Published : Traumic Knock, a short story on Queen Mob's Teahouse

Thanks to jessica sequeira on editorial duties, for publishing this new short story o mine about the brain and behaviour and free will maybe https://queenmobs.com/2020/03/fiction-traumic-knock/

“‘I am the thinnest person I know (and that’s saying something, for I am no stranger to sanatoria)’
Franz Kafka

Stephen was not an especially troubled person. He, in his full adulthood, had learned. For example, before entering any supermarket, with money in his bank account, he would stop and say thanks. Same with clean drinking water. Same with modern medicines, dentistry, etc… Pretty good. But he did defend his corner when he felt he was being bullied. And this led to a few rows. With partners, but at work too. That sort of thing. The problem is, trouble, troubledness, is relative. And being in London in the 21st century, he could be described as angry. I mean, had he been almost anywhere else, ever, he could not be described in this way. That is a fact. Because normal people used to be quite angry, it’s just no one could really see it, and certainly not tell others outside of their circle etc . . . Doesn’t matter. The thing is, one day, Stephen got hit in the head. An accident. The details don’t matter. But he didn’t report it to anyone, just dealt with the headaches, and if anything, maybe, forgot he was struck. He went the doctors and they thought he had depression at first. Because Stephen wasn’t as eloquent as he once was. Then one day Stephen feinted and ended up in hospital and they saw the damage in his head. Anyway, you’ve been filled in…….”

A note on : Erdinger

I must admit, before the Klang Farben Text in Munich, and that remarkable project’s constant exchange and collaboration as an active learning experience for me, I had never come across the German sound / concrete poet Raphael Erdinger. It’s thanks to Chris McCabe’s curatorial vision in suggesting we ask the German participants in the project to present on classic concrete poets that this fascinating figure came up. And then over dinner, stories of this anonymous trailblazer so stoked us that it has resulted in a rare reprinting of his work, thanks to Barrie Tullett, in this beautiful limited edition of 6. I have one and you, if you are reading this, cannot have one. But behold

A note on : Klang Farben Text in Munich

Klang Farben Text was essentially about the visual properties of language as a creative field, and collaboration. It was built in collaboration about collaboration, and the brilliance and professionalism of Elke Ritt, Chris McCabe and Holger Pils ran through the experience as new friendships. I am left with great respect for them, for how we built the project together. Three constant, kind, deeply clever people. And they brought me into the company of Michael Lentz, Lucy Curzon, Pia Leuschner too. The cohort grew, and then reached out to many fine poets, and the very many generous people of Munich who came to watch us work.

The project was no less than 12 poets from two nations for the better part of a week showing and making in Munich. In the gorgeous surroundings of the Lyrik Kabinett, a really remarkable home for us. Working in pairs, making the live, concrete, visual, kinetic. Presenting poetry from the past. Reflecting, actively and variously and insightfully on what we were doing when we worked in the field of concrete or visual poetry. It was a symposium too, as well as the three big evening gigs we did. We ate together, shared long lunches and dinners, talking of more things than I can remember, we exchanged works and books and concepts and methods. We made things together. We were supported as best as we could be throughout. Again, a rare thing.

The opening night was a high energy introduction to each other, rapid solo performances, interventions and interjections. I can impatient and sometimes hard to impress. Everyone was good. Relaxed, authentic, unpretentious, interesting. I did a wee thing with a misdirection intro and then letter sponges. A companion piece to my Lego poem, done for The New Concrete anthology, which created this whole project in a way.

The second night dipped its footing a little to find it, because perhaps it had too but our concept was being tested. I did a powerpoint presentation, played but maybe lost my tone a little, or it didn’t fly in the crowd. It had some funny poetic-jokes though, I think. The collabs began and were considerable – Victoria Bean and Angelika Bean bringing glossolalia and Kim Campanello and Benedikt Kuhn salvaging each other in the dark.

The final night was a triumph and completed our valley. I had the chance to present on Bob Cobbing and his influence on me, alongside a wonderful presentation by Kim Campanello on Paula Claire. Then the collaborations, Robert Montgomery and Gerhild Ebel, burning alphabets in multicolour, Barrie Tullett and Falkner creating new sculpture poetries, Chris McCabe and Michael Lentz crushing the cross-lingual cross method improv and finishing everything with a killer.

