Graham Hardie finds that the poems of Robert Wells offer some pleasing insights.
Michael Loveday gets to grips with the uncertainties and instabilities underlying a new collection from Patricia Debney
Roger Caldwell observes that James Norcliffe makes poetry look deceptively easy
Anyone seeking to be reminded of how we used to work not so very long ago should take the 10-minute tram journey from Birmingham’s newly revamped Grand Central Station to the city’s Jewellery Quarter, where every other shop is a jeweller and the close-knit atmosphere of a neighbourhood once closed to the wider city lingers on.
Peter Ulric Kennedy critiques Derrick Buttress’ idiosyncratic poems
James Roderick Burns looks for vital signs in an anthology of medical poems
John Lucas is entertained by Keith Hutson’s collection of poems about music hall – and by the performers who appear in it
Bernard Green has already given London Grip readers his memoir of Alf’s Café: here now is his “prequel” about dramatic incidents in Farnham in the 1940s…
Of all Shakespeare’s plays, the problematic Taming of the Shrew lends itself to tongue-in-cheek adaptations. Already a play-within-a-play in the original version, framing Shakespeare’s account of the shrewish Kate and her borderline-abusive Petruchio with a backstage broken romance ratchets up a notch the already absurdly charged sexual tension.
Joan Michelson picks her way through a few flower poems by Peter Phillips
One of the most vexed questions around prostitution today concerns the legal status and rights of sex workers. Feminists and policy makers fall into two camps.
Merryn Williams is impressed by Chris Considine’s poetry of self-sufficiency on a small island
By Michael Bartholomew-Biggs • books, poetry reviews, year 2016 • Tags: books, Merryn Williams, poetry