{"id":31587,"date":"2016-03-01T06:30:43","date_gmt":"2016-02-29T17:30:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=31587"},"modified":"2016-03-01T00:14:32","modified_gmt":"2016-02-29T11:14:32","slug":"leaving-the-red-zone-a-standing-room-only-book-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2016\/03\/01\/leaving-the-red-zone-a-standing-room-only-book-launch\/","title":{"rendered":"“Leaving The Red Zone” — A Standing-Room-Only Book Launch"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Leaving<\/a>Yesterday evening I went to the launch of Leaving The Red Zone<\/em>, an anthology of poetry edited by James Norcliffe and Joanna Preston, and published by Clerestory Press, to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the February 22, 2011, earthquake that devastated much of my home city of Christchurch, killing 185 people and injuring many more.<\/p>\n

The large venue (The Laboratory, in Lincoln) was filled to capacity, standing room only in truth—a sign, I believe, of the importance of this collection to the community, not just of poets but of Canterbury people. Another sign of that importance was that it was launched by not one, but two Mayors: Lianne Dalziell, the mayor of Christchurch, and Kelvin Coe, the Mayor of Selwyn District. They both spoke very well, as did the other keynote speakers: James Norcliffe, for the editorial team, and Dr Glyn Strange of Clerestory Press, as publisher.<\/p>\n

Perhaps yet another sign of the importance of this book to the community is that the first printing had almost sold out by the end of the evening—reasonably unprecedented for a poetry launch, in NZ at any rate.<\/p>\n

I have already had a quick skim through my contributor’s copy so know it’s going to repay my time to visit. I hope to share some of the poems therein with you here over the next few Tuesdays. I also have three poems of my own in there—but was both surprised (I hadn’t known in advance) and moved that my poem, Swarm<\/em>, is featured on the back cover. It is a place of honour for any anthology or collection and I am greatly honoured that Swarm<\/em> should be given that place, particularly in this<\/em> book.<\/p>\n

To conclude for today, here are the first words of the first poem in Leaving the Red Zone<\/em>, and also the last lines of the last poem in the book:<\/p>\n

“Solitary sits the city<\/span>
\n one full of people,<\/span>
\n like a widow weeping<\/span>
\n silently at night;<\/span>
\n ….”<\/span><\/p>\n

~ from Lament (<\/em>after Jeremiah of Anathoth) by Ian McCartney<\/p>\n

“Ths pm is lk<\/span>
\n a brkn cty<\/span>
\n all its wds r<\/span>
\n smshd to<\/span>
\n syllbls.<\/span><\/p>\n

Each syllbl<\/span>
\n a brck.”<\/span><\/p>\n

~ from The Poem That Is Like A City<\/em>, by Fiona Farrell<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

To purchase copies of Leaving the Red Zone<\/em>, email clerestory@xtra.co.nz <\/strong>for\u00a0\u201chow to\u201d and other pertinent details.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday evening I went to the launch of Leaving The Red Zone, an anthology of poetry edited by James Norcliffe and Joanna Preston, and published by Clerestory Press, to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the February 22, 2011, earthquake that devastated much of my home city of Christchurch, killing 185 people and injuring many more. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,35,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-booklaunches","category-earthquakepoems","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31587","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=31587"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31587\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31595,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31587\/revisions\/31595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}