Klang Farben Text feels significant in its understatement. Naturally I most often fail and feel dejected as even successes feel fleeting and often unnoticed yet, fundamentally, I’m trying to do things, creatively and curatorially, that haven’t been done before and would not happen otherwise. I need help from others in that. I need to organise with others. Organisation is a word I like, because it operates in a paradox. That the more you can organise context, the freer and more apparently un-organised content can be. Klang Farben Text was a rare thing and a testament to these principles. It was a moment in our professional lives that began friendships and I hope will have a legacy matching its experience.

A note on : Dostoyevsky Wannabe at Writers Centre Kingston

A cool night down in the always cool museum of futures in surbiton. It was the third and final launch of my new book I will show you the life of the mind on prescription drugs and i read alongside my dostoyevsky wannabe bandmates. I gave everyone special pills and asked them to swallow them. They did. They did. We all survived. A lovely audience, some grand performances too https://www.writerscentrekingston.com/#/grandeur/ and such pics from madeleine rose

A note on : Penteract Podcast #2, talking to Anthony Etherin

https://www.buzzsprout.com/834940/2837305

Really good to chat with Penteract Press editor Anthony Etherin, I like being on podcasts so far and this was another positive experience.

https://penteractpress.com/penteract-poetry-podcast

We chatted about why ill have no legacy, why i bother, my teaching, how i got into it etc…

Published : I will you show...excerpt up on Partisan Hotel

https://partisanhotel.co.uk/The-Life-of-the-Mind

Generous of Hotel to share some pieces from my new book with Dostoyevsky Wannabe https://dostoyevskywannabe.com/originals/i_will_show_you_the_life_of_the_mind_on_prescription_drugs

Of course, I must now relate what is inevitable, and describe the object in question. The tiny object that is constantly amused by its matrons and patrons. By its very object it taunts you. Like an unnamed peril surrounding an open palm, about to dart into its centre, like an insect that might be venomous. The white circle ant. The wingless loop moth. A little dead wasp above you and upon you that comes to life just when you were not able to look away and just when you began to feel unwell. It’s a small item, a shape if nothing else, an entity that can affect so much because it is said to be more potent and quieting than the feeling that has brought it into play. It is alleviation and mitigation, you hope. A wee white quell. Am I (is it) being too ambiguous?

A note on : my special course at Kingston University,

In January 2015 I took over a module on ‘modern’ poetry at Kingston University, when I began teaching there. Now, in February 2020, I’m working with my sixth set of students. The course is without doubt my biggest pedagogical achievement. It’s really honed and specialised, and I change it every year, allow huge room for improvisation. I base it around methods fundamentally. Ways of writing contemporary poetry, tools. I’ll teach constraint writing and do case studies on oulipo. Ideas around conscious / unconscious writing with surrealism. Sound, visual, concrete, performance, video, electronic, kinetic, sculptural poetry etc… Then I try to respond to those who are in the room, lucky as I am to be able to control the numbers and have a dozen or under people involved. I try to open spaces for them to find their own subjects, for the methods to just reveal what is most original and idiosyncratic about their interests and personalities. Then I’m very wary of theory, and talk concepts and ideas and philosophy only when it seems to support the methods / subjects people are naturally bringing. So every year of the six has been so different, but I am proper proud of some of the amazing poets who have come from the course. This picture here shows us doing asemic / pansemic writing techniques in lesson.

A note on : SPAM zine interviews Dostoyevsky Wannabe

A good interview with Victoria and Richard of Dostoyevsky Wannabe where they mention me new book https://spamzine.co.uk/post/610924993792147456/feature-on-the-first-five-years-of-dostoyevsky

On Future Things

> We are experimenting with the idea of branching out into non-fiction books alongside fiction and poetry (we’re open for non-fiction books mostly on music and design and technology so if anyone has ideas for these then please check our site and send a proposal). The fiction and poetry side will perhaps slow down as a result, but that doesn’t mean that we are not more committed than ever to helping get work out by fiction and poetry writers whose books we like.

