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Posts by Carcanet Press

In which I talk with the delightful @gregorykearns.bsky.social about stealing books, a railway childhood, translation and the soul’s mobility
. @carcanet.bsky.social

1 week ago 9 3 0 1
Bruegel by Iain Crichton Smith A bony horse with a bird on it droops its head. With a cart of skulls like potatoes Death drives onward. There's a storm of monsters snouted and obscene and on another page a neat snow scene. Large peasants dance under a leaden sky and ships are sinking in a black-framed sea. The blind raise tortured faces. In Cockayne they eat and drink and sleep and at the moon a peasant pisses. Proverbs multiply. Children with adult faces gravely play while aprons break the storm, red plates and jugs, Death in a hood and lands pulled back like rugs. And over the countryside the black birds go with far below them hunters in the snow.

Bruegel by Iain Crichton Smith A bony horse with a bird on it droops its head. With a cart of skulls like potatoes Death drives onward. There's a storm of monsters snouted and obscene and on another page a neat snow scene. Large peasants dance under a leaden sky and ships are sinking in a black-framed sea. The blind raise tortured faces. In Cockayne they eat and drink and sleep and at the moon a peasant pisses. Proverbs multiply. Children with adult faces gravely play while aprons break the storm, red plates and jugs, Death in a hood and lands pulled back like rugs. And over the countryside the black birds go with far below them hunters in the snow.

A montage of various paintings by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, mostly full of sixteenth-century Netherlandish peasant lives, eating, drinking, dancing, playing, working, trudging through the snow – although there is also a painting showing warring angels and devils, and another with two small monkeys sitting in an arched window. The monkeys have small chains running from their waists to a metal ring embedded in the windowsill.

A montage of various paintings by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, mostly full of sixteenth-century Netherlandish peasant lives, eating, drinking, dancing, playing, working, trudging through the snow – although there is also a painting showing warring angels and devils, and another with two small monkeys sitting in an arched window. The monkeys have small chains running from their waists to a metal ring embedded in the windowsill.

A bony horse with a bird on it droops its head.
With a cart of skulls like potatoes Death drives onward


—Iain Crichton Smith, “Bruegel”
from DEER ON THE HIGH HILLS, @carcanet.bsky.social 2021

A #poem for #WorldArtDay
#art #painting #visualart #poetry
artsandculture.google.com/entity/piete...

6 days ago 10 3 1 0
Crowdieknowe Hugh MacDiarmid Oh to be at Crowdieknowe When the last trumpet blaws, An’ see the deid come loupin’ owre The auld grey wa’s. Muckle men wi’ tousled beards, I grat at as a bairn ’ll scramble frae the croodit clay Wi’ feck o’ swearin’. An’ glower at God an’ a’ his gang O’ angels i’ the lift – Thae trashy bleezin’ French-like folk Wha gar’d them shift! Fain the weemun-folk’ll seek To mak’ them haud their row – Fegs, God’s no blate gin he stirs up The men o’ Crowdieknowe!

Crowdieknowe Hugh MacDiarmid Oh to be at Crowdieknowe When the last trumpet blaws, An’ see the deid come loupin’ owre The auld grey wa’s. Muckle men wi’ tousled beards, I grat at as a bairn ’ll scramble frae the croodit clay Wi’ feck o’ swearin’. An’ glower at God an’ a’ his gang O’ angels i’ the lift – Thae trashy bleezin’ French-like folk Wha gar’d them shift! Fain the weemun-folk’ll seek To mak’ them haud their row – Fegs, God’s no blate gin he stirs up The men o’ Crowdieknowe!

“Crowdieknowe”, by Catriona Campbell (b. 1940). Oil on canvas. Three angels, all pale, bald, and androgynous, stand wearing knee-length robes in the middle of a cemetery. One holds a book, and points forward, looking up quizzically. One holds a long trumpet slightly protectively. One gestures downwards towards a man who is hauling himself out of the ground using a golden cord wrapped around the angel's waist. Around the angels, naked men and women are pulling themselves out of their graves, gesticulating at the angels. In the background, more angels fly in while more naked figures clamber over the cemetery wall.

