How did you begin writing, and what keeps you going?
I enjoyed writing as a child. In my teens, reading made me want to write. It was also a way of defining myself as an adolescent. I kept writing, mainly poetry (most of it not very good), and even began publishing poems in magazines of the day until I was in my mid-twenties. But then I stopped writing for a couple of decades, only coming back to it in my mid‑forties. The sense of life being finite, and the pleasure I derive from writing, both for myself and for others, is what keeps me going. I feel now that I am part of a writing community. It would be difficult for me to stop writing now.
How has the process of putting together a manuscript evolved? How do you decide on the shape and size of a manuscript?
I’m afraid that I tend to make it up as I go along. Nevertheless, certain themes, or recurring images, or poetic forms start to emerge, and then to coalesce together almost of their own accord until I realise that possibly I have a book, or more than one, in the making.
What poets have influenced the ways in which you write?
A difficult one to answer. Influences are not something that I choose, and they can change depending on what I am working on. For my first book, Anonymous Intruder (Shearsman, 2009), I could feel the influences of Pierre Reverdy and Kenneth Patchen. For my books Shifting Registers (Shearsman, 2011) and Sleeping with the Ice Cream Vendor (Knives, Forks and Spoons Press 2012), Mark Ford, Rosmarie Waldrop, Jeremy Over, and early John Ashbery were important. For my trilogy of prose poems, Makers of Empty Dreams (2014), Identity Papers (2016), and New York Hotel (2018), all from Shearsman, the work of Lucy Hamilton, Max Jacob, and the unknown Cory Harding (a poet publishing in the late 1970s and early 80s) was significant. Behind all of my writing I can feel the presence of Kafka.
How important has mentorship been to your work? Is there anyone who specifically assisted your development as a writer?
As a teenager, I owe a lot to my mother, who encouraged me to write. I was also extraordinarily fortunate to have an English teacher, David Herbert, himself a published poet, who urged me to send my poems to magazines, and gave me lots of instructions on how to do so.
When I came back to writing in my forties, I did not really have a particular mentor. However, various editors have been hugely supportive when I was feeling quite unsure about my work, for example, Tony Frazer of Shearsman (who has made all the difference), Marc Lowenthal of Wakefield, David Caddy of Tears in the Fence, and Rupert M Loydell of Stride. Poets I have great admiration for have also helped immensely through their encouragement, for example Jeremy Over, John Ashbery, Mark Ford, George Szirtes, and Ian McMillan. The organisation Lancaster litfest has promoted my work locally for more than a decade. My former tutors at Lancaster University, for example George Green, have helped a lot through their kind interest in my various writing, translating and editing projects.
You spent a decade editing the online poetry journal Shadowtrain (2006-2015). Why do you feel this work is important, and what did you learn through the process?
There is a quite a sizable archive of poetry from Shadowtrain stored by the British Library here:
The quality of the poetry in the archive speaks for itself in terms of importance.
I am not sure what I ‘learnt’. I do know that I had huge fun editing Shadowtrain and promoting the work of poets whose work I enjoyed. It also brought me into touch with a great number of poets from across the world I would never have had the opportunity to get to know otherwise.
What are you currently working on?
A further collection of interconnected prose poems; a collection of lineated collage-based poems; some longer prose; and translations of prose poems by Max Jacob. The latter follows on from The Thief of Talant (Wakefield Press, 2016), my translation into English of Pierre Reverdy’s Le Voleur de Talan.
Can you name a poet you think should be receiving more attention?
I can think of many. To give just one example, it really is about time that the work of Kenneth Patchen was included in major anthologies of poetry.
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