> As far as titles are concerned, first up in 2020, we’ve published an anthology in collaboration with Partisan Hotel, also we’ve had Lee Rourke’s Vantablack, SJ Fowler’s I will show you the life of the mind (on prescription drugs), Nadia de Vries’s Dostoyevsky Wannabe Cities Amsterdam anthology

A note on : Launching my new book 'I will show you ...' at Torriano

Dostoyevsky Wannabe publisher celebration tour reading number 2! Launch of my new book launch 2 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Will-Show-Life-prescription-drugs/dp/B0849T1PRK! All the videos are here http://www.theenemiesproject.com/dostoyevskywannabe I read some poems, gravely, then Jessica Sequeira, the famed pianoist, came and played some ancient tunes to my reading. Was a nice quiet night of poets reading to poets in the hallowed shadow of the torriano

Published : Wazogate #9 - OULIPO with Anatol Knotek

My series of new collaborations with European poets on the spanish webplatform Wazogate has a new one out with the brilliant Austrian visual poet, Anatol Knotek. This dates back nearly a decade ago in parts https://www.wazogate.com/alternative-oulipo-methods/

A note on : a small poetry-film for Klang Farben Text

Part of the wonderfully ambitious Klang Farben Text program is a temporary exhibition of new kinetic poem / cinepoems / poetry films by all 12 of the participating brit and german poets. Mine is a little engagement with some corporate powtoon

https://www.britishcouncil.de/en/klang-farben-text-visual-poetry-21st-century / https://www.europeanpoetryfestival.com/klangfarbentext

A note on : Launching I WILL SHOW YOU THE LIFE OF THE MIND... with pills and social discomfort

Sometimes you have to use material to hand, and in performing, be careful to allow out the theatrical and histronic, but not necessarily disturbing. But sometimes in doing that, the balance is relative to the audience’s taste, shall we say. I spent the whole performance saying to myself you’re being too nice, keep it calmed. Not sure how it came out. I munched a lot of blue and whites. Read a bit. Sold a few copies of my book, a new book Im quietly happy with but realise again is quite miserable https://www.amazon.co.uk/Will-Show-Life-prescription-drugs/dp/B0849T1PRK

I read alongside 7 dostoyevsky wannabe listmates. All their very good readings are up at http://www.theenemiesproject.com/dostoyevskywannabe

A note on : KLANG FARBEN TEXT in Munich

https://www.britishcouncil.de/en/klang-farben-text-visual-poetry-21st-century

Klang Farben Text: Visual Poetry for the 21st Century

TICKETS FOR EACH EVENT WILL BE AVAILABLE ON THE DOOR. 

Klang Farben Text is a three-day visual poetry festival taking place at the Lyrik Kabinett in Munich on 3–5 March 2020. There will then be a follow-on event on 8 April 2020 at the National Poetry Library in London, which forms part of the European Poetry Festival.

Inspired by the international concrete poetry movement of the 1950s and 60s the exhibition celebrates how that movement has impacted a new generation of poets and artists. The printed word is transformed into film and performance demonstrating how concrete poetry has transcended beyond the book and printing press into an experiential art form for the 21st Century.

Curated by SJ Fowler and Chris McCabe, both poets, performers and editors of visual poetry, this exhibition aims to create an innovative and dynamic dialogue between UK and German poets and artists. The exhibition builds on the celebrated anthology The New Concrete: Visual Poetry in the 21st Century which was published by the Hayward Gallery in 2015, which was co-edited by McCabe and includes work by Fowler. Klang Farben Text (sound-colour-text) will take the form in performative collaborations between UK visual poets and contemporary German poets and a screening of concrete poetry films produced between the 1960s to the present day.

The UK poets are: Chris McCabe, SJ Fowler, Kimberly Campanello, Barrie Tullett, Robert Montgomery, Victoria Bean.

The German poets are: Gerhild Ebel, FALKNER, Angelika Janz, Michael Lentz, Benedikt Kuhn, Jürgen O. Olbrich, with special guest Eugen Gomringer.

“The international concrete poetry movement of the 1950s and 60s didn't end, it exploded into the work of a new generation of contemporary poets and artists. Klang Farben Text brings this UK and German generation together for a three-day celebration of visual poetry in sound, film and live performance" – SJ Fowler, Chris McCabe, curators

Concrete Poetry Films:There will be a looped series of concrete poetry films throughout the programme. These films document the development of concrete poetry from the 1960s to the current day, demonstrating how the form has extended out from the page into moving image and sound. The aim is to show how the current visual poetry scene remains true to the international focus of the original Concrete poetry movement.