“Crowdieknowe”, by Catriona Campbell (b. 1940). Oil on canvas. Three angels, all pale, bald, and androgynous, stand wearing knee-length robes in the middle of a cemetery. One holds a book, and points forward, looking up quizzically. One holds a long trumpet slightly protectively. One gestures downwards towards a man who is hauling himself out of the ground using a golden cord wrapped around the angel's waist. Around the angels, naked men and women are pulling themselves out of their graves, gesticulating at the angels. In the background, more angels fly in while more naked figures clamber over the cemetery wall.

Oh to be at Crowdieknowe
When the last trumpet blaws,
An’ see the deid come loupin’ owre
The auld grey wa’s


—Hugh MacDiarmid, “Crowdieknowe”
from Hugh MacDiarmid: Selected Poetry, @carcanet.bsky.social 2004
#poem #poetry #art #visualart #WorldArtDay
www.carcanet.co.uk/978185754756...

6 days ago 11 2 0 0
Culloden and After Iain Crichton Smith You understand it? How they returned from Culloden over the soggy moors aslant, each cap at the low ebb no new full tide could pardon: how they stood silent at the end of the rope unwound from battle: and to the envelope of a bedded room came home, polite and sudden. And how, much later, bards from Tiree and Mull would write of exile in the hard town where mills belched English, anger of new school: how they remembered where the sad and brown landscapes were dear and distant as the crown that fuddled Charles might study in his ale. There was a sleep. Long fences leaned across the vacant croft. The silly cows were heard mooing their sorrow and their Gaelic loss. The pleasing thrush would branch upon a sword. A mind withdrew against its dreamed hoard as whelks withdraw or crabs their delicate claws. And nothing to be heard but songs indeed while wandering Charles would on his olives feed and from his Minch of sherries mumble laws.

Culloden and After Iain Crichton Smith You understand it? How they returned from Culloden over the soggy moors aslant, each cap at the low ebb no new full tide could pardon: how they stood silent at the end of the rope unwound from battle: and to the envelope of a bedded room came home, polite and sudden. And how, much later, bards from Tiree and Mull would write of exile in the hard town where mills belched English, anger of new school: how they remembered where the sad and brown landscapes were dear and distant as the crown that fuddled Charles might study in his ale. There was a sleep. Long fences leaned across the vacant croft. The silly cows were heard mooing their sorrow and their Gaelic loss. The pleasing thrush would branch upon a sword. A mind withdrew against its dreamed hoard as whelks withdraw or crabs their delicate claws. And nothing to be heard but songs indeed while wandering Charles would on his olives feed and from his Minch of sherries mumble laws.

9/10

You understand it? How they returned from Culloden
over the soggy moors aslant, each cap
at the low ebb no new full tide could pardon


—Iain Crichton Smith, “Culloden and After”
in NEW COLLECTED POEMS, @carcanet.bsky.social 2011
#poem #poetry
www.carcanet.co.uk/978185754960...

5 days ago 2 1 1 1
Edwin Morgan CANEDOLIA An Off-Concrete Scotch Fantasia oa! hoy! awe! ba! mey! who saw? rhu saw rum. garve saw smoo. nigg saw tain. lairg saw lagg. rigg saw eigg. largs saw haggs. tongue saw luss. mull saw yell. stoer saw strone. drem saw muck. gask saw noss. unst saw cults. echt saw banff. weem saw wick. trool saw twatt. how far? from largo to lunga from joppa to skibo from ratho to shona from ulva to minto from tinto to tolsta from soutra to marsco from braco to barra from alva to stobo from fogo to fada from gigha to gogo from kelso to stroma from hirta to spango. what is it like there? och, it’s freuchie, it’s faifley, it’s wamphray, it’s frandy, it’s sliddery. what do you do? we foindle and fungle, we bonkle and meigle and maxpoffle. we scotstarvit, armit, wormit, and even whifflet, we play at crossstobs, leuchars, gorbals, and finfan. we scavaig, and there’s aye a bit of tilquhilly. if it’s wet, treshnish and mishnish. what is the best of the country? blinkbonny! airgold! thundergay! and the worst? scrishven, shiskine, scrabster, and snizort. listen! what’s that? catacol and wauchope, never heed them. tell us about last night well, we had a wee ferintosh and we lay on the quiraing. it was pure strontian! but who was there? petermoidart and craigenkenneth and cambusputtock and ecclemuchty and corriehulish and balladolly and altnacanny and clauchanvrechan and stronachlochan and auchenlachar and tighnacrankie and tilliebruaich and killieharra and invervannach and achnatudlem and machrishellach and inchtamurchan and auchterfechan and kinlochculter and ardnawhallie and invershuggle. and what was the toast? schiehallion! schiehallion! schiehallion!

