Author: Clare Best

I am Clare Best – poet, writer, librettist, teacher of creative writing. My first career was as a fine bookbinder. I've also worked as a bookseller, and for many years as an editor. Poetry publications: Treasure Ground (HappenStance 2009), Excisions (Waterloo Press 2011), Breastless (Pighog Press 2011), CELL (Frogmore Press 2015), Springlines (Little Toller 2017), Each Other (Waterloo Press 2019), End of Season / Fine di stagione (Frogmore Press 2022), Beyond the Gate (Worple Press, 2023). Memoir: The Missing List (Linen Press 2018).

from somewhere to somewhere else

I haven’t posted here for quite a while – I’ve been working intensely for the past few months on all kinds of furtherings – work and domestic. More of those in due course, as and when things reach next stages. And now we’re about to take a holiday! In the run up to doing that…

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Water, water, everywhere

Right now I am at the end of a particular kind of tether – the house rental tether. Last year we decided to sell our home of seventeen years in order to downsize. Having tried to buy various houses, each of which fell through for a different reason, and not wanting to lose our buyer,…

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Illustrated talk for University of Kent symposium on Artists’ Books and the Medical Humanities on 21st April 2016

http://www.kent.ac.uk/english/research/conferences/artistsbooks.html This talk/article has also been posted on the BMJ Medical Humanities blog. I had been so looking forward to this wonderful symposium devised, designed and immaculately planned by Stella Bolaki, and to seeing the exhibition of Martha Hall’s and other book artists’ work  – which is still on until 14 August  (Prescriptions Beaney House of…

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Bodies on show

‘The Ethics of Display: exhibiting vulnerable bodies’ At the Centre for the History of Medicine, the University of Warwick, 21 March 2016 When I signed up for this symposium I was still thinking about the tricky questions thrown up by Lucy Lyons’ ‘Drawing Parallels’ workshop at UCL last year. The experience of that day spent trying…

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StAnza 2016 – a festive table

What a privilege to be invited to take part in StAnza 2016, the 19th annual poetry festival in St Andrews. Heartfelt thanks to Eleanor Livingstone and to all the members of the team who every year organise and programme this outstanding festival. StAnza extends such a warm welcome to everyone who attends – it really…

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The film of ‘Take Me With You’

It’s already three weeks since Tim and I put on Take Me With You: the Museum of Friendship, Remembrance and Loss at Brighton and Sussex Medical School on 18 February. Many thanks indeed to all who came along and joined us that evening. We really enjoyed the event, although (just like real life) it didn’t…

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Take Me With You: the Museum of Friendship, Remembrance and Loss

Take Me With You: the Museum of Friendship, Remembrance and Loss 6.00-8.30 pm, Thursday 18 February 2016 at the Chowen Lecture Theatre, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Falmer Campus BN1 9PX Museum open from 6.00 pm Clare Best and Tim Andrews in conversation (+q&a) 6.30-7.30 pm Drinks reception from 7.30 pm Museum open until 8.30 pm…

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The publication of CELL

Yesterday, Michaela Ridgway and I took delivery of CELL, the not-quite-pamphlet which gives embodiment to my poem in twelve sections with art by Michaela. The object has been designed by Katy Mawhood – it’s a printed and folded sheet with only some of the folds cut, so that it can be handled and read in…

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