Karly

Long-time readers of the blog will remember the post titled How Allie Esiri Made Me Love Poetry, and if you do, you know that this interview has been a long time coming. Writing that first piece felt like admitting something true about myself, something I had known privately for years but had never said aloud, that poetry had found me later than expected, that I had come back to it not through classrooms or rigid analysis but through the soft generosity of Allie’s books.

What follows is a conversation with the woman whose work made poetry feel like home, and who, without ever intending to, made me believe that I had a place in the world of language too.

Absolutely. I think for back to school, back to uni, everyone should have one of your books to carry them through the year.
When I did Shakespeare for Every Day of the Year and I was doing the research, I found that almanacs, which had something for every day of the year, were enormously popular in Shakespeare’s time. After the Bible, they were the second most bought book. A book where you were taught something for every day of the year, maybe about the weather, was a huge thing. I’m not sure why that died, but in a way I’m doing something similar here.

And I also heard you say on a podcast that one of the first people who compiled Shakespeare was executed…
Oh yeah, he was. For forgery. That is quite funny. I mean, a tragedy, but at this time it’s a comedy. It’s very shocking. Imagine. Now, of course, I have to clear rights for many of the poems, and really happily, because you want to credit and pay writers for their work. In the UK, every country has slightly different rules, but in the UK, if a writer has been dead for 70 years, their work is in the public domain. So with Shakespeare, you no longer have to pay or credit. I think I’m safe from being executed for forgery. But yes, probably a huge amount of the poems in my books are still in copyright, and we have to ask permission, because the poet or their estate may not want it in a book. And then, yes, pay up.

How do you balance curating poems for broad appeal with also choosing what you love? And have your instincts changed since the first book?
Well, I think the first few align. I do have quite a broad taste in poetry and a desire to share a wide selection, whether that is with my nearest and dearest or with the wider world. These anthologies are eclectic. I don’t expect anyone to love every poem, but I hope the book is full of favourites and new-to-be favourites. I think variety is fun. You might want some comic poems, then some love poems. Being able to have that mix is something that delights the reader. There are other brilliant books of poetry, single volumes all by one author, and I hope people read my book and think, I want to buy a whole collection. Then they go out and buy Wendy Cope, or whoever. Other people do themed collections, funeral poems, for example, and they are doing something different. But I like the mix. I have not found it a struggle, because I enjoy it. I get lots of recommendations from friends, and I am led to discover new poems. I think I’m on a similar journey to the reader. I’m also discovering new poems, so I feel like the reader and I chime. I hope.

And how do you feel about one-line poems?
Oh, I think some of them are so funny. I’ve got one, haven’t I? The one by George MacDonald, the really, really short one-line poem. And then Muhammad Ali was… I don’t think I have ever included it, because we could never work out how to clear the rights. We didn’t know. The publisher clears the rights for me, but we never worked out who to go to for permission. Muhammad Ali gave this speech, I think at Harvard, and he really liked poems apparently. He did this poem, which was “Me, We,” and I really, really wanted to include it. I will be able to one day, I’m sure. But yes, I think they can be very fun, very funny. I mean, you know, haikus, and some of them are extraordinarily powerful. Mainly they are like this aha moment in nature, and they are so clever. Of course, it’s extremely hard to write to a form, whether it’s a sonnet or a haiku or even a one-line poem. For a great poet, that is probably quite a challenge. So yes, I think all of these are… I just hope people are not like, oh no, on my birthday I have only got one line.

On my birthday, October 21st, I always get the Battle of Trafalgar
Oh, I see, yes. Also, it is Black History Month, so in October I quite often, not in 365 Poems for Life but in some of the other anthologies, begin with that because it’s so important and the poems are incredible. There are poems that were written during the Civil Rights Movement and also before and after. That’s normally quite a strong moment in the month of October. But yes, you’ve got the Battle of Trafalgar, which is a good poem.

I think it’s so important that you always include such a wide range of poets from all over the world, especially because I have found that poetry up until not too long ago was very white, male-dominated.
Yeah, it really was. I mean, decade after decade after decade.