Edwin Morgan CANEDOLIA An Off-Concrete Scotch Fantasia oa! hoy! awe! ba! mey! who saw? rhu saw rum. garve saw smoo. nigg saw tain. lairg saw lagg. rigg saw eigg. largs saw haggs. tongue saw luss. mull saw yell. stoer saw strone. drem saw muck. gask saw noss. unst saw cults. echt saw banff. weem saw wick. trool saw twatt. how far? from largo to lunga from joppa to skibo from ratho to shona from ulva to minto from tinto to tolsta from soutra to marsco from braco to barra from alva to stobo from fogo to fada from gigha to gogo from kelso to stroma from hirta to spango. what is it like there? och, it’s freuchie, it’s faifley, it’s wamphray, it’s frandy, it’s sliddery. what do you do? we foindle and fungle, we bonkle and meigle and maxpoffle. we scotstarvit, armit, wormit, and even whifflet, we play at crossstobs, leuchars, gorbals, and finfan. we scavaig, and there’s aye a bit of tilquhilly. if it’s wet, treshnish and mishnish. what is the best of the country? blinkbonny! airgold! thundergay! and the worst? scrishven, shiskine, scrabster, and snizort. listen! what’s that? catacol and wauchope, never heed them. tell us about last night well, we had a wee ferintosh and we lay on the quiraing. it was pure strontian! but who was there? petermoidart and craigenkenneth and cambusputtock and ecclemuchty and corriehulish and balladolly and altnacanny and clauchanvrechan and stronachlochan and auchenlachar and tighnacrankie and tilliebruaich and killieharra and invervannach and achnatudlem and machrishellach and inchtamurchan and auchterfechan and kinlochculter and ardnawhallie and invershuggle. and what was the toast? schiehallion! schiehallion! schiehallion!

we foindle and fungle, we bonkle and meigle and maxpoffle.
we scotstarvit, armit, wormit, and even whifflet


—Edwin Morgan, “Canedolia: An Off-Concrete Scotch Fantasia”
from CENTENARY SELECTED POEMS, @carcanet.bsky.social 2020
#BookologyThursday #poem #placenames
www.carcanet.co.uk/978178410996...

5 days ago 10 4 0 0
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Henri Coulette New and Selected Poems: Online Launch - Carcanet Press Please join us to celebrate the launch of Henri Coulette's New and Selected Poems, edited by Michael Caines & Boris Dralyuk. The event will be hosted

Friends near and far, mark your calendars for the April 28 tele-launch of Henri Coulette’s NEW AND SELECTED POEMS. Michael Caines and I will be joined by Ange Mlinko. @carcanet.bsky.social

www.carcanet.co.uk/events/henri...

2 days ago 11 2 0 0
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Oh Elizabeth Jennings. Why have I just found you? I love you. From selected poems @carcanet.bsky.social đŸ©·.

2 days ago 9 3 0 0
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Introducing Leontia Flynn!✈

Bringing together work from her five previous collections, this Selected Poems, in its variety of forms, registers the trajectory of a life: the awful and exhilarating experiment of existing in a turbulent world.

Pre-order your copy with code APRILBOOKS15 for 15% off.🔗

5 days ago 7 1 0 1
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📖Upcoming Carcanet Book Launches!

Please join us to celebrate the launches of Leontia Flynn, Robert Minhinnick and Henri Coulette!

