Scottish Poetry Library Podcast

Brian Turner is an American poet. He served for seven years in the U.S. Army, completing tours of duty in Bosnia-Herzegovina (1999-2000) before being sent in November 2003 to Iraq. He is the winner of the 2005 Beatrice Hawley Award for his debut, Here, Bullet, a collection of poems about his experience as a soldier during the Iraq War. In this podcast, Turner talks to Jennifer Williams about the poetry that came out of his experiences in the US military, and how poetry can be a line thrown out by the breath or a question planted inside a reader. Recorded in association with StAnza, Scotland’s International Poetry Festival at StAnza 2014. Many thanks to James Iremonger (www.jamesiremonger.co.uk) for the podcast music.

In this podcast from July 2013, former SPL Programme Manager Jennifer Williams talks to poet, teacher and editor Antonio Ochoa about living and working with, translating and editing the Uruguayan poet Eduardo Milan. Antonio reads some of Eduardo’s poems as well as his own, in both Spanish and English.

When Andrea Gibson died from cancer in 2025 it was a huge loss to the poetry community worldwide. Her poetry resonated deeply with a wide audience of readers and inspired many of her fellow poets. In an essay/tribute to Andrea on the Poetry Foundation website, Amber Tamblyn wrote: "Andrea was that rare breed of writer whose deep compassion for the human condition was limitless, potent, and unequivocal. Their poems were diverse and wide-ranging in theme, and they wrote with unvarnished honesty and integrity about American racism, and the privileges of being white, albeit queer..." In this edition of Nothing But The Poem two of Andrea's poems are featured. Our regular podcast host, Samuel Tongue, after discussing the poems with the Friends of the SPL group who meet monthly on Zoom, takes his customary deep dive. The two poems by Andrea Gibson read on the podcast, and discussed in depth, are: 1. IN THE CHEMO ROOM, I WEAR MITTENS MADE OF ICE SO I DON'T LOSE MY FINGERNAILS. BUT I TOOK A RISK TODAY TO WRITE THIS DOWN. (Read the poem here). 2. INSTEAD OF DEPRESSION (Read the poem here).

In 2014 we chatted to the editors of Far Off Places, a young literary magazine, brave in its outlook and willing to seek connections between genres and art forms. Editors Annie Rutherford and Ceris Aston, and contributing poet Niall Foley, talk about submissions, creepy poetry tastes and the lure of merchandise. Far Off Places was a magazine featuring creative writing and illustration which ran from 2013 to 2018.

In this podcast Jennifer Williams talks to Ilyse Kusnetz (1966—2016) who was visiting Scotland during the StAnza Festival 2014. They talk about when to put the poem in the closet, feminism and politics in poetry and what the Scottish Referendum looks like from across the Atlantic. Before her death in 2016, she taught English and Creative Writing at Valencia College in Orlando, where she lived with her husband, the poet Brian Turner. Ilyse Kusnetz was the winner of the 2014 T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry for her collection Small Hours. Music by James Iremonger. This podcast was recorded in association with StAnza, Scotland’s International Poetry Festival.

This podcast was recorded at-and in partnership with-the 2014 StAnza International Poetry Festival. Jennifer Williams talked to Jacob Polley about meaning and lack thereof, about resisting the idea of ‘home’ and about remaining open to possibility when you’re writing and much more. Jacob Polley is the author of three acclaimed poetry collections, The Brink, Little Gods and, most recently, The Havocs, as well as a Somerset Maugham Award-winning novel, Talk of the Town. Born in Cumbria, he lives in Scotland where he teaches at the University of St Andrews. Many thanks to James Iremonger  for the music in the podcast. Image: Mai Lin Li.

Performance poet Jem Rolls tells all about the page/stage debate, what it takes to make a living from performing poetry and how rhyme helps you remember.   

Thomas A Clark's latest poetry collection - thrums - is an experimental book-length sequence of minimalist verse. The poems reward repeated reading, out loud, or quietly, very slowly, connecting with the words and sounds as they're encountered, experiencing the work as visceral entities in themselves.  Clark's short verses are meditations on rurality, landscapes, all living things, and the sensory experience of walking in the natural world. Our resident podcast host, Sam Tongue, reads and discusses sections of thrums with the Nothing But The Poem group (which is free to anyone who becomes a Friend of the Scottish Poetry Library). In this podcast Sam examines his own thoughts and experiences when connecting with thrums, as well as the opinions and feelings of the group. thrums by Thomas A Clarke was published by Carcanet (2025).