And, you know, male writers taking the credit for their wives or their partner’s writing, so I think it’s very important.
Also, in many cases, it would be their view. So, their view of war, which is unbelievably powerful. One of the gateways to poetry for me was World War I poetry, Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, just speaking from the front, and you felt like you were standing in a soldier’s shoes. But there were women writing too. That sort of voice and view of history is also so illuminating. I feel that for so long, kids, students, adults, just saw that one point of view. History was delivered to us from the battlefield or from the male point of view, and women poets can really help and open our eyes to what happened in history, let alone their concerns. So yes, it has always been really important to me to include women poets and poets from around the world, for all these sorts of reasons. I think they were sort of buried in forgotten sounds. It’s very interesting, because of course, there were periods when only the wealthy were educated and literate, so some poems may reflect limitations in who was writing. But then, the oral tradition, which has been so huge in poetry, as in songs, means poems were being passed down. So I feel there were always women composing and writing and passing them down. It’s very interesting, and I find it important to include.

And you do it in your nursery rhymes book, which is mostly oral tradition, and you know, mostly female caretakers passing them down.
Yeah, I know. Anon, who was probably a woman.

There are so many great new poets sharing their work online nowadays. Do you ever feel pressure to keep up with what is new in poetry?
Well, I like to see what is new in poetry. I’m often sent links by a friend or someone in the poetry world. You can’t keep up with everything in life, can you? It depends on the project I’m working on, what I’m looking for. But I think it’s exciting. I think spoken word and spoken word nights are really exciting for poetry. The internet has been really good for poetry. It’s an amazing place to share poetry, whether it’s on the page that fits on the screen or in bite-sized form. They share incredibly well on TikTok and Instagram Reels. I think it’s brilliant for poetry. It feels like a return to oral tradition.

As well as your books, you also put on very nice events. I went to Shakespeare at the Open Air theatre. The one with the rain. And you were an actress in the 80s and 90s?
Yes, the 90s. 1989 was probably my first job.

Has being back on stage ever made you want to go back to acting?
No, but I do enjoy being on stage with actors again. Working with actors is really fun. The rehearsal before, and putting on the show. It’s fun working with them again. But no, it has not made me want to go do a play or anything like that.

No?
No, but I do like doing the shows.

They’re so good. So, so good.
So fun that you came and sat through the rain. The weather was insane. It was so eccentric and English, wasn’t it? […] I think people even enjoyed the rain in a crazy way. It’s such a madly English thing. A friend of a friend came from LA, and he stayed for the whole thing. He said, I would not be able to explain to my friends back in Los Angeles what I just did. Sat two hours watching Shakespeare in the rain.

Yeah, I thought it would be cancelled because of the rain. I thought people were going to walk out. I remember Olivia Williams wearing very high heels, running around the stage. I was so worried she was going to fall down.
And the stage was like a swimming pool at the end. The actors really loved it. They were such good sports. You’re right; she put on the heels because she wanted to be taller for Helena. They were such professionals. On they went.

And when you have done your live shows, has there ever been a public reaction that surprised you?
Some. It’s normally the comedy that gets huge laughs. I think what surprises all of us, the actors and me, on stage is when they’re just really quiet and concentrating and how you can hold an audience with a poem, that mainly. And where the laughs come, that is interesting. 

It must be very empowering to be on stage and feel all those people listening. Does that make you nervous?
Everyone gets nervous before going on stage, don’t they? You need that adrenaline. I have not stopped getting nervous, but it has got easier. It’s always a little nerve-wracking. Sometimes the nerves come from other things, like whether we are going to run on time. For the yearly show at the National Theatre, for example, we often have exactly one hour on stage, no more. That can be hard to time, because we might deliver the words at slightly different speeds. So there are always different things running through my mind.

Do you have any pre-show rituals?
I don’t, really. I mean, it’s fun the company in the wings before everyone goes on but I don’t. Everyone’s sort of in their own space. Tis bonding, doing a show together. 

