Frogmore poet Brian Aldiss in The Guardian 14 December 2013

Today's Guardian Review (Saturday, 14 December 2013) features an interview with Frogmore poet and 'Grand Old Man of British science fiction' Brian Aldiss on the occasion of the publication of his entire backlist by Harper Collins's digital Friday Project.
Read the whole interview here.

Frogmore published his long poem A Plutonian Monologue as a signed limited edition in 2000. A few copies remain and are available from the Frogmore Press at £5 inclusive of postage and packing.

Contact frogmorepress@gmail.com, or send a cheque payable to The Frogmore Press to 21 Mildmay Road, Lewes, BN7 1PJ, U.K.

Clare Best readings in November

Frogmore poet and editor Clare Best will be reading at two events in London in the coming weeks:

On Thursday 21 November, at Art Workers Guild,  2-4 pm 

6 Queen Square, 

Bloomsbury, London WC1N 3AT

Adjudication event for the Second Light poetry competition, with Moniza Alvi. Clare will be reading 'Cell' which has won 1st prize in the long poem category.

On Monday 25 November, 6pm, at St George's, University of London, Clare will be presenting 'Self-portrait without Breasts' as per the link below. This is a free event. 

http://www.sgul.ac.uk/research/public-engagement/the-art-of-medicine-self-portrait-without-breasts

Call for submissions: morphrog - 'poetry in the extreme'

The eighth edition of morphrog, the Frogmore Press online journal edited by Jeremy Page and Peter Stewart, will go live on 1 January 2014.  

Submissions of 'poetry in the extreme' are welcome to morphrog@gmail.com up until 30 November. The current edition can be found at: http://www.morphrog.com/

Impressions from yesterday's event at Shoreham Airport

Mike Bartholomew-Biggs

Impressions from yesterday's event at Shoreham Airport. 

Michael Bartholomew-Biggs launched his new collection Fred & Blossom, a poetic tale about love and flying, which was reviewed in the latest number of The Frogmore Papers. 

He was joined by guest readers and fellow Frogmore voices Jeremy Page and Jackie Wills. Jackie Wills introduced her new collection Woman's Head as Jug.

Mike Bartholomew-Biggs, Jackie Wills, Jeremy Page

Jeremy Page

Nancy Mattson, Mike Bartholomew-Biggs

Tasting Notes - a poetry film by Matthew Stewart

Frogmore poet Matthew Stewart has created a poetry film of his HappenStance collection Tasting Notes. 

 Watch it here:
http://vimeo.com/72256178

October events

On Tuesday 15 October, at Shoreham Airport (7.00 pm), Michael Bartholomew-Biggs will launch his  new collection Fred & Blossom, a poetic tale about love and flying, which was reviewed in the latest number of The Frogmore Papers.  He will be joined by guest readers and fellow Frogmore voices Jeremy Page and Jackie Wills.  Fred & Blossom is based on the story of F. G. Miles and Maxine Forbes-Robertson, who fell in love in an aeroplane at Shoreham and went on to design and build successful light aircraft during the 1930s.  Through their lives we learn about the beginnings of airline travel, the British class system, the Spanish Civil War and the golden age of detective fiction.  The event is free and all are welcome, but please RSVP to mbiggs@sampo.plus.com

On Thursday 24 October Grace Nichols and John Agard (7.45 pm, doors 7.00)  will be reading at Needlewriters in Lewes.  Grace will be reading from her collection Picasso, I Want My Face Back and John will be reading a selection of his work, particularly from his new Bloodaxe volume Travel Light Travel Dark.  

