From SUSAN WICKS, poet, novelist & translator
I was at first relieved to see that in its recent round of funding decisions, the Arts Council has been at explicit pains to protect poetry and poetry in translation – and then shocked to find that the small press, Arc, which currently fills a very important role in both, has had its funding withdrawn. This decision seems, quite simply, completely anomalous – to the point where I find myself wondering if there has actually been some unwitting omission.
Arc occupies a unique and hugely valuable place in current small press poetry publishing. It is one of our most active and most internationally valued publishing outlets for book-length translations of poetry, and without those publication channels the funding of grass-roots organisations and magazines connected with translation itself risks becoming meaningless. When I was looking for a publisher for my translation of Valerie Rouzeau's Pas Revoir, published in summer 2009 as Cold Spring in Winter, I was particularly glad to find a home for it with Arc, which I already knew well from my two years as Poetry Book Society Translations Selector between 1998 and 2000. Tony Ward's steady commitment to a very strong and varied translation list (very professionally edited by Jean Boase-Beier and printed in parallel text, with serious introductory material by both translator and another expert in the field) has given it a deservedly highly respected place in the area of contemporary international poetry.
At the risk of seeming to blow my own trumpet – which is far from my intention – I feel I have to point out that the Rouzeau book was overlooked by both Carcanet and Bloodaxe, and that it was Professor Jean Boase-Beier, translations editor at Arc and closely connected with UEA’s Centre for Literary Translation, who had the vision to take on what was undoubtedly an innovative and perhaps risky project. Since its publication, this book has had outstanding reviews in the TLS, Poetry Review and elsewhere, won the Scott-Moncrieff Prize for translation from French and been shortlisted for both the Oxford-Weidenfeld Prize for literary translation and Canada’s prestigious Griffin Prize for Excellence in Poetry, where it has brought recognition to both its countries of origin. Without Arc’s courage and energy, this exciting poetry might have seen itself sidelined in favour of safer, long-consecrated alternatives.
Arc’s continuous output in this field is quantitatively as well as qualitatively significant, and the numbers of ordinary readers of poetry who have made important and life-enhancing discoveries between Arc covers must be more impressive still. Arc is noteworthy for being a very proactive and supportive press, liaising between its writers and festival organisers and setting up its own memorable reading events. As a translator I have felt nourished by my dealings with Tony Ward and Angela Jarman at Arc and by the other poets and translators on their list - and seen how other those translators and writers, from Britain and abroad, have received that same invaluable support to make their work available to a wider public both on the page and in performance. And readers and audiences are enthusiastic. I know from my own recent experience as poet, reader and teacher (at Goldsmiths College and for the Poetry School) that Arc titles are reaching new readerships and inspiring new poetry in English all the time. Poetry from cultures not our own enriches us and opens new horizons, as I’m sure the Arts Council decision-makers appreciate. And Arc is one of the organisations that – no doubt without fanfare, but with continued determination and belief and integrity – have been doing that best.
Every unfavoured arts organisation in the country will no doubt make representations in the hope that an unfavourable decision can and will be reversed – but in Arc’s case the withdrawal of regular funding does directly contradict the Arts Council’s expressed priorities, and it seems possible that someone somewhere has simply weighed the evidence incorrectly. I urge you to consider this real possibility.