Review by Kathleen Bell of "The Iliad" by Homer, trans. Emily Wilson

Some months ago, when I was half-way through Emily Wilson’s new translation of The Iliad, I had to set it aside. This is not a criticism of her work but a tribute to its effectiveness. The accumulated violence and grief appalled me as it had never done before. I was sharply aware of the individuality of so many dying men, of the agony they suffered and the anguish their families would endure. I might attribute this in part to the accumulation of contemporary violence brought to our daily attention via TV, computers and smartphones, but I do not believe any previous translation would have had the immediacy that Wilson’s iambic pentameters offer.

When I first read Homer, it was in E.V . Rieu’s prose translation published by Penguin – a decent and accessible enough account. But I was not particularly moved by his account of the prince Asius, whose death is one of many recorded in Book 12: "He was a fool. He was not destined to evade his evil fate and drive back his chariot and pair in triumph from the ships to windy Ilium. In the spear of the sublime Idomeneus, Deucalion’s son, abominable doom was waiting to engulf him."

By contrast, Wilson offers: 

           Poor fool! He was not destined to escape
           his own black doom or ever leave the ships
           or ride back home again to windy Troy,
           proud of his horses and his chariot.
           The spear of splendid Idomeneus,
           Deucalion’s fine son, would bring him down
           and shadow him with death that dims men’s names.

The combination of the metre with clear language drew me far closer to the battle than Rieu managed. Through instances like this – and often more painful and much gorier – Homer takes us close to the details of war. Meanwhile the warriors exult in killing, crave loot as proof of merit, and long for a victory which will involve massacre, wholesale destruction and the enslavement of those few allowed to survive.

At times, as when the gods decide to involve themselves in battle or quarrel over the conduct of the war, The Iliad can seem very distant from our own time – until suddenly a river which is also a god enters the battle and becomes a great flood with effects familiar from reports of current ecological disasters. Meanwhile the macho boasting and posturing of the warriors who often take women as trophies has uncomfortable echoes today. Yet there are moments when a warrior might recognise and almost understand the horror in which he is involved, In Book 18, mourning the death of the man he loves most, Achilles says to his mother:

           If only conflict were eliminated
           from gods and human beings! I wish anger
           did not exist. Even the wisest people
           are roused to rage, which trickles into you
           sweeter than honey, and inside your body
           it swells like smoke …

Inevitably in a translation this long – the book with introduction and notes runs to 750 pages – there are occasional phrases and words which jar slightly. However, I have never read a translation of The Iliad that gripped and moved me so much. I was also delighted by the insights offered in Emily Wilson’s introduction and wished I had found something as clear and illuminating as this when, as an undergraduate, I studied Book 1 of the Iliad for one of my first-year exams.

About the reviewer
Kathleen Bell’s most recent poetry collections are the chapbook Do you know how kind I am? from Leafe Press and the collection Disappearances published by Shoestring (both 2021). She is currently preparing a manuscript that might be another collection while continuing to research and write poems about the engineer James Watt and his times. 

Review by Mike O'Driscoll of "The Study of Sleep and Other Stories" by Brian Howell

What a pleasant surprise to find that Brian Howell is still writing and publishing fiction. I first came across him years ago in UK literary journal Panurge, and he had at least one story in The 3rd Alternative. We both appeared in Nicholas Royle’s two-volume anthology Darklands, as well as in a best of Elastic Press anthology. That story, ‘The Tower,’ was the last time I encountered his fiction. His latest collection is a timely reminder of just how unique and obsessive—in a good way—a writer he is.

The title story, a novella, is the intricate and elliptical four-part portrait of Martin, a performance artist and aspiring writer, told from the perspective of Philip, a childhood friend, Martin himself, and Lenka, the latter’s former wife, but filtered through the narrative perspective of Julie, Philip’s wife, and herself possibly a former lover of Martin’s. The competing stories, as in Kurosawa’s film, Rashomon, both overlap and contradict each other, so that our take on Martin remains ephemeral and incomplete. This is the case even in his own narrative, where seven photographs of his abused lover, Chiara, at different stages of her life, also seem to offer an oblique commentary on his previous relationship with Lenka, which story unfolds in the novel’s third section, ‘The Decay,’ and which is itself Julie’s written interpretation of their marriage. In other hands, such intertextuality might appear an exercise in cold formalism, but Howell never loses sight of his characters, and in particular of their foibles. It’s the desire to learn the truth behind their yearnings and vanities that keeps us enthralled.

The intertextual play between the The Study of Sleep’s four parts is echoed in the remaining five tales, all of which, in their preoccupation with visual art—in particular the paintings of Vermeer, but also with cinema and the means of visual representation—seem to be engaged in a dialogue with each other. Some of them, particularly ‘The Vanishing Point,’ share the same unsettling mood as Martin’s self narrated tale in the title novella, and like it, lean more toward the macabre. Others—‘The Window’ and ‘New York Movie’—explore the extent to which art suffuses memory, how what we remember of specific works not only colours our memories, but shapes the narratives we create about our own lives. The final story, ‘The Counterfeit Smile,’ tells of Vermeer’s life, and of his search for the elusive face that has haunted him throughout his life, and of how it came to appear in one of his most famous works, ‘The Music Lesson.’ Not only is the story full of fascinating technical and biographical detail, but it offers a powerful and heartfelt representation of the artist’s motivations and desires. Just as Marquand, the protagonist of ‘Dutch Interior,’ finds himself falling into the rooms depicted in a mysterious viewing box, Howell’s elegant prose pulls us deep into the worlds of his characters and their obsessions.

