Speeding through ModPo and I could do with a few 36 hour days and/or a better brain. I seem to be spending more time watching discussions about poetry rather than reading poetry and I am starting to feel like a child at the fairground trying to catch up with the merry-go-round. One of the disadvantages… Continue reading ModPo: Seven chapters in and flagging a bit
Author: Josephine Corcoran
Josephine Corcoran is a writer, originally from the north west of England and now based in the south west. Her professional credits include three poetry pamphlets and one full collection, a stage play, and two BBC Radio 4 credits (for a short story and afternoon play). She founded and edited the online poetry site And Other Poems until 2023.
The music of Gertrude Stein
ModPo is racing on; we are now starting Week Five of this ten week course. My highlights last week were listening to a Penn Sound recording of Gertrude Stein reading her poem If I Told Him: A Completed Portrait of Picasso (1912) and watching an extract from Shutters Shut, a dance choreographed by Paul Lightfoot… Continue reading The music of Gertrude Stein
Modern and Contemporary American Poetry: Catching Up at 3AM
Waking at 3am on Saturday and finding myself unable to get back to sleep, I came downstairs in my pyjamas, made a cup of tea and plugged into the final readings for Week 3 of ModPo. I love this course! Hilda Doolittle (known as H.D.), Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams were the poets we… Continue reading Modern and Contemporary American Poetry: Catching Up at 3AM
30,000 students but no-one has to share a desk!
My main news is that, along with 30,000 other people world-wide, I've signed up for, and am into my second week of, the free, on-line, ten-week taster course in Modern and Contemporary American Poetry, or ModPo, offered by the University of Pennsylvania using the Coursera on-line platform and featuring the charismatic and hugely knowledgeable Professor of Literature,… Continue reading 30,000 students but no-one has to share a desk!
On Being Shortlisted for The Bridport Prize (Flash Fiction)
There was a delicious flurry of excitement on Twitter yesterday afternoon when several people tweeted about being shortlisted for The Bridport Prize. The actual winners won't be announced until October 14th but those shortlisted have been notified. None of these people are winners (although they certainly aren't losers!) and won't be published in the Winners'… Continue reading On Being Shortlisted for The Bridport Prize (Flash Fiction)
When is the best time to workshop a poem?
Anita Chapman's interesting blogpost about the benefits and drawbacks of taking excerpts from the first draft of a novel to a writing workshop has got me thinking about when it's best to take poetry. At what stage of the writing process will scrutiny by others benefit a poem? It's a relevant question for me because I've… Continue reading When is the best time to workshop a poem?
Review of ‘Riddance’ by Anthony Wilson
Reading the poems in Anthony Wilson's Riddance I had the sensation of walking through a large house, switching on lamps and spotlights to illuminate not immediately visible nooks and crannies. Nowhere is there one garish light explaining everything at once and, although the book is divided into five sections, I felt inclined to move freely… Continue reading Review of ‘Riddance’ by Anthony Wilson
Well, that was a first…
...or perhaps it's a sign of things to come. I'm usually a slow, slow writer (took me FIVE YEARS to finish 'Honeymoon', a runner-up at Bridport in 2010 - I've written about that here) but this week I've dashed off two new poems, both inspired by these quick-as-a-flash poetry projects on the internet: The Queen… Continue reading Well, that was a first…
Hey Presto! Poems have arrived in my inbox.
It's been almost two weeks since I started a separate blog for poems, 'And Other Poems'. At first I thought this would simply be an uncluttered space for my own poems but I quickly decided that I wanted to include other people's work. How, then, to acquire poems? Could I just select poems that I… Continue reading Hey Presto! Poems have arrived in my inbox.
Footnote to Ian Duhig’s poem, ‘The Irish Slave’.
I'm thrilled to be posting a long out of print poem of Ian Duhig's on my poetry blog today. You can read The Irish Slave here. I am so grateful to Ian for his generosity in sharing this and for sending the following notes, with fascinating links, which help to unravel the poem's mesmerising story.… Continue reading Footnote to Ian Duhig’s poem, ‘The Irish Slave’.
Josephine Corcoran 
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