Sean O'Brien reading tonight

I've just been to a reading by Sean O'Brien at Sheffield Hallam University. I was rather curious to see him read, having read his selected poems Cousin Coat last year and been only partly impressed. He struck me as being at his best the closer he got to Peter Reading's style and subject matter and more recently has been hampered by the fact that it's tricky to be an anti-Thatcherite poet in the post-Blair era (though obviously, the judges of a several major prizes seem convinced that he's onto something). He read an epitaph for Thatcher tonight, introducing it by saying that he wasn't a fan of hers and didn't expect anyone else there was either. There's nothing particularly bold or brave about criticising a Prime Minister from 18 years ago in a city that never had much affection for her in the first place. In fact, it's probably fair to say that a Sheffield poetry audience is relatively unlikely to be shocked or affronted by criticism of the Iron Lady, however pointed the epithets or incisive the similes.

However, the whole reading had the comfortable tone of a return to a city he's spent lots of time in, within the same institution where he used to teach, so perhaps that's fair enough. I'd certainly say that some of the poems he read exceeded my expectations quite dramatically, particularly a longish poem about Hull and how its past and water are both near the surface. This poem made me feel more immediately engaged that I've felt with many of his: both in terms of the immediacy of its sensory evocations and its resonance with part of Hull's distinctive atmosphere.

I knew I'd not seen the best of Sean O'Brien on my last reading of his work and this was a useful prompt to reconsider. Given the quality of some of the books shortlisted for the Forward Prize, The Drowned Book must surely have something going for it to have carried off the spoils. I remain ready to be converted.

[For some useful summary information about Sean O'Brien, see here].