Marie Howe's retrospective reviewed in The Guardian
American poet Marie Howe's poetry was published for the first time in the UK and Ireland in her new retrospective What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems, out from Bloodaxe Books in November 2024. Marie launched the book at Bloodaxe's joint online reading and discussion event on 8 November 2024 - scroll down for details.
What the Earth Seemed to Say brings together more than three decades of profound, luminous poetry from one of America’s most daring and courageous poets, and opens with twenty new poems. This retrospective draws from each of her four collections – including Magdalene (2017), a spiritual and sensual exploration of contemporary womanhood, and What the Living Do (1997), a haunting archive of personal loss. Whether speaking in the voice of the goddess Persephone or thinking about ageing while walking the dog, Howe is ‘a light-bearer, an extraordinary poet of our human sorrow and ordinary joy’ (Dorianne Laux).
Marie Howe will travelling to Ireland to read at Cork International Poetry Festival on 17 May 2025. For full details, see: https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/events?articleid=1496
ONLINE BOOK OF THE MONTH FEATURE
Short & Sweet, Recommended Read for April, online 4 April 2025
Poet Katrina Naomi featured Marie Howe’s first UK publication What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems as her Recommended Read for April 2025 in her monthly e-newsletter Short & Sweet.
‘Marie's poetry is wonderful. […] I love Marie's willingness to be extraordinary - her passion, positivity & slight infatuation with Mary Magdalene. Seek her out.’ – Katrina Naomi, Short & Sweet, on What the Earth Seemed to Say (Recommended Read for April 2025)
Read Katrina's comment in full here.
POETRY EXTRA BOOK OF THE MONTH
Poetry Extra, BBC Radio 4 Extra, Sunday 23 March 2025, 7am, 12pm & 6pm
Daljit Nagra read a second poem from his Poetry Extra Book of the Month on BBC Radio 4 Extra on 23 March. This time he read ‘Seventy’, another of the new poems from American poet Marie Howe’s first UK publication What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems.
‘Her dazzlingly direct style of apparent artlessness seems to convey great wisdom. Here’s a poem about not being noticed so much as we age, amid the hustle and bustle of new life.’ – Daljit Nagra, introducing the poem on Poetry Extra
Daljit concluded the programme by saying that Marie Howe’s retrospective What the Earth Seemed to Say is ‘a book I’d heartily recommend’.
‘***** Plus Daljit reads from his Poetry Extra Book of the Month - It's What the Earth Seemed to Say by American poet Marie Howe.’
Available on BBC Sounds until 22 April 2025. Daljit introduces the poem at 30:31.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00297yf
Daljit first featured What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems by ‘the great American poet Marie Howe’ as his Poetry Extra Book of the Month for March on 2 March 2025, when he read the poem ‘Postscript’ and spoke about the book. Scroll down for more details.
Available on BBC Sounds until 1 April 2025. Marie Howe was featured from 28:06.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0028lqd
POETRY EXTRA BOOK OF THE MONTH
Poetry Extra, BBC Radio 4 Extra, Sunday 2 March 2025, 7am, 12pm & 6pm
Host Daljit Nagra chose What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems by ‘the great American poet Marie Howe’ as his Poetry Extra Book of the Month for March on BBC Radio 4 Extra’s Poetry Extra on 2 March. He spoke about why he had chosen this first UK publication of Howe’s work as his Book of the Month, and then read her powerful poem ‘Postscript’ about the environmental crisis, one of the new poems from What the Earth Seemed to Say.
‘To appreciate Howe’s work, I want you to imagine poetry that’s been stripped back to its barest elements, yet it remains poetic and has a mood that carries us; a poetry of direct statement and simple language that never quite feels direct or simple.’ – Daljit Nagra, Poetry Extra, on What the Earth Seemed to Say, his Poetry Extra Book of the Month
'And Daljit reads from his Poetry Extra Book of the Month: What the Earth Seemed to Say by the American poet Marie Howe. A collection published in Britain for the first time.'
Available on BBC Sounds until 1 April 2025. Marie Howe is featured from 28:06.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0028lqd
ONLINE REVIEW COVERAGE FOR MARIE HOWE
The High Window, online 4 March 2025
An in-depth review of American poet Marie Howe’s new retrospective What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems went online in The High Window on 4 March 2025.