Get tickets for our events here:🔗
www.carcanet.co.uk/events/

1 week ago 2 0 0 0
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Stephen Sawyer on Jorie Graham's poem 'Time Frame' and his own poem 'What We Did Know We Had or Running Thin' In this final episode of Season Three, Stephen Sawyer discusses Jorie Graham's poem 'Time Frame' in relation to his own poem 'What We Did Know We Had or Running Thin'. Together, we explore Jorie Graha...

In the final programme of series three of The Two-Way Poetry Podcast I talk to Stephen Sawyer about Jorie Graham’s poem ‘Time Frame’ in relation to and in conversation with his own poem ‘Running Thin’.

@lrb.co.uk @carcanet.bsky.social @longbarrowpress.bsky.social

www.podbean.com/eas/pb-guui6...

1 week ago 4 3 0 0
A Home in Space Edwin Morgan Laid-back in orbit, they found their minds. They found their minds were very clean and clear. Clear crystals in swarms outside were their fireflies and larks. Larks they were in lift-off, swallows in soaring. Soaring metal is flight and nest together. Together they must hatch. Hatches let the welders out. Out went the whitesuit riggers with frames as light as air. Air was millions under lock and key. Key-ins had computers wild on Saturday nights. Nights, days, months, years they lived in space. Space shone black in their eyes. Eyes, hands, food-tubes, screens, lenses, keys were one. One night – or day – or month – or year – they all – all gathered at the panel and agreed – agreed to cut communication with – with the earth base – and it must be said they were – were cool and clear as they dismantled the station and – and gave their capsule such power that – that they launched themselves outwards – outwards in an impeccable trajectory, that band – that band of tranquil defiers, not to plant any – any home with roots but to keep a – a voyaging generation voyaging, and as far – as far as there would ever be a home in space – space that needs time and time that needs life.

A Home in Space Edwin Morgan Laid-back in orbit, they found their minds. They found their minds were very clean and clear. Clear crystals in swarms outside were their fireflies and larks. Larks they were in lift-off, swallows in soaring. Soaring metal is flight and nest together. Together they must hatch. Hatches let the welders out. Out went the whitesuit riggers with frames as light as air. Air was millions under lock and key. Key-ins had computers wild on Saturday nights. Nights, days, months, years they lived in space. Space shone black in their eyes. Eyes, hands, food-tubes, screens, lenses, keys were one. One night – or day – or month – or year – they all – all gathered at the panel and agreed – agreed to cut communication with – with the earth base – and it must be said they were – were cool and clear as they dismantled the station and – and gave their capsule such power that – that they launched themselves outwards – outwards in an impeccable trajectory, that band – that band of tranquil defiers, not to plant any – any home with roots but to keep a – a voyaging generation voyaging, and as far – as far as there would ever be a home in space – space that needs time and time that needs life.

Larks they were in lift-off, swallows in soaring.
Soaring metal is flight and nest together


—Edwin Morgan, “A Home in Space”
published in CENTENARY SELECTED POEMS, @carcanet.bsky.social 2020
#poem #poetry #Artemis
www.carcanet.co.uk/978178410996...

2 weeks ago 12 4 0 0
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@carcanet.bsky.social - Remembering Ed Dorn today on the Allen Ginsberg Project - allenginsberg.org/2026/04/t-a-...

2 weeks ago 3 2 0 0
Pilate at Fortingall by Edwin Morgan A Latin harsh with Aramaicisms poured from his lips incessantly; it made no sense, for surely he was mad. The glade of birches shamed his rags, in paroxysms he stumbled, toga’d, furred, blear, brittle, grey. They told us he sat here beneath the yew even in downpours; ate dog-scraps. Crows flew from prehistoric stone to stone all day. “See him now.” He crawled to the cattle-trough at dusk, jumbled the water till it sloshed and spilled into the hoof-mush in blue strands, slapped with useless despair each sodden cuff, and washed his hands, and watched his hands, and washed his hands, and watched his hands, and washed his hands.

Pilate at Fortingall by Edwin Morgan A Latin harsh with Aramaicisms poured from his lips incessantly; it made no sense, for surely he was mad. The glade of birches shamed his rags, in paroxysms he stumbled, toga’d, furred, blear, brittle, grey. They told us he sat here beneath the yew even in downpours; ate dog-scraps. Crows flew from prehistoric stone to stone all day. “See him now.” He crawled to the cattle-trough at dusk, jumbled the water till it sloshed and spilled into the hoof-mush in blue strands, slapped with useless despair each sodden cuff, and washed his hands, and watched his hands, and washed his hands, and watched his hands, and washed his hands.

