Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

Armchair Theatre is Brian Docherty’s first full-length collection though it is remarkably assured and, within its limits, technically accomplished. At a time when so much of the verse published and often fulsomely praised is distinguished mainly by its pretentious posturing, verbal sloppiness and plain ignorance of means, it is a pleasure to find work that has something interesting to say and says it with wit and perspicuity.

     ‘The Problem of Form in Modern Poetry’ is funny and makes its point neatly and I specially liked ‘Summer Comes to Crouch End (Mayday)’ which contains a useful tip for possible victims of religious fundamentalists on their doorsteps:

I give the Jehovah’s Witnesses my ‘Jesus was
a Commie faggot’ routine then threaten to read
my epic poem ‘I Fell in Love With A Lesbian’.
That always takes the shine off their shoes.

     Technically Docherty is in command of a rhythmic line that varies between three and five rough stresses, often in unrhymed stanzas of three to five lines. This works well enough for satirical and anecdotal purposes and I am sure it is effective in public performance, but it does become rather monotonous on the page. The diction is resolutely street demotic and many of the references to the names of people, events and things are of the kind of topicality that very quickly fades into, first datedness, and later into virtual meaninglessness.

     There is no way of knowing the chronology of the poems’ composition but if those towards the end of the book are more recent they show signs of a development towards something deeper and more durable than many of the preceding pieces whose effects, while very attractive in their ‘performance’ style, lack the resonance of that authentic poetry to which the reader repeatedly returns. ‘Call Me Up In Dreamland’, a touching tribute to his craftsman grandfather, with symbolic overtones, and the penultimate poem in the volume, ‘Where I Go in My Dreams’ are both fully achieved pieces of a more personal kind which linger in the consciousness and confirm the belief that Docherty is a poet of far more than promise and one whose future should be watched with interest.