And you also get to do it with your friends. I assume they are your friends?
Not all of them, not at all. But I do have very loyal friends who agree to take part quite often. There are always people I have never met before too, and that is fun, because sometimes they become friends. But yes, I do love doing them with friends, especially when we are all at a festival together.

Just before this question, I have a very non-native-speaker moment and accidentally imply that she “makes Helena Bonham Carter read,” which makes her laugh. I laugh too, and we settle back into the conversation.

In a time when curators and creatives in general are often expected to share so much of themselves, I think you have managed to remain both widely admired and known in literary circles and on the internet, but you have remained very private. Has that been conscious, or has it come naturally?
Yeah, I just tend to post about poems and poetry, rather than my personal life. I think it’s a choice, isn’t it? It’s a choice we make. I think I’m promoting the poems and poets. That is the pleasure for me, just helping poetry reach new corners. That feels true to what I want to do.

Because, especially nowadays, social media is so public. It can very easily take away your peace, in a way. Sometimes you really have to pick and choose what you are engaging with, and be intentional about it.
I think everyone has a choice, don’t they? I just see my role as helping promote poems, poets, and poetry. Or Shakespeare. Or nursery rhymes.

What do you hope your anthologies become for people?
Well, I’m not sure. I love hearing that they have been helpful or fun, or useful. I have loved hearing that they were a way into poetry for some people, or just that they enjoyed discovering new poets and poems. It has been genuinely such a huge surprise how many copies sold, because that just was not anyone’s expectation.

Really? But they are so gorgeous.
Yeah, that really helped. Zanna Goldhawk is the designer of the covers. I think it has just been amazing. So I don’t mind if someone just has the book and uses it as a birthday book, or reads it every day, or finds it useful when looking for a poem for a wedding or some other occasion. I don’t feel prescriptive. I don’t mind if people don’t read them every day.

Personally, your work was my gateway into poetry. Your poetry app was the first time poetry felt approachable to me. And beyond the live readings and how brilliantly the actors performed them, I developed a real interest in poetry itself. So, is there a poem that has followed you through different stages of your life?
I think one of my first loves was Christina Rossetti, so some of her poems have been with me forever. And Robert Louis Stevenson too, I’ve loved his poems since childhood. I think they stay with you, and some I know by heart, so they are easy to draw on. I don’t think I have one particular poem. The same goes for As You Like It. We did it at school when we were 16, and that still feels very close to all of us who were in that production.

Is there a poem you reach for when you are overwhelmed, or do you avoid poetry altogether at those times?
Oh no, I do turn to poetry. It might be that Derek Mahon poem, Everything Is Going to Be All Right, or a nature poem. I find they can be incredibly soothing. Like the very famous Wordsworth poem, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, also known as Daffodils. It’s such a clever poem. The first three verses describe this amazing field of daffodils, and then in the last verse, he talks about how he sits and remembers them, and how they bring him pleasure. That is what nature poems can do for me. They can help lead you back to a place where you felt happy, or calm, or entranced. So yes, I think there are a few that I turn to, or draw on from memory.

You must have a full iTunes library’s worth of poems in your head.
I do have a library, but I always try to learn another one by heart.

So, you studied modern languages at university. What did you imagine you would do with that?
Well, I loved it. I studied French and Spanish, and I loved my subject. I didn’t really imagine I would do anything specific with it. I didn’t think I would necessarily use my languages professionally, but there was a lot of literature in my course, and that fed into my whole career, which has been in the arts. I do use some French and Spanish or Latin American poems in my books, probably more than others would, just because there are so many that I love and want to share. So I have used them a little. I think you can study something you really love, and it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t have a direct practical use.