Tickets are £5 (£3 unwaged and claiming benefit) and are available in advance from Skylark bookshop in the Needlemakers, Lewes (and why not pick up a copy of the new issue of The Frogmore Papers while you’re about it?). It is anticipated that this event will sell out and early purchase of tickets is strongly recommended.  More information from:  http://www.needlewriters.co.uk/

 And on the subject of John Agard, the Frogmore blogmaster cannot resist posting this wonderful picture of John receiving The Queen's Gold Medal of Poetry 2012:

Autumn issue of The Frogmore Papers appears

Cover art by Leah Fusco

The latest edition of The Frogmore Papers is now out and will be sent out to contributors and subscribers within the next few days.  The Papers’ 82^nd number contains new poetry from Ann Alexander, Robert Etty, Fred Johnston, Maitreyabandhu and others, prose from Derrick Buttress, Alan Blackwood, Robert  Maslen and Josie Turner, artwork from Alexei Talimonov and all of the poems shortlisted for this year’s Frogmore Poetry Prize by Stephanie Norgate, including the winning poem by Emily Wills.

The suitably autumnal cover was designed by Rye-based artist Lea Fusco (http://www.leahfusco.co.uk/)

Copies are available from The Frogmore Press for £5.00 (post free) or may be purchased from Skylark bookshop in the Needlemakers, Lewes.

Polyscriptum – poetry, translation, language, metaphor

morphrog editor Peter Stewart’s Polyscriptum website – ‘poetry, translation, language, metaphor’ – has been given a spring clean and went live in its new incarnation on 8 August.  

Arthur Rimbaud

In addition to Peter’s translations of Lorca, there are also translations of Leopardi, Verlaine and Heine by Frogmore Papers editor Jeremy Page together with his (1980) translation of Rimbaud’s ‘Drunken Boat’ (‘Le Bateau Ivre’).  

The site also features translations from Finnish by Richard Powell and poems by Janet Sutherland, whose third collection is due from Shearsman next year.  

Link here: http://www.polyscriptum.com/

Frogmore writers win prizes

Robin Houghton

In recent months Ros Barber has won the Desmond Elliott Prize, Clare Best the Poetry On The Lake International Competition, Robin Houghton the Hamish Canham Prize and Sarah Jackson the Seamus Heaney Centre Prize for Poetry.  Congratulations to all of them.

  

morphrog 7

 morphrog’s seventh number went live on 1 July and can be found at http://www.morphrog.com/

Contributors include Sharon Black, Robert Etty, Todd Swift and Kay Syrad.  Subscription is free and can be obtained by emailing morphrog@gmail.com

 Frogmore Poetry Prize 2014

Abegail Morley

 Next year’s Frogmore Prize is to be adjudicated by Abegail Morley, whose latest collection Eva and George, Sketches in Pen and Brush was recently published by Pindrop Press.  Abegail’s debut collection How to Pour Madness into a Teacup (Cinnamon, 2009) was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection 2010. 

Emily Wills wins the Frogmore Poetry Prize for the second year running

Gloucestershire poet Emily Wills has won the Frogmore Poetry Prize for the second year running, with her poem ‘Still Life with Lobster Pots’.  This year’s Prize (the 28^th in its history) was adjudicated by Stephanie Norgate.  Janet Sutherland awarded Emily the Prize last year.  Emily Wills now becomes the fourth poet to have won the Prize more than once, joining the select company of Caroline Price (1988, 1990 and 1993), John Latham (1991, 1992) and Howard Wright (2004, 2009). She is the author of two collections of poems Diverting The Sea (The Rialto, 2000) and Developing The Negative (The Rialto, 2008). She won the Lisa Thomas Poetry Prize in 2010. See  www.emilywills.co.uk

Emily Wills, winner of the Frogmore Prize 2012 and 2013

First runner-up is Sharon Black, who herself won the Prize in 2011. Originally from Glasgow and a graduate of the University of Aberdeen, Sharon now lives in a remote part of southern France and is the author of To Know Bedrock (Pindrop Press).  See

www.sharonblack.co.uk

 

Second runner-up is Wendy Klein.  Wendy was educated at the University of Utah and San Francisco State University and came to the UK in 1971.  She is the author of one novel, Listening for Nightingales (2002) and two collections of poetry from Cinnamon Press, most recently Anything In Turquoise.  See www.wendyklein.co.uk

Other poets shortlisted for the two-hundred guinea prize were Mara Bergman, Charles Evans, Judy Gahagan, Christopher North, Ciarán Parkes and Frances Corkey Thompson.  All shortlisted poems will be published in the 82nd number of The Frogmore Papers in September. Available post-free from The Frogmore Press, 21 Mildmay Road, Lewes BN7 1PJ for £5.00.

