Issue 25 is our anniversary issue - twenty-five issues and ten years' continuous publication! To celebrate, we've asked some of our favourite writers, and some of our regular contributors, to contribute new work to this issue. Highlights include:
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New poetry by Neil Curry, Carol Rumens, Les Murray, Alison Brackenbury; plus the launch of our innovative new poetry feature, 'Behind the Arras', in which poets give us a rare glimpse of the complex skeins of thought and words underneath the neatly woven surface of a finished poem
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Fiction by David Constantine and Joanna Canon
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'Demeter, Caliban and Ted Hughes': a typically wide-ranging and thought-provoking essay by Alan Davis
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Adam Piette on a Shakespeare sonnet
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Phil Davis interviews Jonathan Bate about Shakespeare at the RSC
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Readers Connect looks at A Pair of Blue Eyes, one of Thomas Hardy's lesser known novels
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Plus recommendations of Robert Lowell, Malcolm Lowry, D.H. Lawrence, Tove Jansson, and many more...
contents
editorial
Jane Davis - Looking Forward
Editor's Picks
poetry
Neil Curry
Les Murray
Isobel Lusted
Alison Brackenbury
Simon Fletcher
behind the arras
carol rumens
fiction
David Constantine: Regrets
Ivan Nellist: Local Hero
essays
Alan Davis: Reading Ruskin Reading Blake
Pamela Coren: Serial Reading
interviews
Jonathan Bate: The State of Shakespeare, Part I
learning curve
Adam Piette: The Practice of Poetry: Recalcitrant Poems
Ask the Reader
reading lives
Christopher Routledge: The Tyranny of Thomas
readers connect
Connect with a Classic: Thomas Hardy, A Pair of Blue Eyes
Brian Nellist: The Constraint of Accident
Eileen Pollard: The Unreality of his Words
Sarah Coley: Buffeted at Will
Meet the Reading Group: Sam Wood: Getting Going
reflections
Raymond Tallis: The Shadow of Death: Ann Drysdale, three-three, two-two, five-six
Dan Jacobson: Crab-wise? Guenter Grass, Crabwalk
reviews
John Scrivener: Wrestling with the Angel: The New Cambridge Paragraph Bible, ed. David Norton; A Textual History of the King James Bible, David Norton
recommendations
Angela Macmillan/John McGahern: After Sunset: John Williams, Stoner
Carol Rumens: Spiral Reading: Robert Lowell, Imitations
Ann Stapleton: Our Comfort is the Song: Edwin Arlington Robinson
James Hammond: A Writer in Love: The Complete Poems of D.H. Lawrence
Helen Tookey: Something New About Hell Fire: Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano
Good Books: brief recommendations by Amanda Jones and Angela Deegan
Kerry Hughes: Modern Mythology: Mario Puzo, The Godfather
Angela Macmillan: Saving My Life: Tobias Wolff, In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War
Sophie Paterson: Are there Ants in Heaven? Tove Jansson, The Summer Book
the back end
Enid Stubin: Our Spy in NY
Tom Ashley: Winter Trees
Cassandra: Crossword
Buck's Quiz
Contributors
Quiz and puzzle answers
plus quotations from Wordsworth's poetry