Travelling is never as just simple as getting from A to B. Whether you're sailing in a stately cruise liner or running for a grimy commuter train, your mode of transport affects the way you look at the things around you. Travel can even make us question who we are at home: will we be the same person at the other end of the journey?
The poems in this anthology take in day-trippers and business travellers, but also characters that are forced to voyage against their will, as well as those with no choice but to stay put. Whatever your destination, this book is a companion for the journey, exploring the nuances of the strange state of being in transit.
(A collaboration between the Emma Press and the Centre for Travel Writing Studies at Nottingham Trent University)
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[Impossible these days to believe in the sky / the way it dissipates on contact / its vanishing trick VANTAGE POINT BY SUSANNAH HART]***
(@TheEmmaPress, 26 October 2018, e-book, 96 pages, borrowed from @natpoetrylib via @OverDriveLibs, edited by Sarah Jackson and Tim Youngs)
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This is another impressive collection from The Emma Press. I'd never heard of any of these poets before so I have a lot of new voices to discover. What impressed me is the range and style of the poems in this anthology and the broad spectrum of subjects explored. We have poems about travelling abroad, local travel, people forced to travel, people stuck in their local area to name but a few. Some of my favourite poems were Vantage Point by Susannah Hart, Always Pleasing This Quarter Sun by Lila Matsumoto, Walnuts by Rich Goodson, Taverna by Jane McKie and Watford Gap by Andrew Taylor.
