Sunday, August 26, 2007

Blogdown on the Booker

This being a sordidly sunny Bank Holiday weekend for the first time in - erm, living memory? - I have decided to eschew my usual intellectual-muscle-flexing approach of formulating my own opinions and rely on those of other bloggers to entertain my regulars. Unfortunately, as we're all only too aware, there is a dearth of really strong sharp poetry bloggers in the UK, so prose fiction it must be. And what better to dwell on at the moment in prose fiction than the Booker Prize list, announced earlier this month?

If you can recommend any sharp British poetry bloggers, by the way - whose names do not already appear in my blogroll - then please comment below.

In return, you will win ... well, I can't afford to offer you sweeties, as Ms Baroque does in her plush Hackney pad, but you will gain my respect and appreciation. Worth so much more than a paper bag of barley twists and pear drops, let me assure you.


Randomly Chosen Bloggers on the Booker


This is writer Susan Hill's blog entry last week about the Booker.

Grumpy old Bookman has a few choice words to say on the recent matter of the Booker, at GOB

Dove Grey Reader opens with this: 'Aha, here it is, this is bound to be it...the Booker Turkey ...' and then 'So I started The Gathering by Anne Enright thinking I was going to hate it, no, why mess about, I was going to absolutely loath it.'

You can find the rest of that amusing review and a whole assortment of others in the same idiom (known collectively as the Bookerthon 2007) at Dove Grey Reader

Lastly, Eve's Alexandria supplies this highly informative and attractively presented Booker blog entry.

Enjoy!

7 comments:

Ms Baroque said...

Hey, Jane, you're just jealous. But if you don't enter the competition you can never win the sweeties!

I'm trying to ber a sharp poetry blogger... I suspect I'm just a sort of squishy one.

Jane Holland said...

I AM jealous, yes. You have such a fan club over there at B in H.

I'm sure it's that trail of sweeties ...

Jane Holland said...

To answer my own question, I'd like to see Roddy Lumsden writing a poetry blog; that would be really worth visiting, I feel. But of course he's always too wrapped up in those damn puzzles and mindbenders of his. Vitamin Q, indeed! (Now infowisps)

What is needed here are fearless commentators on the 'inside' of the British poetry scene. Too many of us are afraid of treading on toes. But I bet Roddy wouldn't be, and it could make very amusing and well-informed reading ...

Ms Baroque said...

Let me get my book out & the awards in (tons of 'em, please) and my reviews and essays plastered all over the place and then we'll see. I know I can be caustic, but I am a bit of a polyanna really. I'll say whatever I think, and then flip over backwards three times trying not to have made anybody feel bad!

Jane Holland said...

"Let me get my book out and the awards in ... Reviews and essays plastered all over the place etc..."

Well, good luck to you with that. You may well fare better than me, being rather close to Poetry Central. I got, to date, no awards or shortlistings, one print review (in Ambit) and two online. After waiting nine years to put out my second collection.

If nothing else, poetry makes you hard.

Ms Baroque said...

I was joking, anyway, Jane. One can only go in all guns blazing. Remember the Alamo!

Jane Holland: Editor said...

Yes, optimism is always worth the effort. I'm just a cynical and grumpy old ..... [add your own choice of noun here].

Jx