Below a link to the write-up for this year's National Poetry Competition in today's Independent on Sunday. The winners were Sinead Morrissey, Rosemary Norman, and that David Kennedy bloke I work with:
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertai...ion-801567.html Wasted my entry money yet again.
I'm beginning to think entering the National is like playing one of those pointless 'Roll a Penny' arcade games. As someone who is steadily moving away from the 'under 40 lines telling lyric' poem, the odds of winning the National are simply too remote for me to bother with anymore.
Oh, this is a rare year! I think the winner is a stunning poem, and hugely enjoyed Mr Kennedy's third place effort. I don't know about the second place work - I keep losing interest halfway through, but there's nothing in it that I actively dislike.
Jane - I always divert my entry fee towards extra lottery tickets: if you don't play, you don't win.
I agree with you about these poems Rik - I'm usually irritated by competition winners (because they seem so random, I think) but these are fresh and interesting. The second poem does loose me here:
| QUOTE |
If they were willing in Beirut
to leave their hair untended
they would have done so
more than once in his life,
career. |
But then recovers for a great ending.