem is about what’s not visible, what’s not tangible, and I hope that the Wholes create tiny portals into those murky spaces where art exists in the boundaries of the everyday.

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Holly Pester interview and review

9 Nov

The shape of the poem on the page and aural shape of the poem in my voice relate to each other in a not necessarily harmonious or analogous way, but they have to set each other off, nervously.

An interview with Holly Pester, as well as a review by Sally-Shakti Willow of Holly’s Hoofs  is available HERE

Holly will read from Hoofs and be in conversation with if p then q editor James Davies at Reading and Being Read along with a number of other interesting events other events Saturday 12th November in Manchester’s Central Library. More HERE or see previous blog posts.

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November 12th bonanza

28 Oct

After The Reading and Being Read event at Manchester Central Library on 12th November 11am-4pm (featuring Holly Pester and Michelle Green readings, talks by if p then q and Comma, and object making workshop with Tom Jenks). More HERE

is

Peter Barlow’s Cigarette, 4.30-6.30 at Waterstones, Deansgate, Manchester. This is a free event and features readings by Stuart Calton, Pansy Maurer-Alvarez, Katherine Horrex, Fokkina McDonnell

Refreshments provided

More – https://www.facebook.com/events/569451393237996/

 

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Reading and Being Read. A reading with Holly Pester, talk by if p then q editor James Davies and more

10 Oct

Come along to this great event. Date below. More details HERE

READING AND BEING READ

with Comma Press, If P Then Q, Michelle Green, Holly Pester & ZimZalla

MANCHESTER CENTRAL LIBRARY

Performance Room, Ground Floor

St Peter’s Square, City Centre, M2 5PD

11am to 4pm, 12 November 2016

Tickets £3 before 1 November / £5 after

Twitter hashtag: #ReadingBeingRead

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