Frogmore Poets read in Lewes in June

Clare Best

On Wednesday 12 June from 7.30 pm Margaret Wilmot launches her new pamphlet Sweet Coffee at the Lewes Arms.

On Thursday 27 June at 7.45pm Clare Best will be reading at Needlewriters with Brighton's John O'Donoghue and Sasha Dugdale, poet, translator and editor of Modern Poetry in Translation.

Sasha Dugdale

More info here: http://www.needlewriters.co.uk/#/whats-on/4539813579

Last call for submissions for the 27th Frogmore Poetry Prize

Last call for submissions for the 27th Frogmore Poetry Prize, this year adjudicated by Stephanie Norgate. The deadline is 31st May.

THE FROGMORE POETRY PRIZE 2013

Sponsored by the Frogmore Press www.frogmorepress.co.uk The winner of the Frogmore Poetry Prize for 2013 will win two hundred guineas and a two-year subscription to The Frogmore Papers. The first and second runners-up will receive seventy-five and fifty guineas respectively and a year’s subscription to The Frogmore Papers. Shortlisted poets will receive copies of selected Frogmore Press publications. Previous winners of the Prize have been David Satherley, Caroline Price, Bill Headdon, John Latham, Diane Brown, Tobias Hill, Mario Petrucci, Gina Wilson, Ross Cogan, Joan Benner, Ann Alexander, Gerald Watts, Katy Darby, David Angel , Howard Wright, Julie-ann Rowell, Arlene Ang, Peter Marshall, Gill Andrews, A K S Shaw, Sharon Black and Emily Wills. Adjudicator:  Stephanie Norgate is a playwright and poet. She lives in Sussex and runs the MA in Creative Writing at the University of Chichester. Her plays have been produced on the London Fringe and broadcast on BBC Radio 4. Fireclay, a Poetry Business prize-winning pamphlet appeared in 1998, followed by a selection of poems in Oxford Poets 2000. Her two collections with Bloodaxe are Hidden River (2008), which was shortlisted for both the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Jerwood Aldeburgh First Collection Prize, and The Blue Den (2012). She is currently editing a book of international essays on poetry and voice. Conditions of Entry Poems must be in English, unpublished, and not accepted for future publication. Poems should be typed and no longer than forty lines. Any number of poems may be entered on payment of the appropriate fee of £3 per poem.   Cheques and postal orders should be made payable to The Frogmore Press The following methods of payment are acceptable: cheque drawn on UK bank; British postal order; sterling.   Each poem should be on a separate sheet, which should not include the name of the author. The author’s name and address should be provided on an accompanying sheet of paper. The winner, runners-up and shortlisted poets will be notified by post. All shortlisted poems will appear in number 82 ofThe Frogmore Papers (September 2013), which will be available at £5.00 from the address below, and on the Frogmore Press website.           To receive a copy of the results, please enclose an s.a.e. marked ‘Results’. Poems cannot be returned. Closing date for submissions: 31 May 2013. Copyright of all poems submitted will remain with the authors but the Frogmore Press reserves the right to publish all shortlisted poems. The adjudicator’s decision will be final and no correspondence can be entered into. Entries should be sent to: The Frogmore Press, 21 Mildmay Road, Lewes, East Sussex BN7 1PJ. The submission of poems for the Prize will be taken as indicating acceptance of the above conditions

Frogmore celebrates its 30th birthday - in Brighton, London and Folkestone

John McCullough, Maria Jastrzebska, Michaela Ridgway and Jeremy Page at the NVT

John McCullough wriggling his toes

Frogmore celebrated thirty years of publishing this month with events at the New Venture Theatre, Brighton (compered by Managing Editor, Alexandra Loske) on 5 May and the Poetry Café, Betterton Street, Covent Garden (compered by Frogmore Papers editor Jeremy Page) on 15 May. Readers in Brighton – JohnMcCullough, Maria Jastrzebska, Jeremy Page and Michaela Ridgway – had the surreal experience of reading from the set of Sartre’s Huis Clos, which was mid-run at the NVT.  

