Sunday 17 October 2010

Poetry London 67



There's a short review of Scarecrows in the new issue of Poetry London (buy from here!) in a round-up of recent pamphlets by Christopher Horton. The magazine generally has a strong reviews section - not so much of the tortured puffery that the modern poetry review is famed for. Jack Underwood is particularly harsh, I think, on Matthew Caley's Apparently, calling it 'blokey' and 'emotionally remote' (with qualifiers) but it's certainly refreshing to see reviewers speaking their mind. Here's a little of what Horton says:

"If at times the sheer frequency of the cultish references and deliberate absenting of narrative threatens complete fragmentation, the sheer dexterity of the language still appeals. Stone has a tendency for spell-like pastiche, appropriate to his often dark subject matter."

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