Dolan, Smith & Strange
THAT POETRY THING AT SMITH’S
Melinda Smith reads from Man-handled
The ACT Writers Centre was excited to be among the lucky crowd at Smith’s Alternative for the launch of new works by Shane Strange, Martin Dolan and Melinda Smith. Over 70 others joined the evening via Zoom – a testament to Canberra’s largesse of poetic talent. Celebrated poet, Penelope Layland, emceed the evening.
The three Recent Work Press publications explored richly different ideas with tenderness, humour and at times, flint and fury.
Recent Work Press’s Shane Strange stood on the stage as poet, rather than publisher, to read from his debut collection, All Suspicions Have Been Confirmed, vividly evoking landscapes and the haunting threads of our unique, human bonds.
Martin Dolan’s Sleeping Dogs drew listeners into the pages of mythology, reimagining the epic of Gilgamesh, as well as emotionally re-animating his own ancestors.
Melinda Smith led an utterly focused audience as she read from her seventh poetry collection, Man-handled, which explores both verbal and physical gendered violence. From gentle and wry to disdainful rage, Melinda’s collection included pieces from found-text chapbook, Listen, bitch plus works created over the past three years.
Shane Strange reads from All Suspicions Have Been Confirmed
Martin Dolan reads from Sleeping Dogs
Smith’s proved itself, as ever, a wonderful venue for intimate poetry readings, while the presence of digital listeners (facilitated by Jacqui Malins) was wrapped easily into the physical audience.
L-R: Shane Strange, Melinda Smith and Martin Dolan
Check out what’s coming up next for the Monday night institution of That Poetry Thing at Smith’s: https://www.smithsalternative.com/calendar