Managing Editor Alexandra Loske on a faux Regency phone cabinet

Maria Jastrzebska reclining on the chaise-longue

Readers in London – John Mackay, Abegail Morley, Jeremy Worman and Tamar Yoseloff – provided both poetry and prose between them, the evening concluding with founding editor Jeremy Page reading a short selection of favourite poems published in The Frogmore Papers down the years.

Saturday (18 May) saw the last of the celebratory events, with readings from co-founders André Evans and Jeremy Page at the Amphitheatre in Folkestone, a stone’s throw from the site of the celebrated tea-rooms where the Press was founded.  

Jeremy Page and André Evans at the Folkestone Amphiteatre

An appreciative audience heard André read from his introduction to the first issue of The Frogmore Papers and also his co-founder’s 1983 ‘Requiem for Frogmore’.  Jeremy read a poem originally commissioned by Kent Arts and Libraries for its ‘Century of Kent Writers’ project, evoking Folkestone’s unlikely associations with Charles Dickens, Samuel Beckett and Philip Larkin, before concluding his reading with a selection of Flexostructuralist poems by Bob Mitchell. Mitchell’s work was championed by the Frogmore Press in the 1980s and 1990s, culminating in the publication of the now very rare and much sought after classic Bush Klaxon Has A Body Like A Trio Sonata in 1991.

Coming next from Frogmore:

On 1 July issue 7 of morphrog, Frogmore’s online journal, will go live.

In July, the results of the 27^th Frogmore Poetry Prize, adjudicated by Stephanie Norgate, will be announced.  The deadline for entries is 31 May.

In September number 82 of The Frogmore Papers will be published.  The issue will feature the Frogmore Prize shortlist and a cover by Rye-based artist Leah Fusco.

Frogmore poet at the Mayfield Fringe Festival on Sunday (12 May)

Frogmore Poets Clare Best, Kim Lasky, Jeremy Page and Marek Urbanowicz will be reading at the Mayfield Fringe Festival on Sunday (12 May) ahead of the publication of the ‘Exiles’ double issue of Agenda. 
Other readers will be June English and Agenda editor, Patricia McCarthy, who will read her National Poetry Prize winning poem. 6.30 at The Middle House, Mayfield. 
Details here:
http://www.mayfieldfringe.co.uk/Mayfield_Fringe_Festival/Details_of_Events_%26_Artists.html

Clare Best

Frogmore Poets celebrate their 30th Birthday (in association with New Venture Theatre) on 5 May

Upcoming Frogmore events

The next six weeks look set to be very busy ones for Frogmore.…

Thursday 25 May:  Frogmore contributors Judith Kazantzis and Irving Weinman will read at Needlewriters in Lewes.  Details at: http://www.needlewriters.co.uk/#/whats-on/4539813579

Sunday 5 May:  Frogmore’s 30^th birthday will be celebrated with readings by Maria Jastrzebska, John McCullough, Jeremy Page and Michaela Ridgway at the New Venture Theatre, Brighton.  7.45 pm, tickets £7.00.

Wednesday 15 May:  Frogmore’s 30^th birthday will be celebrated with readings by John Mackay, Abegail Morley, Jeremy Worman and Tamar Yoseloff at the Poetry Cafe, 22 Betterton Street, London WC2.  7.00 pm, free entry.

Saturday 18 May:  Frogmore returns to its Folkestone roots.  Founders André

Evans and Jeremy Page will read at the amphitheatre on the Lower Sandgate Road.  Details tbc.

