The FREE literary magazine of the North Northwords Now Issue 38, Autumn-Winter 2019 JACKIE KAY and KATE SWAN on the work of MARGARET TAIT, DONALD S. MURRAY at Achanalt, IAN TALLACH gets on his bike, LEONIE CHARLTON pursues salmon, SANDSTONE PRESS and its road to the International Booker Prize, SHANE STRACHAN in a Doric dystopia, HELEN ALLISON and others review new poetry collections, PLUS details of our amazing new website Pronn-fhicsean le FEARGHAS MacFHIONNLAIGH; villanelle le NIALL O’GALLAGHER agus sgrìobhadh ùr eile le Maoilios Caimbeul, Liam Alastair Crouse, Iain S. Mac a’ Phearsain, Deborah Moffatt agus Lisa NicDhòmhnaill EDITORIAL ’ll admit it: I’m hooked on the look, Contents smell and feel of newsprint. It’s been that 3 Margaret Tait, film poet – Jackie Kay and Kate Swan way since I was a boy, taken by my father I 4 Poems by Marion McCready and Stephen Keeler – a journalist at Glasgow’s Evening Times – to visit the old Mitchell Lane offices at night. 5 Sgrìobhadh ùr Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh, Deborah Moffatt agus Lisa Nicdhòmhnaill The film-noir lighting seemed to heighten the senses, make the mystery of words made 6 The A82 – disability, ability and cycling by Ian Tallach print even greater. 7 Poems by Mark Ryan Smith, Peter Godfrey, Sharon Black I hope that’s part of the pleasure of Northwords Now for readers: the heft of a new edition. But 8 Last light – Story by Leonie Charlton I’m also aware of the power of online presence 9 Achanalt – poem sequence by Donald S. Murray, Poem by John Robertson Nicoll and the usefulness of digital archives. That’s why, with the backing of the Northwords board 10 From bedroom boxes to the International Booker – Bob Davidson and Sandstone Press and extra support from Creative Scotland and 11 Saturday – Story by Julie Galante, Suspension – by Clare O’Brien, Bòrd na Gaidhlig, we’re launching a new-look The Gardener – by Tom Ashman, Poem by Millie Earle-Wright and Karen Hodgson Pryce website. Constructed by the tech wizards of Plexus in deepest Cromarty (thank you, in 12 Sgrìobhadh ùr Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh, Deborah Moffatt agus Lisa Nicdhòmhnaill particular, Garve, Dave and Colin) this – as 13 Poems by Stuart A. Paterson, Maggie Wallis, Lydia Harris before – has the current issue online, but with a much-expanded back catalogue of back 14 Tam – Story by Sandy Thomson, Loaded for bear – Story by Hilton Shandwick issues as .pdfs. Poem by Sheila Lockhart For the contents of recent issues, you can 16 Standing stone – Story by Shane Strachan now search on author name to point you to all the Northwords Now work by that person 18 Poems by Chris Foxall, Peter Maclaren, Satyapada Campbell, Robin Leiper in the last few years. We’ll also expand online 19 Poems by Amanda Gilmour, David Goldie, Liz McKibben, Kirsteen Bell, Juliet Antill audio-visual content as resources allow. As we continue to add to this archive, we hope it 20 Death of a village – Story by Hannah Whaley, New country – by Anne Pia will become an increasingly useful resource 21 Poems by David James Ross, Ross Wilson, Julian Colton, Lauren Ivers for readers, writers, teachers and researchers interested in contemporary writing in all of 22 The NP – Story by David McVey Scotland’s languages. All this – and newsprint 23 Sgrìobhadh ùr Iain S. Mac A’ Phearsain agus Liam Alastair Crouse too. Enjoy. n 24 Poem by Richard Myers, Her Kind – Story by Anne Elizabeth Edwards Kenny Taylor, Editor 25 Valentine – Story by Jennifer Watson 26 Poems by Samuel Tongue, Anna Fleming, Janis Clark, Catriona McNeill Courtier 27 Ann Marie’s Party – Story by Martin Russell, The Sand Pit – Story by Catriona Yule Visit the Northwords Now Website: 28 Reviews – including by Helen Sedgwick, Valerie Beattie and Cynthia Rogerson on fiction, northwordsnow.co.uk for archive David Alston on memoir, Kenny Taylor on non-fiction, Lydia Harris, Jean Langhorne and resources and to submit work Helen Allison on new poetry collections 31 Contributors’ Biographies 32 Where to Find Northwords Now www.facebook.com/groups/northwordsnow/ Erratum, Northwords Now 37 – page 6 Alison Seller’s name was mis-spelled as Sellar Northwords Now is a twice yearly literary Advertising English, Scots and any local variants. 