Chris Jones : part five

Why is poetry important?

Poetry is important because it has been a good friend throughout my adult life. I mean this not only in terms of my own writing, but in the 1000s of the poems I have read over the past four decades, pieces that have helped me get through it all. And let’s not also forget the crowd of poets/novelists/artists/musicians it has introduced me to - who I know and talk to - because I decided to sit in a room many years ago and craft words on a page.   Poetry has opened so many doors. My life would have been flatter, more monotone without poems.  I’ve been fortunate enough to end up teaching it for a living. How good is that.  Every now and then, I have entered in correspondences with readers of my work who are interested, moved by what I have to say to them. How humbling is that.  Even when I have bad-mouthed poetry it has never sought to retaliate, punish me back. If you are asking me why poetry is important in the world that we live in… well, I always find it instructive, illuminating even that at key points in people’s lives they always turn to poetry to make sense of what is going on.  Poetry can be forgotten about, marginalised, considered a ‘minority sport’ but it always returns to us: at baptisms, naming ceremonies, civil ceremonies, marriages, funerals, individuals choose poems to speak for them and their situation. Yes, poetry can be more quotidian than this, can fit into every nook and cranny of our everyday existence - but poems have this atavistic quality too. 

Chris Jones : part four

When you require renewal, is there a particular poem or book that you return to? A particular author?

One of the reasons why I am sitting here writing this is that I was persuaded to write a literary PhD after completing my degree, a venture that occupied me through my early twenties.  I chose to write about the Anglo-American poet Thom Gunn.  Gunn occupied a strange position in contemporary poetry (perhaps he still does): he was lionised by some key critics and supporters but still felt/feels like a marginalised figure.  I think Gunn appealed to me because he was an outlier, a formalist, influenced by modern fashions/culture it seemed to me much more than his (British) peers.  I was also interested in the trajectory of his career from stuffy post-war 50s England to find a more liberal, experimental version of himself in San Francisco.  I didn’t find the process of writing about Gunn an easy one (I nearly quit) but I’m pleased I carried the project through.  I am also pleased I went to visit Gunn in Haight Ashbury in the mid-90s. I interviewed him (badly) but he was gracious, kind - an attentive host. Books of Gunn’s I return to?  Perhaps controversially, I think Gunn only really hit his straps as a poet in his late thirties (he published his first collection in 1954 - aged twenty-five).  So I would look to Moly (1971) which melds together rhyme, metre and Gunn’s experiences of taking LSD. Anything released after this date is worth returning to - but The Man with Night Sweats (1992) stands out as a work of exceptional quality and emotional depth.  I have just bought The Letters of Thom Gunn which I am going to read over the summer. I’m sure I’ll find new things out about him while going through his correspondences - he had this public persona that he liked to tout around but he was very much a private figure. 

Chris Jones : part three

Has your consideration of poetry changed since you began?

I began reading and writing poetry when I was fourteen so my initial grey-haired response would be: yes! However looking back at my teenager writerly self, there are plenty of things I still recognise in those formative attitudes and approaches to versifying.  One: the first poems I got published were rhyming quatrains and sonnets. Two: I am trying to be both formal and conversational at the same time in the tone of my work.  Three: the poems are driven by trying to capture feelings, however nebulous that might sound. Of course, I have a deeper and more sophisticated understanding of poetry now, but have I really gone that far from my original impulses and designs?  I would say the fact I’ve been teaching creative writing for over twenty years, to a fundamental degree, has changed my consideration of the art form. I’ve had to think how poems ‘work’ (or don’t work) - and different kinds of poems at that. I’ve always tried to read widely and try not to be too prescriptive about what is good or bad, engaging or dull etc.  I increasingly regard poetry as an outward facing form of entertainment - that my poems should tell a story, move my readers, talk about the stuff that really matters to me (and them, I hope).   Maybe I’ve always felt that - it’s just that I have more perspective now: I can reach forwards and backwards and keep my balance in a more sure-footed way. 

Chris Jones : part two

How do you know when a poem is finished?

My attitude to this has changed over the years. My answer takes into account this notion of to the pace I work at, and the way I revise my poems too.  Because I am a formalist, because I write with rhyme and metre at the front of my thoughts, I tend to write a line or two at a time, securing those rhymes like the footholds on a ladder I am climbing up (or down). Rather than completing a draft then reworking it through to its conclusion, I work on one phrase at a time until I am happy with it, then move on to the next grouping of words in an incremental fashion. Even so, I am likely to continue redrafting a poem after I have finished the first main draft.  I used to rush this process more.  This creative impatience, coupled with a less rigorous approach to formal discipline meant that the poems feel a bit more skittish in retrospect, the rhythms are not as secure or fluent.  I’ve worked on rhythm a lot more over the last ten years.  Now I also let the poems rest for longer.  I revise the pieces to a greater extent.  My quality threshold is higher. I read the poems out loud: if there are no bumps or blemishes in the aural quality of the work then I’m nearer to finishing the poem.  I’m obviously going to ask myself: is this what I want to say? Am I happy with the texture, the feel of the piece? Is the sum of what I have written bigger than its parts?  Some of this might seem a bit ineffable but it’s something I’ve learnt to divine through years of reading my own work. I am more patient with myself, with my quirks and limitations, now.

Chris Jones : part one

Chris Jones has lived in Sheffield, England since 1990. He was awarded an Eric Gregory Award (a national prize for poets under the age of 30) in 1996. From 1997 to 1999 he worked as a writer-in-residence at Nottingham Prison. He was the Literature Officer for Leicestershire for five years and then spent some time as a freelance writer and poetry festival organiser. He currently teaches creative writing at Sheffield Hallam University. His poetry collections include The Safe House (Shoestring Press, 2007), Skin (Longbarrow Press, 2015) and most recently Little Piece of Harm (Longbarrow Press, 2021).

His website is: http://www.chris-jones.org.uk/

What are you working on?

I’ve just completed a long narrative sequence of poetry entitled Little Piece of Harm, published by Longbarrow Press.  It took me five years to write: the text is under forty pages long. I say this partly to show how slowly I work.  I’ve had other collaborations and commissions since my last publication in 2016, but this has been the main focus of my efforts.  Fourteen poems. It is as much or as little as I want to express at this moment in my life and I am very happy with the finished collection. I always find, post-publication, it’s a bit like being caught in the wake of an ocean-going liner. Nothing is settled: lots of ups and downs.  You feel strong movement but you’re not sure you’re going anywhere. However, I am writing short, compact, stand-alone pieces currently, as much to exercise my writing muscles as anything else, before I commit to another extended sequence. I want to develop a set of poems about the American artist/photographer/journalist Lee Miller, but having announced this publicly here, with nothing to show for it, this might turn out to be the kiss of death for my nascent project!