PROGRAMME:THE FORMAT FOR THE FESTIVAL WILL BE:

• 3 March 2020: evening public event with Eugen Gomringer as ‘keynote’/guest speaker followed by tasters of each of the 12 collaborating poets

• 4 March and 5 March 2020 evening public events with the collaborating poets (six poets i.e. three pairs per night) One of the public events will feature a whole group performance

• One of the public events will feature a whole group performance

• Days set aside for collaborative work between the pairs of poets and as a group; organising a performance of a shared text

Each individual performance will also include a very short presentation / reading of a classic UK/German concrete poem. This will help join up contemporary practice with the original concrete movement, as well as enriching the poets by learning of other works from the UK/German culture.

Poets' films to run through the three days on loop. See the Lyrik Kabinett website  for more details.

EUROPEAN POETRY FESTIVAL 2020 - program announced

I'm delighted to announce the European Poetry Festival will return for 2020, and will present our most ambitious program yet. www.europeanpoetryfestival.com/2020 11 events over 2 weeks, April 3rd to 18th 2020, in 5 cities and towns across the UK and Ireland. A pioneering showcase of live literature, celebrating collaboration and performance, bringing together over 100 poets from across Europe and the UK. All events are free to attend, please click on the links below to find out more about each event taking place this April

April Friday 3rd 2020 - European Poetry at Writers’ Centre Kingston / Rose Theatre New publications launched for the opening event of the fest.

April Saturday 4th 2020 - The European Camarade / Rich Mix, main space, London The grand event of the festival. 32 poets, 16 pairs, brand new collaborations made for the night.

April Sunday 5th 2020 - Sound Poetry & Performance / Iklectik Artlab, London Innovative, sonic and conceptual poetry, made for liveness

April Monday 6th 2020 - Swiss Poetry in Collaboration / Candid Arts, London Swiss poets collaborate with British-based counterparts.

April Weds 8th 2020 - KlangFarbenText - German concrete poetry / National Poetry Library, London German concrete poets collaborate with British-based counterparts.

April Thurs 9th 2020 - Austrian Poetry in Collaboration / Austrian Cultural Forum, London Austrian poets collaborate with British-based counterparts.

April Saturday 11th 2020 - Polish Poetry in Collaboration / Rich Mix, London Polish poets collaborate with British-based counterparts.

April Monday 13th 2020 - Latvian Poetry in Collaboration / The Poetry Society’s Cafe, London Latvian poets collaborate with British-based counterparts.

April Tuesday 14th 2020 - Hungarian Poetry in Collaboration / Hungarian Cultural Centre, London Hungarian poets collaborate with British-based counterparts (to be confirmed)

April Weds 15th 2020 - European Camarade at National Centre for Writing, Norwich / Dragon Hall Visiting European poets collaborate with poets local to Norwich

April Saturday 18th 2020 - European Camarade at Riverbank Arts Centre : Newbridge, Co Kildare, Ireland Visiting European poets collaborate with poets local to Kildare and Dublin.

A note on : Museum of Futures opening with Performances

This was good. https://www.writerscentrekingston.com/futures20 A night of small chaoses. 18 performances by exhibitors in this always ambitious, DIY exhibition we do down in surbiton, at the ex shop gallery community centre, the museum of futures. I did a weird thing last minute, never getting to myself, but i found a mat and got to slap the floor. I watched some lovely readings from the floor and then 5 or 6 really outstanding performances, of great poise and skill. It was alarming. Like the room, packed out and hot on a cold night.

Pictures by the brilliant Madeleine Rose.

A note on : Teaching at Westerdals in Oslo

One of the most intense teaching experiences of my life and I have been trying to teach intensely, in martial arts before literature, for 20 years. A small week of time with the students of Bard Torgersen’s Westerdals Kristiania school course, which is designed so beautifully that I filled with admiration for it, and very touched to be asked. Bard has built a course around everything that everyone else does not do with such creative practise writing programs and the 30 strong group turned up every day to spend time with me. We actually made a film. So I won’t write further on what happened, but it became a really personal, strange, enriching experience.

A note on : The Language Art at Poetry School (July 2020)

https://poetryschool.com/courses/the-language-art-modern-art-poetry/ Explore the intersections between the post-war traditions of modern art and avant-garde poetry.

