Our Real Red Selves

In war and in birth we reveal OUR REAL RED SELVES, and this volume brings together three poets whose work moves between life and death.

JL Williams’ The History of Fire takes us to war. Her poems are savage and hallucinatory. She writes not about a single war but a patchwork conflict, whose battlefield moves from ancient Greeks to the Gulf conflict to a nightmarish Vietnam-era ticker-tape parade.

Marion McCready’s The Birth Garden reflects on the way childbirth has been viewed by the medical establishment over the past century. Disturbing scenes set on sinister wards and in a natural world both real and raw are captured in McCready’s vivid, urgent language.

Harry Giles’ Drone explores modern warfare and office life. His “drone” is both a remote-control killing-machine and office drudge who is lonely and lacks job satisfaction. Somehow funny and achingly sad, the drone is the most unforgettable character you’ll read this year.

The subjects depicted by these poets are contrasting, but their imagery and intensity echo each other.

An interview about the book with JL Williams 

The book launch at Golden Hare Bookshop 

By jlwpoetry

Books by JL Williams include Condition of Fire (Shearsman, 2011), Locust and Marlin (Shearsman, 2014), Our Real Red Selves (Vagabond Poets, 2015) and House of the Tragic Poet (If A Leaf Falls Press, 2016). A collection exploring the fine line between abundance and apocalypse, After Economy, was published by Shearsman Books in May 2017. She is interested in expanding dialogues through writing across languages, perspectives and cultures and in multimodal and cross-form work, visual art, dance, opera and theatre. Published widely in journals, her poetry has been translated into numerous languages. She has read at international literature festivals and venues in the UK, Sweden, Germany, Denmark, Turkey, Cyprus, Canada, Hungary, Romania, Montenegro and the US. She wrote the libretto for a new opera, Snow, was Writer-in-Residence for the British Art Show 8 in Edinburgh and plays in the poetry and music band Hail of Bright Stones.