{"id":19773,"date":"2013-04-16T06:30:16","date_gmt":"2013-04-15T18:30:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=19773"},"modified":"2013-04-01T23:51:54","modified_gmt":"2013-04-01T10:51:54","slug":"tuesday-poem-angela-carter-by-tim-jones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2013\/04\/16\/tuesday-poem-angela-carter-by-tim-jones\/","title":{"rendered":"Tuesday Poem: “Angela Carter” by Tim Jones"},"content":{"rendered":"

Angela Carter<\/strong><\/p>\n

And then your portrait on the back<\/p>\n

so neutral and complete<\/p>\n

standing full-length<\/p>\n

posed I don’t remember where.<\/p>\n

Eyes sky black<\/p>\n

you stood unsmiling<\/p>\n

suggesting there were realer worlds within.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Your books dealt much in mirrors<\/p>\n

which might have led me to suppose<\/p>\n

that you were one yourself<\/p>\n

and I’d step through the flimsy sheet<\/p>\n

that held you to your words<\/p>\n

and turn and, face inside your face,<\/p>\n

watch the empty space where I had been.
\n.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a9 Tim Jones<\/p>\n

Published in Boat People, <\/em>HeadworX, 2008. Reproduced here with permission.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

As I noted in March 26th’s Tuesday Poem post<\/a>, I am currently running a series of poems in response to works of art, which will include a note from the poet. This week’s poem and note is from Tim Jones.<\/strong><\/p>\n

You can find out more about Angela Carter<\/a> by clicking on her name and reading Tim’s note.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

Poet’s Note: from <\/em>Tim Jones<\/span><\/em><\/h4>\n

“When I was younger, I went through phases of intensively reading the entire oeuvre – or as much of the oeuvre as I could lay my hands on – of specific authors.<\/span><\/p>\n

One such author was Angela Carter (1940-1992), who is probably now best known for her late novel Night at the Circus<\/em>, but whose earlier novels veered closer to science fiction. At a time when I was finding out about feminism, I found Angela Carter’s strongly but unconventionally feminist fiction both fascinating and challenging. The photo that made such an impression on me was on the back cover of The Passion of New Eve<\/em>, her 1977 science fiction novel (though “science fiction” is a pale term to use to describe Carter’s lush, highly symbolic fiction) – and the poem reflects my fascination with the questions of masculine and feminine identity found both in this novel and throughout Carter’s fiction.<\/span><\/p>\n

I get the impression that Angela Carter’s fiction isn’t as well known or widely read twenty years after her death as it deserves to me. If you’d like to know more about her and her work, check out this Scriptorium profile of her<\/span><\/a> by Jeff VanderMeer, or this shorter 2006 profile in the Independent (UK)<\/a>.<\/span>“<\/span><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

About the Poet:<\/span><\/h4>\n

\"\"<\/a>Tim Jones is a poet and author of both science fiction and literary fiction who was awarded the New Zealand Society of Authors Janet Frame Memorial Award for Literature in 2010. He lives in Wellington, New Zealand. Among his recent books are fantasy novel Anarya\u2019s Secret<\/em> (RedBrick, 2007), short story collection Transported<\/em> (Vintage, 2008), and poetry anthology Voyagers: Science Fiction Poetry from New Zealand<\/em> (Interactive Press, 2009), co-edited with Mark Pirie. Voyagers<\/em> won the \u201cBest Collected Work\u201d category in the 2010 Sir Julius Vogel Awards, and has been selected for the \u201cBooks On New Zealand\u201d exhibition at the 2012 Frankfurt Book Fair. Tim\u2019s most recent book is his third poetry collection, Men Briefly Explained<\/em>, published by Interactive Press (IP) in late 2011.<\/span> He is currently working on his third short story collection and, with P.S. Cottier, co-editing the anthology The Stars Like Sand: Australian Speculative Poetry<\/em>, to be published in 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

To find out more about Tim and his work, visit his blog, Books In The Trees<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014<\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>To read the featured poem on the Tuesday Poem Hub<\/strong> and other great poems from fellow Tuesday poets from around the world, click here<\/strong><\/a> or on the Quill<\/strong> icon<\/strong> in the sidebar.<\/p>\n


\n<\/em><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Angela Carter And then your portrait on the back so neutral and complete standing full-length posed I don’t remember where. Eyes sky black you stood unsmiling suggesting there were realer worlds within.   Your books dealt much in mirrors which might have led me to suppose that you were one yourself and I’d step through […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19773"}],"version-history":[{"count":36,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19773\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19802,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19773\/revisions\/19802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}