About Us
Poetry is simply the most beautiful, impressive, and widely effective mode of saying things, and hence its importance.'
Matthew Arnold
Matthew Arnold
Poetry Teignmouth was founded in 2013 by Veronica Aaronson and Ian Royce Chamberlain. Poets Jennie Osborne and Graham Burchell became involved shortly afterwards. Poetry Teignmouth offers the enticing prospect of exploring poetry from different angles in stimulating company.
Veronica Aaronson
I have lived and loved poetry since I was a child starting with AA Milne, Rod McKuen, the Liverpool Poets in my teens to William Carlos Williams, Sylvia Plath, Ted Hughes, Seamus Heaney, Emily Dickinson to name a few. I also love the Sufi poets, David Whyte and Mary Oliver.
Immersion in poetry has provided me with a containing other, has mirrored my moods, has been my journey’s companion, has fed my soul and made my heart sing.
I have had two previous short bursts of writing poetry - in love with life, everyone and everything in Cambridge in my early twenties, in my forties as I realised that I was living someone else’s life and now I am starting again in my ecstatic, exciting sixties.
My children have been fed poetry from an early age. I work as a psychotherapist and use prescription poetry as one of my tools.
My body has talked about a poetry festival in Teignmouth since I moved here.
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Ian Royce Chamberlain
My mother’s family were writers; she was an English teacher with a vast and unrestrainable fund of poetic quotes. So there was a kind of inevitability… But it wasn’t until my 50s, after a career in hard engineering, that the poetry bug bit me. And it was in the modern equivalent of lyrical poetry that I began to find a voice.
I am fascinated by language - by the mix of discipline with flexibility, the manipulation of words into a form which sounds exactly Right; 'Poetry is the best words in the best order' – ST Coleridge.
Poetry is a form of communication; a meaning should be clear to anyone who reads or hears it, not just other poets. This is specially true in poetry for performance, where the audience has a single opportunity to understand my spoken words.
My inspirations are the ‘messy business of being human’ (another quote, from Jennie Osborne), and the environment in which we live.
I relish showing people the detail which poets see, and helping them put their untapped visual expertise into words.
Poetry Teignmouth is a new and exciting challenge.
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Jennie Osborne
I wrote and read incessantly as a child and teenager, strongly influenced by Dylan Thomas, the Liverpool poets and the lyrics and rhythms of rock and folk music. Once I married and started work, life got in the way for twenty years, and it wasn't until my early forties, in Cornwall, that I started writing again, eventually bringing out my first collection in 2010. This was followed by my latest collection, again from Oversteps Books, 'Colouring Outside the Lines' in 2015. I was both amazed and delighted to win the Kent and sussex Poetry Competition in 2015 with 'First to Blink'.
I write to make sense of the world, to show me to myself, to express what is both wholly personal and universal.
Inspiration comes from the South Devon landscape, working with other poets and artists, my everyday life. Always, there are connections.
I write both for the page and for performance, both free verse and set forms, aiming for a marriage of music and meaning.
For an hour-long radio programme containing an interview with Jennie, some of her poetry and some music, use the control below:
Veronica Aaronson
I have lived and loved poetry since I was a child starting with AA Milne, Rod McKuen, the Liverpool Poets in my teens to William Carlos Williams, Sylvia Plath, Ted Hughes, Seamus Heaney, Emily Dickinson to name a few. I also love the Sufi poets, David Whyte and Mary Oliver.
Immersion in poetry has provided me with a containing other, has mirrored my moods, has been my journey’s companion, has fed my soul and made my heart sing.
I have had two previous short bursts of writing poetry - in love with life, everyone and everything in Cambridge in my early twenties, in my forties as I realised that I was living someone else’s life and now I am starting again in my ecstatic, exciting sixties.
My children have been fed poetry from an early age. I work as a psychotherapist and use prescription poetry as one of my tools.
My body has talked about a poetry festival in Teignmouth since I moved here.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Ian Royce Chamberlain
My mother’s family were writers; she was an English teacher with a vast and unrestrainable fund of poetic quotes. So there was a kind of inevitability… But it wasn’t until my 50s, after a career in hard engineering, that the poetry bug bit me. And it was in the modern equivalent of lyrical poetry that I began to find a voice.
I am fascinated by language - by the mix of discipline with flexibility, the manipulation of words into a form which sounds exactly Right; 'Poetry is the best words in the best order' – ST Coleridge.
Poetry is a form of communication; a meaning should be clear to anyone who reads or hears it, not just other poets. This is specially true in poetry for performance, where the audience has a single opportunity to understand my spoken words.
My inspirations are the ‘messy business of being human’ (another quote, from Jennie Osborne), and the environment in which we live.
I relish showing people the detail which poets see, and helping them put their untapped visual expertise into words.
Poetry Teignmouth is a new and exciting challenge.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Jennie Osborne
I wrote and read incessantly as a child and teenager, strongly influenced by Dylan Thomas, the Liverpool poets and the lyrics and rhythms of rock and folk music. Once I married and started work, life got in the way for twenty years, and it wasn't until my early forties, in Cornwall, that I started writing again, eventually bringing out my first collection in 2010. This was followed by my latest collection, again from Oversteps Books, 'Colouring Outside the Lines' in 2015. I was both amazed and delighted to win the Kent and sussex Poetry Competition in 2015 with 'First to Blink'.
I write to make sense of the world, to show me to myself, to express what is both wholly personal and universal.
Inspiration comes from the South Devon landscape, working with other poets and artists, my everyday life. Always, there are connections.
I write both for the page and for performance, both free verse and set forms, aiming for a marriage of music and meaning.
For an hour-long radio programme containing an interview with Jennie, some of her poetry and some music, use the control below:
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Graham Burchell
I started to write my first book when I was seven and some forty-six years later I finished it. In between I had written village pantomimes, school plays and even dabbled briefly in performance poetry, but it wasn’t until I stopped being a teacher in 2003 that I took to writing poetry seriously. Since then I have moved on to publish two full collections and have studied for an M.A. in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.
I was living in the United States when I started writing poetry as a career rather than as an amusement, and not surprisingly two of the four poets who have influenced me most profoundly are American - Billy Collins and James Wright. The English poets that have had similar influences are Ted Hughes and John Burnside.
I am always up for new ventures in poetry and to have something with the potential of Poetry Teignmouth virtually on my doorstep is very exciting.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Graham Burchell
I started to write my first book when I was seven and some forty-six years later I finished it. In between I had written village pantomimes, school plays and even dabbled briefly in performance poetry, but it wasn’t until I stopped being a teacher in 2003 that I took to writing poetry seriously. Since then I have moved on to publish two full collections and have studied for an M.A. in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.
I was living in the United States when I started writing poetry as a career rather than as an amusement, and not surprisingly two of the four poets who have influenced me most profoundly are American - Billy Collins and James Wright. The English poets that have had similar influences are Ted Hughes and John Burnside.
I am always up for new ventures in poetry and to have something with the potential of Poetry Teignmouth virtually on my doorstep is very exciting.
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