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To celebrate the third #RLSDay on 13 November 2013, we discussed Robert Louis Stevenson with Jeremy Hodges, the author of the new biography Lamplit, Vicious Fairy Land. We find out about Stevenson’s “lost loves” including Kate Drummond, a girl he met at a brothel and who likely lives on as Catriona in Stevenson’s sequel to Kidnapped, his relationship with his cousin Catherine in France and the fact he very likely died of syphilis. The book is available from the RLS Society website. We also feature the track ‘Filly’ by New Archer from the EP Bees Nudge The Mouth Of A Feathered Rose.

It’s about time we talked about boxes. Phone boxes. Boxes on forms you tick. How we make boxes. How boxes can describe the world. We talk with nick-e melville about his new exhibition ‘Dole‘ at Forest Centre Plus in Edinburgh (until 16 November) which investigates institutional language and the sometimes overly bureaucratic nature of unemployment. And we also feature the piece ‘The Scientists’ by Andy Field (@andytfield) and performed by Ira Brand (@irabrand).

Journeys – both literal and literary – weave through the latest edition of Book Talk, in which I sit down with authors Olivia Lang, Sarah Hall, Pedro Lenz and translator Donal McLaughlin to talk about their latest projects.

Granta Best Young British Novelist Sarah Hall reads a creepy excerpt from her new short story collection, The Beautiful Indifference, and discusses the very human need to fight, and how modern-day living has stripped us of the opportunity to do so. Find out where she got the inspiration for her excerpted story, She Murdered Mortal He, and why she finds it easiest to write short stories on the road.

How does a Swiss German novel wind up being translated to Glaswegian Scots? With a little inspiration from James Kelman and some unique urban landscapes. Ryan discusses Donal McLaughlin‘s translation of Pedro Lenz‘s novel, Naw Much of a Talker, and discovers what’s really important in a good translation (and it’s not necessarily being slavishly faithful to the source!).

Finally, Olivia Lang speaks up about alcoholism as a destructive force in literature, as detailed in her nonfiction book, The Trip to Echo Spring. Detailing the lives of six authors with well-documented relationships with alcohol (Ernest Hemingway, John Cheever, John Berryman, F Scott Fitzgerald, Tennessee Williams, and Raymond Carver), Lang seeks to pull away the pervasive myth that it was cool for writers to drink a lot. In reality, it was a destructive force for them, as it is for anyone else, that may have cost the world some great literature. Hear one of the crazier anecdotes detailed in the book, and why Lang found the sobering subject matter so interesting.

Podcast contents

0:00-0:47 Introduction
0:47-11:20 Sarah Hall Interview
11:20-24:10 Pedro Lenz and Donal McLaughlin interview
24:10-32:37 Olivia Lang Interview

Jacqueline Smith has interviewed a swathe of poets from around the Commonwealth at her [email protected] events, and now they are collected in one beautifully curated e-book published by The PotHole Press.

Inspiration From the Common Wealth of Writers to Boost Creativity draws together a series of interviews of writers which focused on aspects of crafting as well as inspirations and influences in their writing.

I recently visited Prague with Literature Across Frontiers and chatted to a selection of poets he met there. We begin with Tomáš Míka, a poet, hip-hop artist and translator of many works including James Hogg and Samuel Beckett, who reads his poem ‘If we do not entertain ourselves, they will entertain us’ and discusses his chaotic ‘maximalist’ approach to poetry performance. Translator, poet and episodic essayist Ondřej Buddeus‎ reads his poem ‘bit-poetics’, tells us why Google is both a poetic and hilarious word and how he is exploring how language adapts to new technology. Playwright and poet Kerry Shawn Keys reads one of his poems and tells us about how he used to experiment with ‘trance’ states. Glasgow born and Prague based writer Christopher Crawford, the editor of online magazine Body reads one of his poems and talks about his approach to editing.

I’m in Valve. Issue 3.

experimental prose and fiction from well-kent faces including Michael Pedersen, Katy McAulay and Ryan Van Winkle, Valve III also features work from emerging writers like Scott Morris, Chelsea Cargill and Fiona Inglis.

The Camaradefest was a unique one day explosion of dynamic collaboration in contemporary avant garde and literary poetics. 100 poets aligned in 50 pairs, each writing an original collaborative work, written specifically for the festival and premiered on the day. We feature 4 of the pairs – Marcus Slease & Claire Potter, Stephen Watts & Will Rowe, Julia Bird & Sarah Hesketh, Ghazal Mosadeq & Ricardo Marques – and discuss the thinking behind the process with SJ Fowler.

The ‘Burbs is a collaboration with myself and SJ Fowler. He’s just released Enemies with Penned in the Margins — an entire collection of his collaborations and it is something special and unique to be a part of. You can buy a copy or check out our work on Commiserate, an ongoing collaboration project.

I was involved with the Poetry meets Biomedical Science project, hung out with the esteemed Veronica van Heyningen, and wrote a poem, ‘Caprice’, which will appear in sequences and pathogens from Litmus Press.

Commiserate is a monthly experiment in poetic collaboration.

October, 2013: William Letford – The Beat is Your Foot

Ryan Van Winkle & William Letford

Says Ryan: I was very glad when SJ Fowler asked if I’d collaborate with my old friend William Letford for his epic CamaradeFest at the Rich Mix in London. The poem started with a text message Letford got during Reel Festivals’ UK tour and evolved with the help of some brilliant of curve balls. Comma cow cow yiki!

The Beat is Your Foot

I am reading your book
it’s pretty dark
where I am right now

sitting with another
life on fire
another job well done

Then

Yesterday, I lay down
on the tarmac
of a Tesco car park

and bench pressed
a shopping trolley
The kids knew

Some of the elderly did too
I’m happy for the rest

to believe I was drunk
or crazy  coma cow cow yiki

Now

people are going home
green purple salmon
our lantern, the soft moon

paved over rivers
something is going on
something is scratching

There are gaps of grief
coma cow cow yiki yiki ay
and art to shinplaster over

these cracks are contagious
coma cow cow yiki
and all the wolves

howl to get in
and weren’t we
roaring lions

No

You were the wolf
I was the lion
I still am, coma cow cow yiki

mice whisper and see
I was getting
your dark book yesterday

i was sober enough
two stories high
everything made sense

the trolly, the size
of my house, width
of my mothers arms

Now

I’m using my hands
tracing emotions in the air
sadness is an arc

you must not push – slide
happiness is a single point
and my heart beats

Yes

chiki down chiki dee down
down down gi doom bong    bong
gi doom bong gi dibby dibby

coma cow cow yiki yiki ay
chiki down chiki dee down

down down gi doom bong    bong
gi doom bong gi dibby dibby
It’s like my hands

are where magic is
and the beat is your foot
in my spoiled, toothless mouth.

Says William: Ryan was in Australia and I was in the North East of Scotland. I’m glad technology has moved forward otherwise our collaboration would’ve involved quills and month long journeys over land and sea and the death of some postmen, and the death of some sailors, and us growing older with painful dental problems. As it was i threw words in his direction which instantly found him and whenever they came back they were better than before.

We duet-ted the poem in London and I loved hearing it out loud. Smiled all the way through it. Even though we have the internet I suspect we’re growing older anyway. My teeth feel okay though.

William Letford has received a New Writer’s Award from the Scottish Book Trust and an Edwin Morgan Travel Bursary from the Arts Trust of Scotland. His first collection, Bevel, was published by Carcanet Press in 2012. He has received rave reviews for his work which combines experimental structure with cadences and accents of ordinary speech to produce “moments of transcendental insight” (The Guardian).