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Giving away money (without pain)
Jul. 8th, 2013 01:42 pmWell, the Forward Prize shortlists for 2013 are out now. I helped compile said lists in June, together with Jeanette Winterson, David Mills, Paul Farley and Sam West. Some thoughts on the process here:
What's the best thing about judging the Forward Prizes? Free books? Giving away money? Reassessing some poet you hadn't paid enough attention to? Those are good, but I think the best might be the poems, and odd lines, that stick in your head for weeks. They may be from books that didn't even make the shortlist, but they've still made a permanent mark – Dannie Abse's line "Men become mortal when their fathers die" from his collection Speak, Old Parrot ( Hutchinson), isn't going to leave me any time soon.
I will totally admit that the main reason I said yes when approached was that one of the other judges was Sam West, and the fangirl in me couldn't resist meeting Major Edrington from the Hornblower series. (And his readings at the meeting, in a most mellifluous voice, improved many a poem I'd been unsure about.) But I did wonder if I could keep up with all the reading, especially when the books arrived 12 or 15 at a time.
Once you start, though, it becomes addictive not only to read each in its own right but to compare one with another, to re-read and see something that didn't immediately impress become more powerful, to see a poet whose work you thought you knew doing something unexpected. Best of all, of course, to find a poet you didn't know at all and are glad to have come across. This happens most often on the First Collection list, which was my favourite to read. It also contains more books from small presses, and I am very glad some of those made it to the shortlist; small presses need all the help they can get, and they are often where the most interesting and adventurous writing happens. We had to produce shortlists of five in the three categories (best collection, best first collection and single poem); there are six on the best first collection shortlist, which indicates the quality in depth we were seeing in that category.
When we compared shortlists, many books and poems appeared on two or three, a few on four; only one book appeared on all 5. Some had got a grip on only one judge, who was nonetheless passionate about his/her fancy and would argue fiercely to convince the rest. This made for animated debate, and if you ever thought it was possible for these lists to be "fixed" by one judge pushing for a favourite poet, be assured that he'd have a job; there are four other equally opinionated folk in that room and he'd have to convince at least two of them.
Sometimes, we did change our minds about something, or rather reassess it against other choices. And sometimes we didn't. I'm glad to say there was no pressure to achieve unanimity, because that's how to end up with an anodyne list that neither offends nor inspires. Some of the choices are unanimous; others are majority decisions. I'll admit to being less than enthusiastic about at least one on each list, and no doubt my fellow-judges could say likewise. By the same token we would each be passionately enthusiastic about several on each list, and that's as it should be.
Any trends? Well, if Philip Larkin were living, he might have to revise his opinion that the "myth-kitty" was dead. I swear I met the whole Greek and Roman pantheon, several times. Unlike Larkin, I've no particular view for or against mythical beings in poetry; it depends how you use 'em. But I was surprised at their huge popularity in this year's crop and can suggest no reason. Another kind of poem much in vogue is where a narrator watches a craftsperson making something. It might be anything from lace to a Dutch barn; the fascination is with the act of making, which parallels the poet's own craft. Again this can work or not, depending on the poet's skill, but it can risk looking a little vicarious. I don't think it is any accident that one of the books on the first collection shortlist, Adam White's Accurate Measurements (Doire Press), is by a poet who has himself worked as a joiner, and it shows in the immediacy and assurance of his poems on the craft.
There are collections with a central theme, like Rebecca Goss's Her Birth and Dan O'Brien's War Reporter, and more disparate ones – Sinead Morrissey's Parallax, Marianne Burton's She Inserts the Key. In the individual poems list there is both grim subject-matter and humour, often coexisting. I don't think you could identify any unifying principle to the poems and books chosen, other than that they had to be memorable, to stay in the mind even after the judge had read another couple of dozen. That was my yardstick, anyway.
What's the best thing about judging the Forward Prizes? Free books? Giving away money? Reassessing some poet you hadn't paid enough attention to? Those are good, but I think the best might be the poems, and odd lines, that stick in your head for weeks. They may be from books that didn't even make the shortlist, but they've still made a permanent mark – Dannie Abse's line "Men become mortal when their fathers die" from his collection Speak, Old Parrot ( Hutchinson), isn't going to leave me any time soon.
I will totally admit that the main reason I said yes when approached was that one of the other judges was Sam West, and the fangirl in me couldn't resist meeting Major Edrington from the Hornblower series. (And his readings at the meeting, in a most mellifluous voice, improved many a poem I'd been unsure about.) But I did wonder if I could keep up with all the reading, especially when the books arrived 12 or 15 at a time.
Once you start, though, it becomes addictive not only to read each in its own right but to compare one with another, to re-read and see something that didn't immediately impress become more powerful, to see a poet whose work you thought you knew doing something unexpected. Best of all, of course, to find a poet you didn't know at all and are glad to have come across. This happens most often on the First Collection list, which was my favourite to read. It also contains more books from small presses, and I am very glad some of those made it to the shortlist; small presses need all the help they can get, and they are often where the most interesting and adventurous writing happens. We had to produce shortlists of five in the three categories (best collection, best first collection and single poem); there are six on the best first collection shortlist, which indicates the quality in depth we were seeing in that category.
When we compared shortlists, many books and poems appeared on two or three, a few on four; only one book appeared on all 5. Some had got a grip on only one judge, who was nonetheless passionate about his/her fancy and would argue fiercely to convince the rest. This made for animated debate, and if you ever thought it was possible for these lists to be "fixed" by one judge pushing for a favourite poet, be assured that he'd have a job; there are four other equally opinionated folk in that room and he'd have to convince at least two of them.
Sometimes, we did change our minds about something, or rather reassess it against other choices. And sometimes we didn't. I'm glad to say there was no pressure to achieve unanimity, because that's how to end up with an anodyne list that neither offends nor inspires. Some of the choices are unanimous; others are majority decisions. I'll admit to being less than enthusiastic about at least one on each list, and no doubt my fellow-judges could say likewise. By the same token we would each be passionately enthusiastic about several on each list, and that's as it should be.
Any trends? Well, if Philip Larkin were living, he might have to revise his opinion that the "myth-kitty" was dead. I swear I met the whole Greek and Roman pantheon, several times. Unlike Larkin, I've no particular view for or against mythical beings in poetry; it depends how you use 'em. But I was surprised at their huge popularity in this year's crop and can suggest no reason. Another kind of poem much in vogue is where a narrator watches a craftsperson making something. It might be anything from lace to a Dutch barn; the fascination is with the act of making, which parallels the poet's own craft. Again this can work or not, depending on the poet's skill, but it can risk looking a little vicarious. I don't think it is any accident that one of the books on the first collection shortlist, Adam White's Accurate Measurements (Doire Press), is by a poet who has himself worked as a joiner, and it shows in the immediacy and assurance of his poems on the craft.
There are collections with a central theme, like Rebecca Goss's Her Birth and Dan O'Brien's War Reporter, and more disparate ones – Sinead Morrissey's Parallax, Marianne Burton's She Inserts the Key. In the individual poems list there is both grim subject-matter and humour, often coexisting. I don't think you could identify any unifying principle to the poems and books chosen, other than that they had to be memorable, to stay in the mind even after the judge had read another couple of dozen. That was my yardstick, anyway.
