New Poet Laureate

[Ray]

Has this not been discussed yet?

After 341 Years, British Poet Laureate Is a Woman

Here's an excerpt from one of Carol Ann Duffy's poems, "Eurydice" from this link:

Eurydice

Girls, I was dead and down

in the Underworld, a shade,

a shadow of my former self, nowhen.

It was a place where language stopped,

a black full-stop, a black hole

where words had to come to an end

And end they did there,

last words,

famous or not.

It suited me down to the ground.

So imagine me there,

unavailable,

out of this world,

then picture my face in that place

of Eternal Repose,

in the one place you'd think a girl would be safe

from the kind of a man

who follows her round

writing poems

hovers about

while she reads them,

calls her his Muse,

and once sulked for a night and a day

because she remarked on his weakness for abstract noouns;

just picture my face

when I heard -

Ye Gods -

a familiar knock-knock-knock at Death's door.

Him.

Big O.

Larger than life.

With his lyre

and a poem to read with me as the prize.

Things were different back then.

For the men, verse-wise,

Big O, was the boy.

Legendary. The blurb

on the back of his books claimed

that animals,

aardvark to Zebra,

flocked to his side when he sang,

fish leapt from their waves

at the sound of his voice,

even the mute, sullen stones at his feet

wept wee silver tears.

Bollocks. Furthermore,

we've all, let's be honest,

been bored half to death by a man

who fucks like he's writing a book.

And, given my time all over again,

I know that I'd rather write for myself

than be dearest, beloved, dark lady, white goddess, etc. etc.

In fact, girls, I'd rather be dead.

But the Gods are like publishers -

usually male -

and what you doubtless know of my tale

is the deal......

[dirac]

Thanks for posting, Ray. I had meant to put something up but hadn't gotten around to it. Duffy seems a solid choice, a poet with popular and critical appeal. It's a tough role because as Andrew Motion points out in the article you linked to, the British press seem to enjoy kicking around the poet laureate's official efforts. Times have changed and it seems both poet and public are understandably less comfortable with the idea of nuzzling up to royalty in verse, although some great poetry in that vein was produced in centuries past.

Related story.

For her fans - and there are a lot - it will be justice at last. Ten years ago it was between Duffy and Motion and one Downing Street official intimated that it was the poet's sexuality that was the stumbling block. "Blair is worried about having a homosexual [sic] as poet laureate because of how it might play in middle England," the official told the Sunday Times.