Mauve

TLS arrived today, and I eagerly turned to see who'd won the poetry competition. I don't know why I was eager, as I'd been lukewarm about the shortlist. It's eagerness about competition tout court, rather than the quality of the contestants. Something unpleasantly atavistic then.

'The Mauve Tam-O'-Shanter' is a depressing poem. Not just because it is about a bereavement. I don't know whether the poet writes from personal experience, but that shouldn't make a difference. (Oh, it seems to in the case of war poetry, and Tim Kendall has written eloquently about that.) Grief shouldn't disarm criticism. What I object to in the poem is cliché, sentimentality, and outright nonsense. And that seems to be what readers of the TLS like - or at least the voters in this competition. As I neither entered nor voted in the competition, I think I can allow myself a little grumble.

'The Examiners' came second. Of its type, it's highly competent, but there is nothing about it that couldn't have been written half a century ago. Why should this matter? I don't think poetry should be that damn' comfortable, even if it's about uncomfortable subjects. The edge of humour here stops the uncomfortable being anything more than a mild unease... And if, as John Hartley Williams claims - nor is he the first to do so - all poetry should be an experiment, it's not clear what this is trying to do, except be clever. Entertain, I suppose.