A Latin harsh with Aramaicisms
poured from his lips incessantly; it made
no sense, for surely he was mad


—Edwin Morgan, “Pilate at Fortingall”
published in Centenary Selected Poems, @carcanet.bsky.social 2020
#Easter #poem #poetry #GoodFriday
www.carcanet.co.uk/978178410996...

2 weeks ago 20 6 2 0
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This month we're publishing Alcatraz: Poems from the Contemporary Welsh by Robert Minhinnick!đŸ’„

Get 15% off your copy when you use the code MARCHBOOKS15:
www.carcanet.co.uk/978180017503...

2 weeks ago 1 1 0 0
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Say hello to our April titles! đŸŒŠïž

Get 15% off with code APRILBOOKS15 until the end of the month:
www.carcanet.co.uk/new-titles-o...

2 weeks ago 4 0 0 0
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Discount Spotlight:

This Women's History Month, get 20% off our rediscovered women poets with code REDISCOVER20:
tinyurl.com/zd76bpcx

Lynette Roberts is one of the most astonishing and brilliant poets of the 20th century. This book contains sixty-five of Roberts' uncollected and unpublished poems.

3 weeks ago 2 0 0 0
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Happy World Poetry Day!🎉

To celebrate, we're offering 25% off 10 of our bestselling poetry collections until tomorrow (Sunday 22 March).

Head to our website checkout and use code POETRY25 for 25% off:🔗
www.carcanet.co.uk/

Or, read more about the books on offer:
tinyurl.com/5anxv5zh

1 month ago 5 3 0 1
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‘I’ve been to heaven, SinĂ©ad’ —extract from Among Communists - Books Ireland 'From then on, whenever I thought of a perfect anything, I pictured the GDR'. An extract from Among Communists by SinĂ©ad Morrissey (Carcanet Press).

‘My idea of the German Democratic Republic still has our old hoover at its heart.’—An extract from Among Communists by SinĂ©ad Morrissey (Carcanet Press)
@carcanet.bsky.social @chaptersbookstore.bsky.social
booksirelandmagazine.com/ive-been-to-...

1 month ago 5 2 1 1
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Discount Spotlight:

This Women's History Month, get 20% off our rediscovered women poets with code REDISCOVER20:
tinyurl.com/zd76bpcx

Alice Meynell was a major British author of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this is the first collection of her work to be published in 75 years.

1 month ago 3 0 0 0
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Follow us on Instagram to be the first to hear more PN Review news!âŹ‡ïž
www.instagram.com/carcanetpres

1 month ago 0 1 0 0

Belfast, comunismo, conflicto norirlandés y poesía. Ninguna sorpresa que las memorias de Sinéad Morrissey sean uno de mis libros mås esperados del año.

Se publica en inglĂ©s este mes y la autora lo presenta mañana por Zoom 👇👇

1 month ago 3 1 0 0
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We're delighted to announce that three Carcanet poets have been longlisted for the 2026 Jhalak Prize!🎉

Many congratulations to SuAndi, Catherine-Esther Cowie, and Lorna Goodison, who have been longlisted for their collections Leaning Against Time, Heirloom, and Dante's Inferno.

1 month ago 7 1 0 0
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Tomorrow night at 7pm on Zoom, award-winning poet SinĂ©ad Morrissey will launch her memoir AMONG COMMUNISTS, hosted by memoirist @suzyjoinson.bsky.social â€ïžđŸ”„

Tickets here: tinyurl.com/bdhavz5y

Tells a history of the Northern Irish conflict unlike any other... see you there? 📚

1 month ago 1 1 0 1
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Cath Drake's The Verandah Cath Drake's The Verandah – Cath Drake's The Verandah Welcome!  Join quality poetry masterclasses, writing and mindfulness workshops with the best teachers...