If you could give your student self a poem to carry in her pocket, what would it be?
Oh, my student self. So my university years, not my schoolgirl self. What would it be? Gosh, I don’t know. Would it be a poem to help you through heartbreak, or…

I mean, whatever you feel would best represent that time in your life.
Yes. I think it was, like most people’s university years, emotionally varied. It was very busy. I was reading mostly French and Spanish literature then. I wonder if any one poem really struck me. I’m not sure. I was really into Latin American novels at the time, writers like García Márquez and magical realism, fantasy. Something like that would be useful, a poem that could take you into another world. Because sometimes, the most helpful poem is not the one that directly addresses your emotional state. Sometimes you just want an escape. Something like a Yeats poem, maybe He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven, or something that propels you into a future time where you are madly in love, or just into another realm altogether, like in a Marvel movie. Something that transports you. I think that is what poems do for me. I don’t think I could pick just one. I don’t remember exactly when I discovered Maya Angelou, maybe a little later, but I remember her autobiography and her poems really spoke to me then. So maybe Maya Angelou. I don’t know. I have too many favourites. Far too many.

Just going back to what you said about including South American poems. Do you think it’s easier for you, since you know the language, to sense whether the translation feels accurate? Whether it’s really conveying what the poet meant?
I suppose so, yes. I suppose that is easier when I’m using a French or Spanish poem. But I also include poems from Chinese, Russian, and Japanese, and in those cases I have to work out whether the translator is a renowned one. Sometimes there are different translations to choose from, so I can pick the one I prefer, or I take advice. I ask a friend who knows the language.

And what do you think about poetry in translation in general?
I find it tricky. I had to write an essay on this for my Cambridge entrance exam. I think I argued then, and I probably still believe it now, that if you take something like the Bible, it is definitely worth translating. But if you take a sonnet, how much are you losing in translation? Quite a lot. But then again, people would not know Shakespeare’s sonnets in other countries if they had never been translated. Some poets, or poets who are also translators, can create something beautiful out of a translation. It might not be literal, but it’s still a piece of art that captures the same sentiment. They might try to honour the form or make other creative decisions, and the same goes for translating plays. I think the great works should be translated, even if something is lost. Sometimes it’s nice to include both versions on the page so you can compare them. But there is no answer. There’s no right answer but I do find it interesting thinking about. Or you know, Haikus, how much it’s lost, it’s supposed to be a certain number of words per line and certain amount of syllables in total, it just ends up being something completely different. But then we wouldn’t know the great haiku writers if we didn’t happen to speak Japanese. I enjoy the argument, really, and I enjoy not having an answer to it. 

We can’t have answers for everything.
No. Hooray that we can’t. I love that. I think that is one of the reasons we go into the arts.

You once said something that really stuck with me, that we tend to return to what we loved as children. For you, that was poetry, wasn’t it?
Yes. I had a book of poems, and I also had a book of Ancient Greek myths.

When you were growing up, how were books treated in your house? Were they something to annotate and scribble in, or kept pristine?
I was never big on annotating books but I think others did. I don’t think I did. I would look after my books; I do treasure them. I don’t think I had that many. We used to borrow books from the library, or school. I’d sometimes request a book for a birthday present. I remember, well, my mother reminded me that I asked for the Lamb’s Tales of Shakespeare when I was 11 from my aunt, who used to give very generous presents, and it was this big hardback, I think it was quite special. I’ve still got it. So yeah, I think, it was very much a thing of mine. I think I was lucky that the few books I had I really loved.

If you could assign a poem to the British public, what would it be and why?
Maybe I would choose Everything Is Going to Be All Right by Derek Mahon. It’s not entirely straightforward, but it does feel hopeful, doesn’t it? I think that would be a good one to share right now, in troubled times.

As our conversation came to a close, I found myself returning to the feeling that first drew me to her books, the sense that poetry can be both anchor and invitation, both mirror and window, both comfort and gentle challenge. Speaking with Allie only confirmed what her anthologies have always suggested. Poetry matters because people matter, and her work continues to prove that one carefully chosen line can illuminate an entire day. I left our conversation grateful for her voice and grateful, too, for the quiet ways poetry keeps finding us just when we need it.

For more on Allie Esiri’s work, upcoming events, and anthologies, you can visit:
Her website: allieesiri.com
Instagram: @allieesiri

All photographs used in this feature appear courtesy of Allie Esiri