Happy May Day, everyone! And, especially, a big happy birthday to my best pal, Ó.F., if she's reading!
The Watchful Heart is being launched tonight at Kenny's Liosbán shop in Galway. 6pm - all welcome!
Subtitled 'A New Generation of Irish Poets – Poems and Essays', the book is an anthology of the work of twenty-four Irish poets born in the last fifty years. It has bio and biblio details of each contributor, together with photographs. The anthology was ably edited and compiled by Joan McBreen.
My copy arrived this morning and it looks great. I had a very quick dip into the poems and essays - a lovely, varied lot - and how are these for a taster of the essay titles?:
'The brindled cat is chewing the nightingale's tongue' - Louis de Paor on translation
'Poetry doesn't exist' - Alan Gillis - ??!! intriguing...
'Closing the book on the open mic' - Eileen Sheehan - ooh, controversial-sounding!!
'Getting my snake, getting my corset and getting my tongue pierced' - Kate Newmann on writing with kids in schools.
My own essay is rather soberly titled 'The Art of the Body: poem as female self-portrait'.
It's a very comprehensive anthology and a nice match for Salmon's other recent anthology Poetry: Reading It, Writing It, Publishing It, which I am currently reading and thoroughly enjoying. I'd highly recommend it to anyone who wants to be published or who has any interest at all in contemporary poetry. There are some great essays in it, notably (from my reading so far) by Nessa O'Mahony and David Gardiner.
Hoping to see some of you at tonight's Watchful Heart launch!
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