Over this intensive weekend, you will discover poets and artists who make use of language, sound, space, printing, and writing, to see how these practises are fundamental to both artforms. We’ll also bring light to some great moments in modern art and poetry that have enriched the traditions of both writing and art-making.

This is a practical course for people interested in developing their skills in either art forms, alongside furthering their understanding of experimental poetry and contemporary art; the onus will be on how these great moments in modern art and poetry can enrich writing and art-making, rather than dense historical analysis. Over the weekend we will focus on:

Saturday 11 July & Sunday 12 July, 10.30am – 4.30pm.

All classes will be in our offices at 1 Dock Offices, Surrey Quays Road, Canada Water, SE16 2XU. The venue is a 2-minute walk from Canada Water Station. Take the ‘Lower Road’ exit from the station onto Surrey Quays Road, then walk straight ahead, crossing over Deal Porters Way, and the Dock Offices come up on the left. The door for the school is at the far end of the building.

More information about how all our face-to-face courses work can be found on the Face-to-Face courses page.

A note on : 'The Unfinished', the Museum of Futures annual Visual Literature exhibition 2020

https://www.writerscentrekingston.com/futures I have had a great curatorial team to help with this staple of the Writers Centre Kingston program this year - Maria Omena, Gabriella Buckner, Aifric Kyne, Djahane Zair and Marcia Knight Latter - which made installing it easy peasy and made me rethink my thoughts of it maybe being the last time I do this, four years in. Some really great works came in too, new faces and old faves. The exhibition runs Feb 18th to March 17th

A note on : Robert Sheppard on collaboration, and The Enemies project

robert on the right, post camarade with jeff hilson

Curating collaborative events is a fundamental part of my work, as many people know me for this, and in October 2020 it’l be ten years since I put on the first Camarade style event. One of the incidental aims of the project, which I’ve written about a lot (it’s obliquity towards creating friendships and communities which means it does so almost always, it’s trojan horsing of experimentation because of the breakdown of the ‘singular’ poet voice in performance etc.) is to connect generations of poets. Because I found poetry in my mid twenties from nothing, I took from my previous profession that it was innate to seek out those who had been doing what you were aiming to do for many decades and ask them how they did it, why they did it, was it worth doing. This is why I sought connections and dialogues with poets like Iain Sinclair, Tom Raworth, Maggie O’Sullivan and many others very early on. I invited them, I corresponded with them. One of the most universally appreciated of these poets who had done the poetry for far longer than I was Robert Sheppard. Robert’s work stretches beyond his lifetime writing, and his unusually wide ranging and insightful use of poetics, into the many poets he’s influenced and taught. Me being one of them. He has recently been writing on collaboration and generously included a post about the enemies project https://robertsheppard.blogspot.com/2020/02/thoughts-on-collaboration-5-literary.html

It is in fact worth reading all of his threads on collaboration, and his blog in general https://robertsheppard.blogspot.com/2020/01/robert-sheppard-thughts-on.html

Published : I will show you the life of the mind (On prescription drugs)

My new book is now available from Dostoyevsky Wannabe. They have done a grand job creating a beautiful book with an especially ambitious text. Please snag one at the link below, thanks. I will show you the life of the mind (on prescription drugs)
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Will-Show-Life-prescription-drugs/dp/B0849T1PRK

From the publisher, "From the mysterious recesses of the mind (or is that brain?) comes the urge to fix our sadness! Drugs are the answer, allied with literature. Legal, prescribed drugs, by hurried doctors, which reroute synapses in millions of human beings consciousnesses. What is the poetry of this ubiquitous but hidden malforming of the already overblown 21st human mental experience? In England, of all places? Who knows?! But SJ Fowler’s inventive espousing of fiction, poetry, illustration and found-text, as one singular literary undertaking, offers up the mess and hope of searching. A choose-your-own-adventure novel into the pits of your cognisance, this truly original book of confusion and consolation, as generously vulnerable as it is challenging, is by turns sad, funny, abstract and painfully clear. What emerges is YOU: the writer, the reader, the patient, the doctor, the doubt and decision, and how to newly express this, a life of the mind…on prescription drugs." 
https://dostoyevskywannabe.com/originals/i_will_show_you_the_life_of_the_mind_on_prescription_drugs

The book will be launched on February 22nd, 23rd and 25th. http://www.theenemiesproject.com/dostoyevskywannabe