The Eye of Temenos:Reflections on Sacred Space

A mind-blowing and moving collection of poems and short prose pieces about the biggest piece of public sculpture in Britain and its site in the historic Middlesbrough Dock - written by professional poets, prose writers, university students, school children, football fans, community groups, individuals and at least one rock star! Collected and edited by Andy Willoughby and Bob Beagrie.

Price: £10.00 + £1.99 postage in the UK. (For postage to Europe and Worldwide please select 'The Eye of Temenos: worldwide postage' item from our online shop)

With Andy Willoughby & Bob Beagrie. Andy and Bob are nationally and internationally published poets, educational playwrights and Senior Lecturers in Creative Writing. They will take participants through six sessions of fun creative writing exercises, mini tours and research skills building tasks drawing on the resources of the Middlesbrough Central Reference Library, Teesside Archives and MIMA to produce a portfolio of poems and fiction. The course is non-accredited, but will provide you with work that can be developed for publishing and for supporting entrance to Teesside University's M.A. Creative Writing programme.

The six week course begins on Thursday 7th July, and will run from 5-7pm based in Middlesbrough Reference Library every Thursday.

Cost: £60.00 to be paid in advance by PayPal via this web site. Or payable by Cheque at the first session. Limited numbers are available so early booking is advised. Payment must be made in full and no concessions are available.

For further information please contact: andy_ekzuban@hotmail.com

'The Wilds' is an experimental anthology of contemporary poetry exploring natural, urban, psychological and social wildernesses. It brings together established and emerging voices from the North East's poetic landscape, it features work from fifteen of the North East's established poets S.J. Litherland, Cynthia Fuller, Kate Fox, Andy Croft, Marilyn Longstaff, Paul Summers, Jo Colley, Angela Readman, Maureen Almond, Gordon Hodgeon, Ghazala Bashir, Keith Armstrong, Andy Willoughby , Bob Beagrie and Tom Kelly, who all worked in a one-to-one mentoring role with fifteen new poets from Teesside. The Wilds is a map to literary delights and new adventures, but tread carefully, 'Here be dragons!'

"This is a living anthology that leaps from the page into the deeps of mind often left untouched by more mainstream poetry. It will leave you hungry for more contact with the vital scene in the North East of England"  Kalle Niinikangas

ISBN: 978-0-9553930-2-0

Publication price £6.99 + £1.00 postage

The long awaited first poetry collection by Middlesbrough's legendary, underground poet P.A. Morbid in which Teesside's visionary dark angel sings of longing, love and loss, being and non-being in verse that both stings with absolute reality and haunts with its thwarted romanticism. He takes you from the dregs of the bottle to The Emerald City and makes you wonder if there is any such place as home.

'PA Morbid - part wizard, part poet, haunts the Boro like an inspired, highly literate ghost. His "dark portentous dreams" are intimate as a voice whispered into your ear as you are about to fall asleep, but leavened by humour and grounded by the occasional meat pie.' Jo Colley

'PA Morbid lives up to his name in many ways. Yet from the corner of his eye the poet catches glimmers of light above council estates, an old fashioned romanticism and yearning on the high street. These poems hold on to a moment like a fragile thing. This is poetry as honest as it gets.' Angela Readman

ISBN: 978-0-9553930-4-4

                         Publication price £3.99 + £1.00 postage

The fifth collaboratively written bi-lingual illustrated pamphlet in the Anglo Finnish series from Ek Zuban. This finely designed limited edition collector's item features poems by Poet in Residence from BBC Radio 4's Saturday Live - Kate Fox, who has dropped her funny act to write a series of well wrought, painfully honest reflections on the complexities of love, loss, obsession and forgiveness.

Her partner in the book is one of Finland's most popular poets Jenni Haukio, who has written around the same themes in her own inimitable, deeply moving and strikingly imagistic way, her words deeply rooted in the nature of her native archipelago.

ISNB: 978-0-9553930-1-3

Publication price £5.00 + £1.00 postage

Ek Zuban's professionally produced Spoken word and music CD

SAMPO: HEADING FURTHER NORTH

Following a ten year exchange with Finnish poets Beagrie and Willoughby's take on the Kalevela legend with amazing mystical backing from world music duo Gobbleracket. The two poets journey in and out if the myth connecting to bardic heroes, the origins of iron and contemporary North Eastern realities in rapidly shifting perspectives and tones ranging from the tragic heroic to the comic pathetic while Milo Thelwall and Kev Howard play a plethora of instruments and haunt the listener with Tuvan throat singing and shamanic chanting. Production by Dominic Nelson Ashley of Solzaf studios.

Praise for Sampo

'There are a great many retellings of myths and because of the nature of myth itself  countless modernisations. What Beagrie and Willoughby do, however, is distinctly less common, as they hot-wire their original Finnish source material and, with a back seat full of fine musicians, drive it dangerously and exhilaratingly into the Northern Europe of the 21st century. The ride is breath-taking.'

 Paul Hardwick , Poet and Senior Lecturer in Medieval Literature  

"The icy tracts of Finland and the industrial heartlands of north-east England certainly seem to have found a common voice in a poetic performance which kept us spellbound. The insistent choruses ("the iron in the blood points north") and the quality of the music which overlaid the poetry make this a sort of Waste Land for the 21st century."                                       

Andy Humphrey , The Speakers Corner , York Literature Festival

"Sampo is a sparkingly original work from the North East that interweaves myth and reality across two cultures brilliantly.  The fusion of words and soundscape allows this two-man verbal rollercoaster to shine at their very best!"

Claire Morgan , Apples & Snakes

"A collection that casts spells like sparks from a blacksmith's anvil. Memorable, haunting and insightful."

Rob Nichols , The Evening Gazette

Publication price £7.99 + £1.00 postage