Carcanet book launch online: Sasha Dugdale in conversation with Kathryn Maris

Online book launches are actually a joy, so thanks to Manchester’s Carcanet Press – incidentally still celebrating 50 years at the forefront of poetry publishing – for bringing them into our homes thick and fast. Recently, we’ve heard from Evan Jones, Adam Crothers, Theo Kwek and Rebecca Watts, and for this event in the ether, it’s the turn of multi-award-winning poet Sasha Dugdale, with her latest collection Deformations.

Sasha Dugdale is a poet, translator and playwright, co-director of the Winchester Poetry Festival and editor of Modern Poetry in Translation between 2012 and 2017. Deformations marks her fifth poetry collection with Carcanet, the four previous ones being Notebook (2003), The Estate (2007), Red House (2011) and 2017’s Joy, featuring the poem of that title which received the 2016 Forward Prize for Best Single Poem, and published the same year that she was awarded a Cholmondeley Prize.

For this event in the ether, it’s the turn of multi-award-winning poet Sasha Dugdale, with her latest collection Deformations

Deformations includes two large-scale works related in their preoccupation with biographical and mythical narrative: ‘Welfare Handbook’, a long poem which explores the life and art of controversial sculptor and cultural figure Eric Gill, and ‘Pitysad’, a series of simultaneously occurring fragments composed around themes and characters from Homer’s Odyssey. Acting as a bridge between the two is a series of individual poems on the creation and destruction of cultural and mythical conventions.

Kathryn Maris joins Sasha to discuss the new work, and audience members will have the opportunity to ask their own questions. Kathryn Maris is a poet, critic and curator, who has published three collections and a pamphlet. A selection from Kathryn’s recent book, The House With Only An Attic And A Basement (Penguin 2018), won the Ivan Juritz Prize for creative experiment.

Registration for this online event is £2, redeemable against the cost of the book, available direct from Carcanet at a special price – attendees will receive a discount code and details of how to buy during and after event. Please note that there are limited places for this Zoom event, so do book early to avoid disappointment.