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Jon Miller, Peter Urpeth, Pam Beasant co.uk www.jennymclarenstudio.com Designer Submissions to the magazine, through our Gustaf Eriksson on-line system on the Northwords Now www.gustaferiksson.com website, are welcome. They can be in Gaelic, 2 Northwords Now Issue 38, Autumn-Winter 2019 Nothing else is ever anything unless lit by it Jackie Kay and Kate Swan on the work of Margaret Tait uring the past year, events, there with her. If you needed a pee you allow you to understand things in sharp screenings and a new website had to use a bucket on the lawn outside. relief. Dhave helped to celebrate the I find that extraordinary, because it’s work of pioneering film poet, Margaret JK: Hard core! very intimate and it’s also got a kind Tait. Born on Armistice Day in 1918 and of distance; it does both at once. Her active as a film-maker and writer from KS: She handled all the correspondence mother is her mother, and it’s personal. the 1950s until the late 1990s, when that went back and forth with funders, But she could be any number of mothers she died in Kirkwall, her work is still such as the British Film Institute and or grandmothers that we all know and fresh, surprising and worthy of repeated Channel 4, very well. But she was identify with. viewing and reading. determined to get her way, her view. I She’s got that ability, that poets have as Around the start of the year-long think one of the amazing things about well, to make something particular and celebrations, the Scots Makar, Jackie Kay, ‘Blue Black Permanent’, now available to universal at the same time. I think it’s a introduced some of Margaret’s short films watch on the BFI player and on MUBI, really interesting use of film too. It feels at a session chaired by Nicola White at is that Margaret kept hold of the film so fresh, like something you haven’t really the Cromarty Film Festival. What follows she wanted to make. All the shorts were seen, these particular angles and ways of Margaret Tait, photo by Gunnie Moberg is drawn from what she said in her © Estate of Gunnie Moberg made just by her – she filmed and cut looking. ‘Portrait of Ga’ is an unusual introduction and in answers to questions them herself. On a feature film, she had portrait of an old woman. Almost like from Nicola and the audience. Further because Margaret Tait was doing things to work with a huge crew and others, a ‘day in the life of’, she goes through observations are from Kate Swan (also that nobody else was doing then, such such as financiers and costume people. things in her life – her wee rollie, to her in the audience), who worked for several as taking time to show a sweetie being But she kept hold of it, because she made boiled sweet, to the different clothes that months with Margaret on Orkney, as unwrapped. I love the slow-motion-ness what she needed to make. She was a pure she wears, to running along. And she executive producer and co-producer of that. artist that way. gives us these moments in time, for all of her only feature film ‘Blue Black She understood that time is a poem, in time, really. Permanent’ (1992). a sense. Time is a poem and the land is a JK: And ‘pure artist’ is what you think It’s the same with her Hugh poem and the land makes a poem happen. when you’re seeing these films, because MacDiarmid film. We have that portrait ✯ And she understands the relationship there’s something pure and clear and now of him, showing an utterly different Jackie Kay: I first came across the between stories and heather and sea and clarifying about them – as fresh as the side than the one we usually get in wonderful work of Margaret Tait through people and land.