About the reviewer
Mike O’Driscoll is a writer living in Swansea. His work has appeared in Black Static, Interzone, the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and numerous anthologies. His story ‘Sounds Like’ was adapted for a TV movie by Brad Anderson, as part of the Masters of Horror series. Mike blogs on different aspects of genre writing and film here.

Review by Sally Shaw of "A Physical Education" by Jonathan Taylor

A Physical Education: On Bullying, Discipline & Other Lessons is a book of memoir, interwoven with literary, film, drama and social sciences, by Jonathan Taylor, published in 2024 by Goldsmiths Press. 

When I started reading this book I wasn’t sure what to expect or even if I would be able to fully understand what Jonathan Taylor is discussing. As I read on and paused to consider what had been written I discovered how literature has tried to record or unveil bullying, how it has the power to aid individuals that are being bullied, and also Taylor’s skill in his examination of this subject. His writing enabled me to consider the many forms and complexities of bullying and bullies. Taylor’s bravery in sharing his at times harrowing experiences of being bullied will, I’m sure, enable others to identify bullying either of themselves or others and, in doing so, reduce it in educational and work settings, or deal with it. 

By providing literary examples, the book exposes, in a non-threatening way, the many different forms of bullying within education. For example, Taylor discusses the example of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, in relation to issues of classroom democracy, after he has been beaten down by the other children for standing up for the rights of a character in a drama the class are watching: "The problem, of course, with apparently individualistic behaviour is that it doesn’t come from nowhere. Individualism is never simply itself. Rather, it is made - and often made for, rather than by - the pupil or pupils at the centre of it. In The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, the so-called individualism of the 'Brodie set' is obviously made, in part, by Miss Brodie herself, forged by her 'as the leader of the set … as Roman matron.' 'I am putting old heads on your young shoulders,' she declares, when her favourites are eleven. 'I would make you the crème de la crème.' Later, she proclaims: 'You are mine … of my stamp and cut.' Miss Brodie’s stamp and cut are what 'set them apart' from the other pupils, and ultimately, 'it was impossible to escape from the Brodie set because they were the Brodie set in the eyes of the school.' This puts them in an 'enviable’ position,' such that 'everyone thought the Brodie set had more fun than anyone else.' All too often, though, being set apart in 'the eyes of the school' is much less fun, more a matter of ostracism than envy." I think that most people can relate to a drama, novel or film and for me this book has made me aware that it is a legitimate form of support for people affected by bullying.

I can only say what I discovered by reading this book. One thing is that it can sometimes take years to realise bullying has been, or is, taking place. Reading this book I did think about my past and present. I knew I was bullied by teachers, work colleagues, and I have also started to uncover bullying from individuals close to me. And I have found the book contains further reading to enable me to explore this in greater depth. In fact, as I read on, I started to acknowledge that I think I could have been a bully at times in my earlier life, but I’m unable to recall the details. Taylor examines how the bullied have the potential to become the bully. I happened to watch the film The Joker (2019), starring Joaquin Phoenix, an extremely dark and disturbing film, that to me demonstrated a possible consequence of when the bullied become the bully. As Taylor discusses, the very term "bullying" is almost impossible to define, as it can range from teasing to domestic abuse and more. 

This book is worth reading by everybody as it is relatable to all areas of society and may lead to readers identifying bullying, so enabling greater awareness and understanding. There may not be one single method of stamping out bullying, but this book shows that greater understanding can reduce the risks for future generations. The more we can talk about it, reduce the shame, the more people will be helped.  

About the reviewer
Sally has an MA Creative Writing from the University of Leicester. She gains inspiration from old photographs, history, childhood memories, and is inspired by writers Sandra Cisneros, Deborah Morgan, Liz Berry and Emily Dickinson. She has short stories and poetry published in various online publications including The Ink Pantry, AnotherNorth, Roi Faineant Press. 
Sally lives in the countryside. 

You can read more about A Physical Education on Creative Writing at Leicester here. 

Review by James Nash of "Remembering" by Julie Gardner

This is a tender and moving collection celebrating and memorialising two lives, the poet’s mother and her own husband, but succeeding, as all good poetry does, in finding universal truths about our common humanity and shared experience of loss.

Deftly constructing a history for her mother who died at forty-seven, and recording the emptiness after her husband’s death, these are quiet but truthful poems that bind us into the ordinary, but somehow extraordinary, emotional textures of human lives, and show us how we survive in the aftermath of tragedy.

This is from ‘Moving On’:

          After the van had gone
          I mopped the kitchen floor
          then went upstairs, stood awhile,
          as empty as the house itself.

Julie Gardener is a fine poet, content to let her readers ‘join up the dots’ if you like, but also happy to acknowledge the influence of other poets like Grace Nichols and Jacob Polley. She is playful in terms of form in ‘Rondo,’ riffing on nursery rhyme (a motif which appears in several of these poems), but ultimately what we have in this fine collection is a poet using simple and gracefully chosen words to explore the territory of memory and grief. The almost Wordsworthian reliance on everyday language gives these poems an emotional reach and power that is refreshing and unusual.

This is from ‘For Arthur’:

          Widow sounds so sad and slow
          and I am neither, though I will
          forever wish you here.

The photograph on the front cover of the poet’s mother is blurred; the poems inside reclaim the misty lives of those who have gone before, mother and husband, and prove again and again that art can construct great memorials. The gift of this brilliant collection is that it allows us to connect to our own loss and mourning, our own ‘remembering’ if you like.

About the reviewer
James Nash is a poet based in Leeds. He often writes in the sonnet form and his next collection, Notes of Your Music, will be published by Valley Press.