In this podcast Jennifer Williams talks to Madeleine Campbell, A C Clarke, Christine De Luca and Haris Psarras about poetry translation in Scotland and about the innovative new book Quaich: An Anthology of Translation in Scotland Today. About the book: This collection of essays and translations has been compiled to sample and reflect on contemporary Scotland's rich tradition of literary translation. The title is symbolic of how the anthology is to be read: as an offering, an act of kindness, an opportunity to gain insight into other cultures. "Quaich" is a term derived from the Scottish Gaelic word "cuach", and it refers to a traditional two-handled drinking cup, usually made of wood or metal. The quaich has a special place in Scottish history; it was used to offer guests a cup of welcome, and the craft of quaich-making was held in high regard. Translation can sometimes be seen as an unfriendly, invasive, even treacherous, act, but this volume aims to celebrate what is good about literary translation, its power to bring together, rather than to separate. All the texts contained here have a vital connection to Scotland through their authors or translators, languages or themes. They are as diverse as Scotland is today, itself a plurality of languages and peoples. Image: Quaich by Stephen Downes, under a Creative Commons licence  

In this podcast from 2015, Jennifer Williams speaks to Salma*, an Indian poet and crusader for women’s rights.  They talk about Salma’s strength and bravery in the face of oppression, her commitment to writing and publishing under extremely challenging circumstances and even *gasp* the use of the ‘v’ word in contemporary poetry!  Salma was born in a small village in Southern India, and overcame many obstacles to publish her poetry and fiction, now recognised as an important contribution to Tamil writing.  Salma came to Scotland as part of the Scottish Poetry Library’s Commonwealth Poets United project. As part of the cultural programme surrounding the XX Commonwealth Games, Commonwealth Poets United was an international exchange project between six Scottish poets and poets from six Commonwealth nations:  Canada, India, Jamaica, New Zealand, Nigeria and South Africa.  It established relationships between artists, organisations and communities through a culturally enriching poetry exchange. The project was supported by Creative Scotland and the British Council, and partnered by BBC Radio Scotland. *Rakkiaiah is an Indian Tamil writer, activist, and politician known by the pen name Salma and the nickname Rajathi, and often referred to as Rajathi Salma. Music by James Iremonger.

It has been some time since this podcast was recorded with one of our Commonwealth Poets United visitors, Tolu Ogunlesi, however it feels like just the right time to release it as Tolu speaks so beautifully about how poetry platforms on the internet and new technologies such as email allowed him to become part of a global community of poets. In a time when the world feels fragile and where notions of borders and ownership seem fraught with complexities and power struggle, it is a relief to hear a poet speaking of poetry as a connecting force in his life, as a passport to new landscapes and ideas. Tolu Ogunlesi is a journalist, poet, fiction-writer and photographer who lives in Lagos, Nigeria. His poetry collection Listen to the Geckos Singing from a Balcony was published in 2004, and his work has been widely published in magazines and anthologies. Music by James Iremonger.

Odysseys of one sort or another theme this archive edition of the SPL podcast. Our guide, the poet Alasdair Paterson, takes us on a journey from a wry take on Homer’s Greece through the Liverpool music scene of the 1970s, onwards to post-Soviet Russia, ending in Arcadia. Little wonder Paterson’s collection is called Elsewhere or Thereabouts (Shearsman). Along the way we welcome guests such as the geologist James Hutton and Paterson’s fellow librarian-poet Philip Larkin.

In this podcast guest interviewer and multi-lingual writer and translator Jessica Johannesson Gaitán talks to three bilingual poets about what it means to have more than one mother tongue, feeling guilty or not about writing in big languages, translating one’s own poetry and much more! Juana Adcock is a poet and translator working in English and Spanish. Ioannis Kalkounos was born in Greece. His first collection of poems, dakryma, was published in 2011 (Athens, Dromon Publications). Agnes Török is a spoken word performer, poetry workshop leader, poetry event organiser and Loud Poet. Jessica Johannesson Gaitán grew up in Sweden and Colombia. Music by James Iremonger.