‘There is a remarkable evenness of tone in the American poet, Marie Howe’s, What the Earth Seemed to Say, which is Howe’s first book in the UK but her fifth overall. […] Howe’s gifts with narrative, with a kind of reportage, if you like, means that the psychological narrative comes across more clearly.’ – Ian Pople, The High Window
Click on Marie Howe to be taken direct to the review.
https://thehighwindowpress.com/category/reviews/
GUARDIAN POEM OF THE WEEK FEATURE
The Guardian, Poem of the Week, online Monday 30 December 2024
Carol Rumens discussed a poem from American poet Marie Howe’s new retrospective What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems in her online Poem of the Week column in The Guardian on 30 December. She featured the poem ‘Hurry’, which she described as ‘an example of Howe’s skill at turning an everyday anecdote into a parable’.
‘What the Earth Seemed to Say is a substantial selection of work, ranging from The Good Thief, published in the 1980s, to a group of recent poems from 2023. Howe is a writer well known for exploring Christian themes from innovative modern-dress perspectives, as in her 2017 collection Magdalene.’ – Carol Rumens, Poem of the Week, The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/dec/30/poem-of-the-week-hurry-by-marie-howe
POETRY BOOKS OF THE YEAR FEATURE
Sunday Independent, Books: The critics’ cut, Poetry Books of the Year, Sunday 8 December 2024
Paul Perry chose What the Earth Seemed to Say for his poetry books of the year feature in Ireland’s Sunday Independent’s books of the year as chosen by the paper’s critics.
‘What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems by Marie Howe is a compelling compendium of the poet’s piercingly steady gaze at the painful truths of our lives with poems rich in forthright lyric insight.’ – Paul Perry, Sunday Independent (Poetry Books of the Year 2024)
In print only.
REVIEW COVERAGE IN THE GUARDIAN
The Guardian, Saturday 2 November 2024
An excellent review of What the Earth Seemed to Say was included in Jennifer Lee Tsai's best recent poetry round-up for November 2024 in The Guardian.
'This rich and luminous compilation draws from four previous collections, including the hauntingly elegiac What the Living Do (1997), a tribute to Howe’s brother, who died as a result of Aids, and Magdalene (2017), an intense exploration of womanhood. It opens with a bounteous selection of new work. [...] Howe’s poems carry an emotional depth and transcendent simplicity. There is a simultaneous earthliness and spirituality in her musings on the metaphysical revelations of the divine, the sacred and the eternal.' – Jennifer Lee Tsai, The Guardian
In print in The Guardian's Saturday magazine on 2 November 2024. Available online here.
ONLINE LAUNCH EVENT
Friday 8 November 2024, 7pm GMT
Online launch reading by Marie Howe, Philip Gross and David Constantine
Online launch reading by Marie Howe, Philip Gross and David Constantine, celebrating the publication of our new November titles. All three poets read live and discussed their work with each other and with the host, Bloodaxe editor Neil Astley.
Now available on YouTube.
MARIE HOWE READS FROM HER COLLECTION MAGDALENE
Marie Howe: Magdalene
In her collection Magdalene (2017) Marie Howe imagines the biblical figure of Mary Magdalene as a woman who embodies the spiritual and sensual, alive in a contemporary landscape. Between facing the traumas of her past and navigating daily life, the narrator of Magdalene yearns for the guidance of her spiritual teacher, a Christ figure, whose death she continues to grieve.
Pamela Robertson-Pearce filmed Marie Howe reading and discussing the poems of Magdalene during her visit to Ledbury Poetry Festival in Herefordshire in July 2018. The poems included are: ‘Before the Beginning’, ‘On Men, Their Bodies’, ‘The Affliction’, ‘Magdalene: The Addict’, ‘The Landing’, ‘The Teacher’, ‘Magdalene – The Seven Devils’, ‘The Girl at 3’, ‘Walking Home’, ‘The Map’ and ‘One Day’. All these poems, apart from 'The Girl at 3', are included in What the Earth Seemed to Say.
[01 November 2024]
