It was quite a coup for Newcastle Fringe Festival to get the former Poet Laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, on the bill. An added bonus at The Old Coal Yard was the Scottish multi-instrumentalist John Sampson who opened the show with a rousing fanfare on a hunting horn. This was followed by virtuoso performances on a variety of other instruments including the crumhorn and recorders of different sizes, even playing two simultaneously.
Duffy sat impassive, waiting her time. The evening was billed as ‘Earth Prayers’, presumably in part to promote the anthology of the same name published last year which she has edited. The collection offers a rich array of authors from the romantic poets Leigh Hunt and Dante Gabriel Rossetti to the current Poet Laureate, Simon Armitage, and up and coming Irish bard Jess McKinney.
Celtic poets are much in evidence in the volume, and also received an airing in Newcastle; Norman McCaig’s ‘Toad,’ and Kathleen Jamie’s riposte to the world in 2021 ‘What the Clyde Said, After COP 26’, plus two Seamus Heaney poems.
Duffy offered a few of her own compositions, rich with botanical references. She frequently recites long lists, naming herbs, flowers, and native trees, and mourning their loss. The poem ‘English Elms’ explores the ‘masterpiece trees’ known as Seven Sisters in Tottenham who were ‘overwhelmed’ by urbanisation, and then disease introduced through global trade.
Bees were also much in evidence in many of the poems Duffy read to the packed crowd, both her own and penned by others. I particularly liked her praise poem ‘Virgil’s Bees’, and ‘The Human Bee’ which is inspired by the practice of hand pollination in China, necessary in the age of declining bee populations due to insecticides such as neonicotinoids. In complete contrast Duffy also offered us the profane ‘Formal Complaint.’ It is a highly political poem addressing in part the ‘twin evils of Trump and Brexit’ in the form of a sestina, a complex structured verse in which six key words are rotated in a strict pattern as line endings, all coming together in the final verse. For this she apparently accepted words chosen by Sampson: “– arseholes,” “gatekeepers,” “chancers,” “tossers,” bullshitters,” and “patriots.”
The reading ended with a much more meditative (almost religious) tone as Duffy read three assorted prayer poems, which were rather spoiled by an audience member noisily exiting stage left for the public toilets. This was followed by Sampson playing Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’ on the trumpet. Whilst this is one of my favourite songs, I felt the rather forced audience participation was a bit cheesy especially as the main plinky-plonky tune emanated apparently from a computer-generated track.
Full marks, however, for reminding us of the ongoing climate crisis and the power of the arts, and particularly poetry, to explore the relationship between the anthropogenic and the natural world.
Julie Ward saw Carol Ann Duffy and John Sampson at The Old Coal Yard as part of Newcastle Fringe.
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