Commonwealth Poets United was an international exchange between six Scottish poets and poets from six Commonwealth nations. Toni Stuart is a South African poet named in the Mail and Guardian’s list of 200 Inspiring Young South Africans for her work in co-founding I Am Somebody! – an NGO that uses storytelling and youth development to build integrated communities. Rachel McCrum, originally from Northern Ireland, is a poet and the co-creator of popular spoken word event Rally and Broad (2012-2016). Both poets visited each other’s countries to draw inspiration from a different culture. When Toni was visiting Scotland, she came into the Scottish Poetry Library with Rachel to talk about their exchange trips, how food united them, and how ‘when you learn a new language, you gain a new soul’.

In August 2014, our then regular podcast host Colin Waters travelled to Faslane, home of the UK’s nuclear deterrent, to talk to poet Gerry Loose. Loose’s collection fault line is a suite of poems inspired by the area, which is his backyard. The great natural beauty contrasts with the ugliness of the military base, inspiring Loose. He guides Colin around the area, sharing its history and his thoughts on the nature poetry’s radical past and present.

This edition of our Nothing But The Poem podcast, hosted as usual by Samuel Tongue, features two poems by Isabelle Baafi, from her 2025 Forward Prize winning debut collection Chaotic Good. ‘In this wise-hearted and deft debut, Baafi gets to the grain of family, inheritance, the grit of growing up and the grappling to become oneself.’ - Rachel Long ‘Isabelle Baafi’s Chaotic Good is a debut of amazing endurance. Its formal pressures create a kind of kaleidoscopic intensity that – with each turn of the chamber – brings newly beautiful and painful shapes into focus. - Will Harris The two poems discussed in the podcast from Chaotic Good are The Cottage and Burst Me Into Song

Hugo Williams won the 1999 TS Eliot Prize for Billy’s Rain, a collection that captured a certain amount of journalistic interest for its unvarnished depiction of an affair. His collection, I Knew The Bride, was also been nominated for the TS Eliot Prize (as well as the Forward), although it’s subject matter is a little darker, taking in the death of his sister and his own kidney failure, which requires him to spend a significant amount of time every week on dialysis. We were lucky to spend time with the poet in 2014 when he was up for the Edinburgh International Book Festival. He talks about the influence of popular music on his work, mortality, and what Hardy was doing with Shelley’s heart.

When we think of World War One, our images of the conflict are largely shaped by those of the Western Front or perhaps Gallipoli. It was a truly global conflict, however, and one less remarked upon campaign was that of an ill-fated Anglo-Indian force dispatched to secure oil supplies in what is, today, southern Iraq.  Poet, playwright and songwriter Jenny Lewis’ father fought as part of that force. Her collection Taking Mesopotamia (Carcanet) re-imagines the campaign using her father’s diaries. It also takes in more recent wars in the region as well as the story of Gilgamesh, the ancient Sumerian warrior king, to create a vision of a mankind that repeatedly fails to learn the lessons of war. Lewis took time out from the StAnza poetry festival, where she was appearing in March 2014,to talk to us about war, oil, myth, and the gods. Photo by Ben Prestney

The latest edition of our Nothing But The Poem podcast, hosted as usual by Samuel Tongue, features two poems by Juana Adcock. Samuel Tongue comments: "Juana Adcock is a poet who works between languages and registers and themes, ever inventive and risk-taking. In this all too brief intro to two of her poems, I hope you get a sense of all of these elements. And please come and borrow her books from the SPL." Liz Lochhead said of her first collection Split: "Here is sharp specificity, humour, daring. These poems rock. They sing." The two poems discussed in the podcast are The Task of the Translator and The Guitar's Lament.

J.L. Williams is a poet fascinated by the possibility of metamorphosis, whether it be witnessed in the natural world or experienced in one’s own life. Her first collection Condition of Fire (Shearsman) was inspired by Ovid, and in her second collection Locust and Marlin (Shearsman) she returns to the theme of change from a fresh perspective. In this 2014 podcast, she talks to us about the nature of stone, the poetry of locusts, and just how spiritual she is. Photo by Chris Scott.