A bit of a bumper session, this 'un.
Attendees: FB, HH, AS, CW (new member!), MG, JL in spirit... think that was it. Maybe I'm wrong....hmm....
Discussed: The Hunt (HH); Melanie (JL); three poems (LR); Adam's funny poem (AS)
Henry's piece, The Hunt, described some cavemen of sorts hunting an elephant. It played around with narrative form and stance, and took us from a Kipling-esque benevolent narrator through to a postmodern anti-structuralist voice... It might feature in his new book, too!
Melanie depicted, amongst other things, the ineffectual weakness of twenty-first century man in all its glory. Melanie moves in with our humble narrator, and sets about stripping him of everything, including the paternity of his child. Some people thought this was all about Melanie as a device for the prefigured womb-creature that would tear about boyfriend and girlfriend; others thought Melanie was just a bit of a bitch. Wry, funny, horrificially self-deprecating, it was a delight to read and discuss.
Lettie and Adam's poems both received a spirited response from the group. It was the first time we read something (Lettie's work) without the author there, which led to an interesting shift in response from the group. I took more of a back seat, taking notes, which meant we got all sorts of things said and discussed to a level of detail that having the author there to clear things up might not have permitted. It was, nonetheless, a worthwhile discussion and much was made of the high quality of the poetry (totally bitchin', yo).
November '09
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