February 2021: Literary Events Online
The HCE magazine team have created another list of literary open mics, events and workshops, to help you plan for the weeks ahead. You can stay virus-free AND enjoy your favourite gigs! This February is also the perfect chance to “travel” afar and attend events you never thought you could…
REVIEW: JOELLE TAYLOR’S ‘SONGS MY ENEMY TAUGHT ME’
By Stella Backhouse || But what if that truth is brutal, ugly, controversial and not something people want to hear? What then is poetry’s role? Joelle Taylor’s 2017 collection Songs My Enemy Taught Me asks all these questions and more. It’s not an easy read; it isn’t meant to be. […]
THE JANUARY CHALLENGE 2021
The January Challenge 2021 By Eve Volungeviciute Keeping up one's spirits at this time can be difficult, but luckily, in this day and age there are plenty of chances for creative people to express themselves. 64 Million Artists organisation is doing a...
REVIEW: ANDY WILLOUGHBY’S ‘TOUGH’
By Stella Backhouse || Ghosts stalk the pages of Andy Willoughby’s 2004 collection Tough. They catch you in the opening poem and lead you through Whitby’s vanished whalebone arch […]
January 2021: Online Literary Events
Finally – 2021 has arrived! Sadly, this COVID-19 pandemic has not yet been resolved, and the challenges of making sure arts events still happen – safely – are on-going. Here is the good news: the HCE magazine team have created another list of literary open mics, events and workshops, to help you plan for the weeks ahead. […]
INTERVIEW: FIRE & DUST MEETS LAURA POTTS
HCE booked Laura Potts as the headliner for December’s Fire & Dust poetry night, knowing her words would magically transport us out of this crazy year, if only temporarily. We caught up with her after the Fire & Dust gig, to ask a few questions…
Announcement: Contributors to HCE: The Green Issue
In The Green Issue (December 2020), “everyone” was…
INTERVIEW: FIRE & DUST MEETS MOLLY TWOMEY
Molly has been selected for Words Ireland’s National Mentoring Programme 2020 and is currently under the guidance of Grace Wells. In 2020, Molly was one of two poets from Cork, Ireland who participated in the annual international poetry exchange between Cork and Coventry (UK). She wowed the crowd with her words […]
REVIEW: NIGEL HUTCHINSON’S ‘THE HUMBLE FAMILY INTERVIEWS’
Reviewed by Stella Backhouse || Hutchinson embraces a variety of forms. At the collection’s heart are two extended sequences of modified found-poetry, ‘The Humble Family Interviews’ and ‘Accidents of this Game’. Around them are arranged stand-alone poems about nature, fragments, time and art – indeed, it’s a collection notably rich in artistic inspiration […]
REVIEW: JANE BURN’S ‘ONE OF THESE DEAD PLACES’
By Stella Backhouse || I have a lot of sympathy for Jane Burn’s lament for a lost industry and a lost way of life in her 2018 collection One of These Dead Places. But though Burn clearly loves the valley of her birth, I’m not sure how much it loves her back. […]