David Morley on Value, Poetry, and Krill

"If I hold up a ten pound note and a poem and I burn one then the other, how do we feel? Do we feel more about one of them because we recognise its value?"

This quotation is from poet David Morley's blog entry dated April 29th, which is an account of his recent reading with Fiona Sampson, Alan Brownjohn and Naomi Jaffa at the ever-marvellous Troubadour in London, accompanied by some lengthy and fascinating thoughts on the current British poetry scene.

"Outside is now becoming the new inside. One example: the gently whale-like appetite of Salt Publications – whose work and enterprise I think is totally welcome and good fun – has torn the nets between what we used to call the avant-garde, what we used to call the middle of the road, and what we used to call the mainstream. I think this blending of species is probably a good thing. Now we are different types of krill mixing about in the same space. Now we are all inside the whale, as Orwell would have it."

I can't top that kind of insight at the moment, so here's the link to David's blog and happy reading!