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  Mother | Line

  Ankita Saxena

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  What do we inherit from our mothers? From our grandmothers? From the legacy of colonisation and empire? Mother | Line, Ankita Saxena's debut poetry collection, charts lineage in all its forms, delving into female rage, compassion, and endurance. Drawing on the author's British Asian heritage and experiences growing up as a woman in an increasingly violent world, this collection weaves together the personal and the political in ghazals, odes and specular poems, which hold a mirror to the world and to themselves. "We are daughters of Kali", Saxena writes, and "mothers linger on the sides, hearing us become them; / our routines only theirs to thank for, our spices, / our blends, and even our greedy tongues.
  "A sublime and considered collection, speaking to, and spanning lineage, inheritance, friendship; what it can mean to be a girl, a woman in the world — across continents, oceans, time." - Rachel Long

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  The Return of Peter Grimm

  David Belasco

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  Mr. Belasco has written the following account of Peter's" evolution: [ ] The play, "The Return of Peter Grimm," is an expression in dramatic form of my ideas on a subject which I have pondered over since boyhood: "Can the dead come back?" Peter Grimm did come back. At the same time, I inserted a note in my program to say that I advanced no positive opinion; that the treatment of the play allowed the audience to believe that it had actually seen Peter, or that he had not been seen but existed merely in the minds of the characters on the stage. Spiritualists from all over the country flocked to see "The Return of Peter Grimm," and I have heard that it gave comfort to many. It was a difficult theme, and more than once I was tempted to give it up. But since it has given relief to those who have loved and lost, it was not written in vain." (Summary from Introduction)Coordinated and edited by ToddHW.Cast:Stage Directions: Kristin GjerløwPeter Grimm: rafeFrederik, his nephew: Chuck WilliamsonJames Hartman: AnthonyAndrew MacPherson: balaRev. Henry Batholommey: Larry WilsonColonel Tom Lawton: alanmapstoneWilliam: ToddHWCatherine: Amanda FridayMrs. Batholommey: MaryankaMarta: Anna SimonClown: Anastasiia SolokhaHawker and Barker: Ellen PreckelVoice (bringing telegram): WoollyBeeGirls (4, little, singing): Julia Niedermaier

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  The Frozen Earth & Other Poems -...

  Winifred Holtby

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  Winifred Holtby was born on 23rd June 1898 to a prosperous farming family in the village of Rudston in Yorkshire.  
   
  A governess provided her early education before she went to Queen Margaret's School in Scarborough.  After passing the entrance exam for Somerville College, Oxford in 1917, she decided to join the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps in early 1918.  However, soon after her arrival in France, the War ended. 
   
  She returned to study at Oxford and met fellow student Vera Brittain.  After graduating from Oxford, in 1921, Winifred and Vera moved to London, hoping to establish themselves as authors. 
   
  Her early novels met with only moderate success but as a journalist she was both prolific and increasingly well-known.  Her articles graced more than 20 newspapers and magazines, including the Manchester Guardian newspaper.   
   
  Winifred was a committed feminist, socialist and pacifist.  She gave many lectures for the League of Nations Union.  She was also active in the Independent Labour Party and was a campaigner for the unionisation of black workers in South Africa. 
   
  In 1931 the symptoms of high blood pressure, recurrent headaches and bouts of lassitude brought forth a diagnosis of Bright's disease.  She was given two years to live and now put all her efforts into what was to become her crowning achievement: South Riding.  Released posthumously it received lavish praise and enormous sales.  Her canon of works tackle difficult subjects head on, many in unusual ways, brimming with verve and usually strong female protagonists. 
   
  Winifred Holtby died on 29th September 1935 in London.  She was 37. 
  01 - The Frozen Earth & Other Poems by Winifred Holtby - An Introduction 
  02 - The Frozen Earth by Winifred Holtby ''Edwards's Funeral March'' 
  03 - Two Early Poems (No Mourning by Request & The Debt) by Winifred Holtby 
  04 - The Foolish Clocks by Winifred Holtby 
  05 - Prayer by Winifred Holtby 
  06 - Hills in the Transvaal by Winifred Holtby 
  07 - The Grudging Ghost by Winifred Holtby 
  08 - Trains in France by Winifred Holtby 
  09 - The Frozen Earth Symphony by Winifred Holtby - The Dead Musician 
  10 - For the Ghost of Elinor Wylie by Winifred Holtby 
  11 - House on Fire by Winifred Holtby 
  12 - Happy Ending by Winifred Holtby

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  Short Poetry Collection 026

  Various Various

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  LibriVox’s Short Poetry Collection 026: a collection of 20 public-domain poems.

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  A Shropshire Lad

  A.E. Housman

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  This now seminal collection of sixty-three poems was originally self-published by Housman in 1896 after rejections from publishers.  None saw its potential. 
  Housman, it is said, originally wanted to name the book, The Poems of Terence Hearsay, referring to a character within, but changed the title to A Shropshire Lad at the suggestion of a colleague. 
  The poems were mainly written in 1895 whilst Housman was living in Byron Cottage in Highgate. The book sold slowly. The initial print run of 500 took two years to sell through.  However by 1911 annual sales were in the order of 13,500 copies and, during World War I, the book accompanied many young men into the trenches. 
  It thereafter became a cultural icon, remembering a gentler time, a better time. 
  Housman did confess that much of what he had written about, especially in terms of terrain and geography was assumed rather than known.  But such poetic licence is easily set aside when the finished work is read and admired.? 
  As George Orwell later remembered, "these were the poems which I and my contemporaries used to recite to ourselves, over and over, in a kind of ecstasy".

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  Songbook - The Lyrics and Music...

  Steven Heighton

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  From the award-winning, multi-genre author and musician Steven Heighton, Songbook brings together Heighton’s lyrics and music for the first time in a single volume, including his final songs, which have never been heard or seen until now. When Steven Heighton died suddenly of cancer in 2022, he was in the middle of an intensely creative period of songwriting. He released his first album of original material, The Devil’s Share, in 2021 and was preparing to record his second album. Known first as a poet, Heighton had always held that “music and poetry are two words for the same thing.”
  		 
  As in his songwriting, in Songbook, Heighton moves fluidly between genres and subjects, from political songs like “The Butcher’s Bill,” about the carelessness of nations sending their youth to war, to reimagining the myth of Orpheus (“I'll hold my breath the whole way down / And find your soul in the undertown”), to blues tunes like “Last Living Woman Alive,” and a tribute to the late John Prine, the “Buddha of Song.” With chords accompanying the lyrics, readers and musicians have the ability to bring the songs to life with their own interpretations. The music in Songbook was the final work of Heighton’s life, and it is not only a gift to have his lyrics and chords but an invitation from Heighton himself, challenging his readers to answer the call and keep singing along.

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