Arachne 10

December 1, 2022

Arachne Press is celebrating 10 years as a small, independent publisher of award-winning short fiction, award winning poetry and (very) select non-fiction, for adults and children. And on Tuesday November 29, Arachne’s Cherry Potts co-hosted a reading to celebrate this amazing achievement and to launch recent collections – the most recent being the wonderful, evocative Routes by Rhiya Pau, British-born poet of Indian heritage, winner of the Eric Gregory Award 2022. The book celebrates and chronicles the long journey Rhiya’s family undertook over lands, languages and cultures to finally land in Britain 50 years ago. To quote Sarah Howe, the 2022 Eric Gregory Awards judge, “This is a collection in which routes and roots tug against one another…[…] This is a work of humane intelligence, formal experiment and linguistic verve that promises much.” And I want to add the word ‘moving’, ringing as it does absolutely true in its emotional universality.

This last sentence is also completely appropriate to the poetry of Claire Booker. Claire’s poetry collection, A Pocketful of Chalk, was published by Arachne Press in July 2022. In it light, sea and sky are always present, reminders of loss and sorrow while consoling and reaffirming. The title of the collection reflects Claire’s living environment, the wonderful South Downs.

Despite being certified as disabled with Ehlers-Danlos at the age of 16, Jennifer A McGowan has led several exciting and creative lives. Latterly, poetry saved her life when she nearly died from Covid, and some of her poems in How to be a Tarot Card (or a Teenager) (Arachne, October 2022) echo that time, while others wittily transport us backwards and forwards to different, and always fascinating, places.

And talking of different and fascinating places, what about Michelle Penn‘s dystopian island, the protagonist of her book-length poem, Paper Crusade, published by Arachne in June 2022. The poem, with its interesting format and fonts, but above all its fable- and nightmare-like characters – a veritable Tempest through the looking glass – truly transported us elsewhere.

All poems were beautifully and clearly read. If you want to revisit them, buy the books at https://arachnepress.com/shop/Poetry-c12178370

Many thanks to Cherry Potts for co-hosting (actually doing most of the work!) and congratulations to her for 10 years of great publishing. All Arachne publications have stunning covers, so much so that there will be an exhibition of them, and their production process, at the Stephen Lawrence Gallery in Greenwich in mid-late January. Well worth a visit!

And many thanks to the audience for turning up on the night of the England v Wales football match…

See you all in the New Year. Very best wishes and Seasons Greetings to you and yours.

Events

TUESDAY MARCH 4 at West Greenwich Library, at 7.30
“In His Own Voice: Geoffrey’s Grigson’s Poetry”
A special evening on the poetry and the creative, colourful and influential life of Geoffrey Grigson (1905-1985). With his daughter Caroline Grigson, grandson Joe Banks and poets Graham High, Blake Morrison, and poet and editor John Greening.

Free event with refreshments (donations welcome) and books on sale. Texts will be projected on screen. Doors open at 7pm for a 7.30 start.

Geoffrey Grigson lived and worked through amazing times, culturally and politically, and was a prolific poet, writer, critic and editor. At the centre of English intellectual life, he knew the poetry grandees of his days and greatly admired those of the past. When he was only 27, he founded the bi-monthly journal ‘New Verse’, thus becoming hugely influential in the poetry world. He wrote over 500 poems himself, and on March 4, 1968 he recorded a number of them, which we’re going to hear in the course of the evening (exactly 57 years later!) – as well as many stories about him and his life. Other works have been selected and will be read by poets Blake Morrison, Graham High, John Greening (who also edited an anthology of Grigson’s works), by Grigson’s daughter Caroline Banks, Frances High and myself.

TUESDAY MARCH 25 at West Greenwich Library – ‘Mica Press launch: new poetry from Rosie Johnston, Michael Vince and Antony Johae.’ With Nayma Chanchoun, Michael Foley and Leslie Bell.

TUESDAY MAY 13 at West Greenwich Library – ‘Maggie and Maggie’. Same name, different voices: poetry from Maggie Butt and Maggie Harris.

TUESDAY JUNE 24 at West Greenwich Library – ‘Telltale Poets: Sarah Barnsley, Robin Houghton and Peter Kenny’