Friday 31 May is the deadline for submissions to the next edition of morphrog – Poetry in the Extreme (Frogmore’s online journal).  Submisison should be made by email to: morphrog@gmail.com

Friday 31 May is also the deadline for receipt of entries for the 27^th annual Frogmore Poetry Prize, to be adjudicated by Stephanie Norgate.  Full details are available at: http://www.frogmorepress.co.uk/  All shortlisted poems will be published in the September issue of The Frogmore Papers.

And finally, to mark Frogmore’s 30^th birthday anyone taking out a two-year subscription to The Frogmore Papers in May will receive a free parcel of Frogmore publications along with the latest issue.  A two-year subscription covers four issues and costs only £15.00.  Cheques to: The Frogmore Press, 21 Mildmay Road, Lewes BN7 1PJ.

Frogmore's 30th birthday issue out now

The 81st issue of The Frogmore Papers is out now. Subscribers will receive their copies shortly. The cover art is by David J Markham, who also designed the cover for last year's anthology Languages of Colour. It features his interpretation of a vintage photograph of the original Frogmore Tearooms at Folkestone. Click here for more information on DJ Markham's work. 

Contributors to this issue: John Aldridge, David Ball, Mike Barlow, Sharon Black, Oliver Comins, Luigi Coppola,Tim Cresswell, Michael Curtis, Michael Fraley, Sam Gardiner, Jonathan Greenhause, Robert Hamberger, Sheila Hillier, Samantha Jackson, Antony Johae, Denise McSheehy, David McVey, Abegail Morley, Mark A. Murphy, Isabel Palmer, Patricia Pogson, Martin Richards, Matthew Stewart, Michael Swan, John Duncan Talbird, Alexei Talimonov, Emma Timpany, Vivienne Tregenza, Mary Wight, Margaret Wilmot, Jeremy Worman.

To subscribe send a cheque/postal order for £15-00 (two years, four issues) or £10-00 (one year, two issues) payable to 'The Frogmore Press', 21 Mildmay Road, Lewes, East Sussex BN7 1PJ. 
New subscribers receive a complimentary title from our back catalogue.

Individual issues are available post-free from the Frogmore Press at £5, and from Skylark in the Needlemakers in Lewes. http://www.skylarkshop.com/

Frogmore’s 30th birthday

May 2013 will see the 30^th anniversary of the publication of the very first Frogmore Papers and Frogmore’s birthday will be celebrated with events in Brighton, London and Folkestone.

Cover art by DJ Markham for the
upcoming issue of The Frogmore Papers

Readers at the New Venture Theatre, Brighton on Sunday 5 May will include Maria Jastrzebska, John McCullough and Michaela Ridgway. 

On Wednesday 15 May John Mackay, Abegail Morley, Jeremy Worman and Tamar Yoseloff will read at the Poetry Café in Covent Garden. 

And on Saturday 18 May Frogmore founders André Evans and Jeremy Page will read from the first issue on the Lower Sandgate Road, Folkestone, a short hop from the site of the famous tea-rooms where the Papers were founded.

Full details to follow.

1980s postcard showing the Frogmores tearooms in Folkestone,
the birthplace of the Frogmore Press

Frogmore poet Maria Jastrzębska at Needlewriters 24 January 2013

Frogmore poet Maria Jastrzębska will read at Needlewriters in Lewes on 24 January 2013. Maria will read from her new collection At the Library of Memories (Waterloo Press).
Details here: http://www.needlewriters.co.uk/#/whats-on/4539813579

morphrog 6 - Poetry in the extreme - goes live

 On 1 January the latest issue of morphrog  - poetry in the extreme - went live.
http://www.morphrog.com/

Contributors to the sixth number are Liz Adams, Francine van den Berg, Clare Crossman, Robin Daglish, Antony Johae, Jack Little, Robert Miles, Martin Myers, Jeremy Worman and Aprilia Zank.

Submissions for morphrog 7 will be considered from now until 31 May 2013 and should be sent in a single word document to morphrog@gmail.com