Guardian Unlimited Books | By genre | There's a first time for everyone

Well I've linked to a number of sites recently and not really posted any thing myself. Here I have yet another link from The Guardian but an interesting article all the same. I particulaly liked this section by Charles Chadwick from London aged 72

"So why go on writing with little or no hope of publication? Svevo once said: 'Write what one must. What one needn't do is publish.' Is it that one has to learn to do it for its own sake? There's nothing odd, and certainly now in the least heroically tenacious, about that. There are millions of people out there who weave tapestry, make furniture and pots, write poetry, paint watercolours because that is what they enjoy doing and want to get better at. The creative imagination seems to have a life and persistence of its own. Another imperative is to take trouble to do things properly. When you see someone having a shot at painting a few houses and trees and clouds or whatever, you don't feel like tapping them on the shoulder and saying: 'Why bother with all that detail; you'll only shove it away in your garage or give it to Uncle Frank and Aunt Ethel who won't know the difference?"

For me the pleasure of getting the right words in the right place is my most important ambition for my writing. I've been able to hold that in balance with the way people respond to the poems. My first pleasure is getting it right. As Plath puts it "Like a well done sum."

I've begun to distribute the booklet. I've even sent the booklet to The Poetry Book Society. We'll see if they promote it at all. Not much feed back yet from my colleagues although my two main poetry mentors have both made quite positive comments about individual poems and the project as a whole.