From Lokis (1869) by Prosper Mérimée
“We are now coming into a forest, Professor, where the kingdom of the animals still flourishes—the matecznik, the womb, the great nursery of beasts. According to our national traditions, no one has yet penetrated its depths; no one has been able to reach to the heart of these woods and thickets, except for poets and magicians, who can travel everywhere. […] Lions, bears, elks, the joubrs, our wild oxen or aurochs, all live very happily together. The mammoth, who is preserved there, is highly thought of; he is, I believe, the Marshal of the Diet.”
Matecznik News
After many months of relative (or absolute?) inactivity, we now have some news to report. And exciting news it is!
Jim Stewart Exhibition at the Larick Centre in Tayport
Jim Stewart was an influential and much-loved tutor on the Creative Writing MLitt at Dundee University until his untimely death in 2016. He was also a very accomplished poet in his own right and two of his former students, Keren Macpherson (a Matecznik poet herself) and Sue Haigh, have curated an exhibition of poems and art works to celebrate his life and achievement. The exhibition will run from 31 May until the end of June at the Larick Centre in Tayport.
Matecznik Press will be publishing a pamphlet of Jim’s poems, including some previously unpublished ones, to accompany the exhibition. I would like, as publisher, to thank first of all Ros Flogdell, Jim’s sister, who holds the copyright to his poems, for her enthusiasm and support for the editors’ efforts. Also deserving of our gratitude are Professor Kirsty Gunn and Dr Gail Low of Dundee University, who edited the first collection of Jim’s work (THIS: The Voyage Out Press, 2019), from which some of the poems in our pamphlet are taken. Without their painstaking editorial work, Jim’s work might never have reached a broader readership; we hope the forthcoming exhibition and the accompanying pamphlet will spread the word yet further afield, cementing Jim’s reputation as (in W.N. Herbert’s words) ‘one of the most significant Scottish poets’ of his generation.
Performance of Maiden Mother Mage at St Mary’s Kirk, Haddington, October 3rd 2026, 7pm
We’re delighted to announce that - after the extremely successful and well-attended events at Culross Abbey in July and Glasgow Cathedral in September of last year - Rebecca and her team have been invited to perform Maiden Mother Mage in Haddington this coming October. The venue could hardly be more fitting: Thaney was the daughter of the King of Lothian and was hurled from nearby Traprain Law into the Firth of Forth by her monster of a father. Here’s a link to the event:
https://www.rebeccajoysharp.com/maiden-mother-mage
Maiden Mother Mage
Matecznik Press is delighted to announce the publication of Maiden Mother Mage by Rebecca Sharp, a poetic and dramatic reimagining of 6th century Brittonic princess Thaney (later St Teneu, St Enoch). Distinguished poet and translator Sasha Dugdale writes that ‘this hybrid work of poetry and drama is ambitious, deeply atmospheric and filled with fluent and full-throated voices. Its compelling musicality and the shifting planes of its mythic landscape make for a sensational and moving piece of theatre.’ And acclaimed novelist Victoria MacKenzie describes Maiden Mother Mage as ‘an astonishing, evocative and deeply compassionate new work’.
Matecznik Press is delighted to announce the publication of Twelve Poems by Beth Junor. This is what fellow poet and former StAnza director Eleanor Livingstone has to say about Beth’s new collection: ‘The prevailing tone is one of quiet reflection, especially in poems referencing more recent histories, whether in Syria or the North Sea. This is a welcome new collection from a poet whose carefully crafted poems are easy to read but not easy to forget.’
Deirdre Grieve, writer and daughter-in-law of Hugh MacDiarmid, discerns in Beth’s collection ‘something happening beyond the words on the page [which] gives these short poems a resonance that stays with us.’ You can read the full text of Deirdre’s review of Twelve Poems in the ‘Blog’ section of the website.
New online resource for Lapidus Scotland
Here is the link to a resource Rebecca Sharp has created for Lapidus Scotland for their online toolkit. It focuses on themes explored in How Do We Talk About Knives, the anthology edited by Rebecca, Marcas Mac an Tuairneir and Samina Chaudhry and published by Matecznik in 2023. It’s well worth a look - Rebecca has come up with some really interesting questions which got me thinking about my name and how I feel about it. (Fairly positive on the whole but Rebecca encourages you to probe a little deeper than that.)
How Do We Talk About Knives
Beth McDonough has written an excellent review of How Do We Talk About Knives, together with Jean Taylor’s Litany of Coal, in DURA (Dundee University Review of the Arts): https://dura-dundee.org.uk/2023/12/19/where-and-who-we-are-two-pamphlets/?fbclid=IwAR05yDT94t3wAj2UtTBLApTQkPqXsAZ_mKbDN0Nw4OqwCuXUFf36MjYLI34
Listen to Vahid Davar being interviewed by Mary Blance for The Books Programme on BBC Radio Shetland: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001t8qt
Interview with Vahid Davar
Poet and gallery owner Beth Junor has recorded an interview with Vahid, now available to view on Beth’s website:
https://junorgallery.scot/art-and-poetry-videos/
The full text of Vahid’s contemporary epic, Nassim’s Testament, appears in English and Persian in the Atlas of the World, an artist book created by Ramin Haerizadeh, Rokni Haerizadeh and Hesam Rahmanian, a Dubai-based artist collective from Iran. The Atlas was exhibited at Laurel Parker Book studio in Romainville near Paris this summer:
https://www.laurelparkerbook.com/en/projects/rrhv-atlas-of-the-world/
‘Portrait of a Poet’ by Lindsay Macgregor
For a while now I’ve been meaning to post new poems that have impressed me by poets whose work I admire. You can find the first of these, ‘Portrait of a Poet’ by Lindsay Macgregor, in the ‘Poems’ section of the website. Lindsay’s new collection, Desperate Fishwives, has just been published by Molecular Press; if you’d like to purchase a copy - which I’d strongly recommend - you can contact Lindsay directly: 7lindsay12@gmail.com/
