 Weyfarers 1 Mountside, Guildford, GU2 5JD, UK ISBN 0307-7276 £2.50 Subscriptions: £6 pa to 9 White Rose Lane, Woking, GU22 7JA, UK Overseas prices on application. visit Weyfarers' website Before commenting on this review please read the FAQ page Home page Notes for publishers Want to be a reviewer? Anthologies. Books. Audio. Magazines. Software. Video. Artefacts. Web design by Gerald England This page last updated: 21st May 2005. |
Weyfarers #94 | |
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An eclectic bunch of 30-odd poems, with some poems standing out from the general level of competence. There is a thoughtful, tightly-controlled piece, ANASTASIA, by Yvonne Baker, in which a family member the poet has only known through a photo and a mother's tales comes alive when another photo is discovered, which reveals her, in her ubiquitous kinship, as the gene-source of all the relations that express the poet's totality of experience: And in that moment, I became aware that all my life you had been around me. Aunts with capable hands. Cousins with pale eyes. Reflections. Facets of infinity. A hidden rainbow in the family.In THE SPINNING WHEEL, by Niall McGrath, the just-mentioned object, acquired by the poet's parents while on holiday in Ireland, has become more than just a family souvenir: now also an heirloom To be packed up with other furniture As I move house. It belongs to my future, I couldn't just leave it behind in an empty room.There are a couple of interesting pieces by John Brantingham, FIREWOOD and THE FIRST SIGNS OF SPRING. They are very prosaic, scientific and consequential in delivery; the first poem analyses cutting wood with an axe, and concludes there is nothing more satisfying, nothing that boosts my ego more, than that one solid strike that reduces a brittle trunk to kindling.The other poem describes the onset of spring through the sudden proliferation of larvae, and their varied manifestations on his clothes, in his ears and all over his house: The rest of the day all I can think about is one crawling into my head and every time my hair brushes my lobe, I spasmodically thrust my little finger down my ear hole to keep the little bastards from setting up house-keeping.There is an original, well-crafted poem, GOING THERE, by Andria J. Cooke, which cleverly captures the allure of the sea, with its dreams and images, that can still satiate the barren longing of landlocked mundane existence: it washes into you just the same, like wine to the long parched longing part that thirsted for sight and sound of itself since you washed up on arid land.There are also interesting pieces by Deirdre Armes Smith, Martin Jones, Robert Bone, Christine Lowes and Tony Turner. The issue concludes with some useful reviews of other magazines and such. | ||
| reviewer: Alan Hardy. | ||
| Weyfarers #95 | ||
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Weyfarers is a good middle of the road poetry magazine. Expect a decent standard of craftsmanship. Don't expect to be startled. Stella Stocker (one of three editors who revolve duties between them) does a fine job. Poems are grouped together thematically, so that they reinforce one another, and certain poets are allowed to establish their presence with several contributions (I always think this is a good idea.) I'm not fond of doggie poems as a genre, but there are two here that I love. The one by Stephen Wrigley is genial and the one by Alan Dunnett is sad. Dunnett in particular has me excited. His poem is unshowy, honestly felt and acutely well-observed. Now I want to see more of his work. | ||
| reviewer: Tony Grist. | ||
| Weyfarers #96 | ||
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Published by the Giuildford Poets Press since 1972. This is beautifully designed and attractive to handle. No glossy sticky gaudy covers. This magazine says I am a Poetry Magazine and not a bank brochure offering rip off mortgages; nor am I a sales brochure loaded with 3 piece suites awash with slinky females and fluffy cats. Having said that we come to the contents where obvious care has been taken in the order of the poems, so avoiding the mental strain for the reader in jumping from one page to the next which you do get in some magazines. Two poems I find interesting: THE SUMMIT by R.L. Cook and LUMINESCENCE by Caroline Price. Both ambitious poems and both with faults — or are they faults? Taking THE SUMMIT first, the line breaks are nearly all wrong. Look nice but make no sense. As the errors continue practically all through the poems I'll just quote the last two lines: And through the foreground though man threads a maze In the blue distance still the answer stays.If this was written as prose I think it would read: And through the foreground, though man threads a maze, in the blue distance, still the answer stays.You could perhaps have one less comma, but I think this is the meaning intended. But it is, as I say, far from clear. And try reading these two lines and then ask yourself where do you draw breath? Another difficulty is that in the rest of the poem nearly all the meaning in the line endings has to continue onto the start of the next line to make sense therefore the reader automatically does the same with the last two lines, with puzzling results. Indeed I still do not know whether the maze is threaded through the foreground or in the blue distance. Poetry is meant to be composed of layers of meaning but not like this! This is an error of syntax. When we come to LUMINESCENCE again I have a problem. This time not with the line endings but with interpreting the poem. I would say that in spite of my criticism I liked the poem very much. So, I got off to a bad start with the first few lines: How hard was it, to think of them turning their known world unfamiliar each night with pins and board,Does it mean how hard was it for them or how hard is it [was it] for us to understand what it was like for them? The next error I made was that I thought the pins and board refered to the operations board in a RAF room, and moving blindly through a maze of sudden obstaclesrefered to planes on night flying missions. On reflection I think the first line is refering to the fact these unknown [to us] people had a hard time of it — to quote Eliot — and that it is difficult for others to feel what it must have been like for them. And now I realize the pins and board may be blackout. However, having said all this, there is not one word that should be altered in any way. And that is the sign of a good poem. It reminds me of when school kids did literature at school and had to interpret a poem written by someone from an earlier era. There will be many readers of this poem whose only experience of blackout will be that gleaned from TV documentaries or a school trip to a museum. What do you bet it won't end up on the GCE curriculum or on whatever school course the education minister of the day has cooked up for us. A good poem. Magazine recommended. | ||
| reviewer: P.J. Precious. | ||
| Weyfarers #97 | ||
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The editorship is rotated between the three people on the editorial board so the magazine doesn't feel stale. This issue's editor seems to have gone to the trouble to carefully organise the contents so that each poem is linked to its neighbours but there's no overall theme to the complete issue. Mike Smith's BLUE EYES ... It was that blue Hard and vulnerable as eggshells Cracked me From across the counter When she glanced up Over her coffee And slow blinked.nestles next to another poem on the theme of blue. Deirdre Armes Smith's LOST SPRING has a blue feel to it This year I see the Spring through glass... ... Friends have turned into bunches of flowers or sheaves of 'get well' cards flat and inanimate. I am locked away in the land of illness...poignantly letting the images do the work. The issue concludes with a busy article of reviews where titles appear in bold rather than being separated into individual sections, so if a title or name catches your eye it's not immediately apparent where the review begins or ends. A good, solid presentation that takes no risks. | ||
| reviewer: Emma Lee. |