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Poets and Poetry in Cornwall - an essay by Penelope Shuttle
‘The whole world’s water at some time or another
These lines are from Living in Falmouth, a long poem by Peter Redgrove, who lived in Falmouth, Cornwall most of his life. Falmouth is a deepwater port in the far-west of Cornwall, and his poem attests to the connectedness of Cornwall with the rest of the world. Both by its maritime associations, and its long history of migration by its tin-miners, an industry stretching back to Phoenician times, Cornwall has always been in touch with the rest of the world, and this connectedness is also there, vitally, in its creative life. For many years painters and writers have been drawn to Cornwall, fascinated by its light, its atmosphere, its ability to be both far from the wider world, and yet part of it. In an earlier poem, Peter describes Cornish light as ‘the tangy pearl-light, tangy tin-light…’ (Minerals of Cornwall, Stones of Cornwall) and notes how Cornwall ‘plays and thinks with the mineral light,/It sends back its good conclusions, it is exposed,/|It sends back the light silked and silvered…’ Cornwall, a long narrow green county, is bounded by the sea on three sides; so it is almost an island, and the quality of its light comes about from the constant bouncing-back and forth of light as it reflects up from sea to sky and back again and again and again… - Cornwall has a powerful un-English sense of identity. Until the 18th century Cornish, a language closer to Breton and Welsh than to English, was widely spoken, and my own first impression of Cornwall, when I got off the bus at St Erth in the summer of 1969, was of this un-English-ness, for the signposts to towns and villages were in another language – Degibna, Zelah, Halzephron, - they were in Cornish! Every church was dedicated to saints I’d never heard of – St Mylor, St Levan, St Buryan, St Materiana, and I soon learned the Cornish saying that there are more saints in Cornwall than in heaven! So language itself is a profoundly interesting and concerning element in living in Cornwall, and as poets we are constantly reminded of the magic of this lost shadow language, Cornish. Poetry is alive and kicking in Cornwall. In 1972 Peter Redgrove founded The Falmouth Poetry Group, and FPG continues to this day, having had subsequent Chairs, Derek Power, Michael Bayley, Jane Tozer, and, currently, myself. The group focuses on intensive work-shopping of new poems by members. We have organized several poetry festivals and plan future one-day festival events (readings, workshops) in 2008. For the past two years I have run Poetry School Small Groups Seminars from my house in Falmouth, which are, in effect, Masterclasses, and for the next two years the Seminars will be run by American-born poet Alice Kouvanas, in Penzance. fal publications, under the direction of Victoria Field, publishes poets and authors who live in Cornwall, and has created renewed focus upon such writers. Other Cornish towns, especially Liskeard, Redruth, Camelford and Penzance, have strong poetry communities. The Cornish Literary Guild focuses on traditional poets, and the recently-formed Charles Causley Society celebrates this most Cornish yet widely-travelled of poets. Poetry Cornwall, a magazine edited by Les Merton, is based in Redruth. We have an email calendar, devised and run by Caroline Carver, enabling information on all poetry events to be widely circulated, and this has drawn the poets in Cornwall even closer together. A number of us critique our poems via email, and so the danger of isolation, always present to writers, is mitigated. Residential courses at Camelford and at Cape Cornwall run each year. There are also links between poets, artists and musicians, such as the ILLUSTRATED BIOGRAPHY event organized by Amanda Brown in The Morrab Library and BROKEN GROUND, a celebration of Wheal Jane, one of the biggest tin mines in Cornwall which ceased production a few years ago, had text by Peter Redgrove, set to music by Paul Hancock, accompanied by paintings by Ray Atkins, and this was performed on site in 2001. Poets in Cornwall look outward, are published in journals around the world, and also give readings and lead residential courses abroad. Poets in Cornwall are rooted in a richly creative and supportive environment yet we cherish our links with poets around the world. We’ll bring Cornwall to you, and when we return home we’ll take the gift of contact with you, of new things learned, and new poems inspired. Finally, in words from LIVING IN FALMOUTH,
‘Sun steers from the muddy Falmouth east
Yes, we have tickets. Penelope Shuttle
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