Join sought after teacher David Morley for an immersive workshop on the pantoum, one of poetry’s most haunting and versatile forms. David will offer a unique visual map of the form and experiments with extended pantoums. @carcanet.bsky.social @profdavidmorley.bsky.social www.cathdrake.com 11 May

1 month ago 2 2 0 0
Poem for Innocent Victims of War A. C. Jacobs You did not die for me Or love or desperation. No-one chipped your names On plaques on peaceful blocks of stone. You are just the useless dead Who mock our daily sin of passion, Climb through our heads in cold, slow silence. When you were people We could have loved you, Found out your names And brought you presents. We could have walked around with your response. Or even if you chose to die We might have understood your longing And written down your utmost fear. Now, though, you have got beyond our feelings, And we can never almost follow To learn your last shared and perfect secret.

Poem for Innocent Victims of War A. C. Jacobs You did not die for me Or love or desperation. No-one chipped your names On plaques on peaceful blocks of stone. You are just the useless dead Who mock our daily sin of passion, Climb through our heads in cold, slow silence. When you were people We could have loved you, Found out your names And brought you presents. We could have walked around with your response. Or even if you chose to die We might have understood your longing And written down your utmost fear. Now, though, you have got beyond our feelings, And we can never almost follow To learn your last shared and perfect secret.

When you were people
We could have loved you,
Found out your names
And brought you presents


—AC Jacobs, “Poem for Innocent Victims of War”
published in NAMELESS COUNTRY: Selected Poems, @carcanet.bsky.social 2018
#poem #poetry
www.carcanet.co.uk/978178410675...

1 month ago 16 10 0 0
For My Mother Iain Crichton Smith She is tougher than me, harder. Elephant body on a miniature stool keels when rising till the drilled stick plants it upright. Rock fills the false room who has more air about her. Kneaded life like good butter. Is at seventy not afraid of the perished dead who spit and rear snarling at me, not her, though forty years younger. Not riches do I wish me nor successful power. This only I admire to roll the seventieth sea as if her voyage were to truthful Lewis rising, most loved though most bare at the end of a rich season.

For My Mother Iain Crichton Smith She is tougher than me, harder. Elephant body on a miniature stool keels when rising till the drilled stick plants it upright. Rock fills the false room who has more air about her. Kneaded life like good butter. Is at seventy not afraid of the perished dead who spit and rear snarling at me, not her, though forty years younger. Not riches do I wish me nor successful power. This only I admire to roll the seventieth sea as if her voyage were to truthful Lewis rising, most loved though most bare at the end of a rich season.

She is tougher than me, harder.
Elephant body on a miniature stool
keels when rising till the drilled stick
plants it upright


—Iain Crichton Smith, “For My Mother”
from New Collected Poems, @carcanet.bsky.social 2011
#MothersDay #poem #poetry
www.carcanet.co.uk/978185754960...

1 month ago 5 2 0 1
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This month we're publishing Before Violence by Joe Carrick-Varty!🎡

Get 15% off your copy when you use the code MARCHBOOKS15:
tinyurl.com/3z5c7mtv

A Poetry Book Society Spring Recommendation
Joe's outstanding second collection reflects further on growing up under the cloud of abuse and alcoholism.

1 month ago 3 0 0 0
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Congratulations to Dane Holt whose debut collection 'Father's Father's Father' has been shortlisted for the 2026 John Pollard Poetry Prize! @tcddublin.bsky.social

The winner will be announced at a ceremony in Trinity in April 2026.

Check out the book here: www.carcanet.co.uk/978180017468...

1 month ago 2 1 0 0
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⭐Discount Spotlight:

This Women's History Month, get 20% off our rediscovered women poets with code REDISCOVER20:
tinyurl.com/zd76bpcx

The Miraculous Season, is a revelation of the true breadth and brilliance of Lang's poetry, rediscovered and made available in print for the first time since 1975.

1 month ago 6 1 0 0
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Many good reasons to listen to this 'Verb' with @imcmillan.bsky.social! One is to hear lovely lucid lines by Elizabeth Jennings read & introduced by Michael Schmidt,who published her so long @carcanet.bsky.social. Her marriage of formal grace & intense openness to life's seasons is, I think, unique.

1 month ago 10 4 2 0