I had a really grand time working with editor Alice Willitts on a feature for the latest, collaboration themed, edition of Magma magazine. We spoke quite a few times over many months, sharing ideas, and Alice really put her heart into this issue and I’ve a lot of admiration for her approach.

In the end, the issue features a large interview we did, discussing many things, including my selected collaborations NEMESES and my film THE ANIMAL DRUMS, all available to read online https://magmapoetry.com/archive/magma-78/articles/interview-with-sj-fowler/

The print issue also has a selection of my visual collaborative works, so worth getting a physical copy. The magazine has some brilliant poets in there, really an extraordinary list, including works I had the pleasure to commission, like Christodoulos Makris and Pierre Alferi, alongside many of those I admire https://magmapoetry.com/archive/magma-78/

A real pleasure to spend an evening the company of the Magma magazine audience, for an event exploring drafting, its process and concepts, curated by John Canfield and hosted by Patrick Davidson Roberts. I always enjoy speaking to people who aren’t perhaps familiar with my work, or even the philosophies that underpin, who see modernism or the avant-garde as something alien (though I don’t want to assume too much). It was an evening where the insights given by Rebecca Perry and Kathryn Maris, both of whom spoke wonderfully, complimented my more discursive, fundamental questions and ideas. And the audience really seemed to engage with this, the collective impetus of the event, and the notion that I want to question certain assumed ideas about what drafting means, from the creative impulse, to the notion of a language idea, to refining, to what might be called a finished piece. And that these questions aren’t necessarily antagonistic to more confirmed notions, that seem to proffer control of language in poetry. I was really touched to have quite a few people stop me after speaking and share their thoughts and enthusiasm and was very grateful to John and the team at Magma for having me involved in a really positive event in the lovely environs of the Teahouse Theatre in Vauxhall.