Rookie: Selected Poems

by Caroline Bird

Caroline Bird is one of Carcanet's most popular poets. Her startling instinct for metaphor, the courage of her choice of subjects and the integrity of her witness, set her apart: a poem is a risk, and it has to be a risk worth taking for the poet and for the reader. Starting with Looking through Letterboxes in 2002 when she was 15 years old, she has published six Carcanet books, culminating in The Air Year, which was awarded the Forward Prize in 2020, shortlisted for the Polari Book Prize and the Costa Poetry Prize, and a Book of the Year in the Telegraph, Guardian and White Review. Rookie presents a formidable body of work composed over two decades from one of the poetry world's most energetic and consistently compelling voices.

Genres: Poetry

192 pages, Paperback

Published May 26, 2022

About the author

Caroline Bird was born in 1986 and grew up in Leeds before moving to London in 2001.

Caroline had been shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize twice in 2008 and 2010 and was the youngest writer on the list both times. She was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize 2014. She has also won an Eric Gregory Award (2002) and the Foyle Young Poet of the Year award two years running (1999, 2000), and was a winner of the Poetry London Competition in 2007, the Peterloo Poetry Competition in 2004, 2003 and 2002. Caroline was on the shortlist for Shell Woman Of The Future Awards 2011.

Caroline has had four collections of poetry published by Carcanet. Her first collection Looking Through Letterboxes (published in 2002 when she was only 15) is a topical, zesty and formally delightful collection of poems built on the traditions of fairy tale, fantasy and romance. Her second collection, Trouble Came to the Turnip, was published in September 2006 to critical acclaim. Watering Can, her third collection published in November 2009 celebrates life as an early twenty-something with comedy, wordplay and bright self-deprecation. Her fourth collection, The Hat-Stand Union, was described by Simon Armitage as ‘spring-loaded, funny, sad and deadly.’ Her fifth collection, In These Days of Prohibition, is due to be published July 2017.

Bird’s poems have been published in several anthologies and journals including Poetry Magazine, PN Review, Poetry Review and The North magazine. Several of her poems and a commissioned short story, Sucking Eggs, have been broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Radio 3. She was one of the five official poets at London Olympics 2012. Her poem, The Fun Palace, which celebrates the life and work of Joan Littlewood, is now erected on the Olympic Site outside the main stadium.

In recent years, Caroline has given poetry performances at Aldeburgh Festival, Latitude Festival, the Manchester Literature Festival, the Wellcome Collection (with Don Paterson,) the Royal Festival Hall (with Elaine Feinstein), St Hilda’s College (with Wendy Cope), the Wordsworth Trust (with Gillian Allnutt), Cheltenham Festival, and Ledbury Festival, amongst others.

Caroline Bird began writing plays as a teenager when she was the youngest ever member of the Royal Court Young Writer’s Programme, tutored by Simon Stephens. In 2011 Caroline was invited to take part in Sixty Six Books by the Bush Theatre. She wrote a piece inspired by Leviticus, directed by Peter Gill. In February 2012, her Beano-inspired musical, The Trial of Dennis the Menace was performed in the Purcell Room at the Southbank Centre. She is currently writing the book and lyrics for Dennis the Menace the Musical for The Old Vic.

Caroline’s new version of The Trojan Women premiered at the Gate Theatre at the end of 2012 to wide critical acclaim. Caroline’s play Chamber Piece featured as Show 3 in the Lyric Theatre Hammersmith’s Secret Theatre season, premiering in October 2013, before touring the country. In 2013, Caroline was short-listed for Most Promising New Playwright at the Off-West-End Awards. In Christmas 2015, her re-twisted telling of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz premiered at Northern Stage, and received a four star review in The Times.

Caroline is also an enthusiastic leader of poetry workshops. In addition to working in primary and secondary schools, she is also a regular teacher at the Arvon Foundation. She is one of the writers-in-residence for the charity First Story. She is currently mentoring three exciting poets – Rachel Long, Emma Simon and Hilary Watson – for the Jerwood Arvon Mentorship Scheme.

Reviews

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

(3.5) I discovered Caroline Bird early last year through In These Days of Prohibition and her latest collection, The Air Year, was one of my favourite reads of 2021. Part of the joy of working my way through this chronological volume was finding the traces of Bird’s later surrealism. Her first collection, Looking through Letterboxes, was written when she was just 14 and published when she was 16, but you’d never guess that from reading these poems of family, fairy tales and unspecified longing. I particularly liked the first stanza of “Passing the Time”:

Thirty paperclip statues on every table in the house
and things are slightly boring without you.
I’ve knitted a multi-coloured jacket for every woodlouse
in the park. But what can you do?

Trouble Came to the Turnip has some cheeky and randy fare, with the title poem offering a beleaguered couple various dubious means of escape. Watering Can pits monogamy and marriage against divorce and the death of love, via some twisted myths and fairy tales (e.g., Narcissus and Red Riding Hood). “Last Tuesday” is a stand-out. The Hat-Stand Union has more of what I most associate with Bird’s verse: dreams and the surreal. “How the Wild Horse Stopped Me” was a favourite. Mostly, I’m glad I own this so I can have access to the material from her two latest collections, but it was also fun to encounter her earlier style. In an afterword, she writes: “I chose poetry because it let me hide and, once hidden, I could be brave, roll my heart in sequins and chuck it out, glittering, into the street.”

Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.

[Kirsty Sheppard · Rating 4 out of 5]

another random library pick-up, but this one with a happier ending than most

oh how we giggle. i am a simpleminded girl and i enjoy colourful, transparent, glittery things. i use transparent in a non-pejorative sense by the way, meaning it’s easy to know what she intended the poem to mean. this helps the work-shy reader to just sit back and let the pretty colours go by

another symptom of my low-brow capacity is how much i favour the poems she wrote at 14 to the later works. the two i read repeatedly were ‘passing the time’ and ‘chaining bikes to this girl is strictly prohibited’. the first was just lovely because i also like the thought of woodlice in wooly jumpers. the second was a ping-pong match between poetic sincerity and phrases so uncalled for you can’t help but laugh (think: sorry for fingering the neighbours then brushing back your hair - girlie what are you talking about)

overall it was a giddy, batshit ride, that occasionally falls short (by means of cloaking sincerity so heavily with absurdity you can’t get near it)

FUN TIME THOUGH i like it

[Michael Reffold · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delightfully surreal and bursting at the seams with inventive use of language and bizarre concepts that somehow smack of truth. I really enjoyed reading this although I didn’t fall in love with any particular poem, the cumulative effect of the writing was impressive.

[Iulia · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5*

Exceptionally raw and powerful poetry, bold and playful and very very punchy. Some (mostly the ones drawn from Bird's more recent collection) perhaps less effective in tone & form though definitely angrier, with more irrepressible energy, than the earlier ones.

[Eli · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heartbreakingly funny, honestly surreal, wonderful.

[Becca Lloyd · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. Bird is an incredible poet.

[Georgia Darwin · Rating 5 out of 5]

this one was extra special because it was a beautiful, thoughtful gift annotated by one of the best people in the world