Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch: Poetry, Publishing, and Advice for Aspiring Writers

Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch is a poet whose work has been shortlisted for numerous prizes (including Wales Book of the Year (2009 and 2013) and published in several newspapers and magazines. I was fortunate enough to be able to catch up with her over Zoom, where she spoke about her approach to writing and gave some useful advice for aspiring poets and writers.

Image credit: Bilyana Tomova

Background

Though encouraged from a young age by her artist mother to draw Samantha recalls finding it easier to write, particularly in her childhood home where books were piled from “ceiling to floor”. From playing with words in the company of her siblings, poetry was initially alluring because it could be both a “more manageable way of dealing with words and lines”, but also a more compressed novel-form, where each line could lead a reader eagerly onto the next.

At secondary school level, her Classics teacher who – though she did not realise it at the time – took her interest in poetry to a more formal level.

“He really made me think about the connections between the words, especially in the way we do when we’re translating from one language to another; and I love that sort of interrogation of the line. I’d only just started Greek at O Level as it was then, and I did a kind of crash course in it with him; then he introduced me to Propertius and Tibullus and Catullus, who I found thrilling, and that was a love that continued throughout my time at university.”

Samantha read Classics at Newnham College from October 1984 – June 1987, where specifically the teaching of form and structure stayed with her during her career as a poet. Part of the value of form is that it “helps you to remember the poems” and “allows for portability”; and indeed, Samantha stresses that rendering form well is also one of the most difficult tasks of a poet.

The ‘creative process’

The initial draft of the poem follows from a “structured” writing process, which begins only with pen and paper.

Her process is to “divide [the page] into three: there are two columns in the top half, and then the second half is ready for me to start writing. In a way it takes away from the fear of the blank page, as I’ll already have something that I particularly want to explore. In the left-hand column, I’ll make a list of all the images, similes, colours, phrases or ideas that I’d like to see in the poem; in the right-hand column I write out the narrative of the poem.”

The rest of the page is then left to be filled; with writing already in the top half, this can more easily be achieved. Though some might consider such a structured approach limiting, for Samantha it “opens up possibilities”, and can also be adapted to suit any writer’s preferences (for example, by adding more columns to broaden out the frame of ideas even further).

Image credit: Sophie Carlin

The role of the audience

The question of approach to poetry – or more specifically, whether a poet ought to write with an audience in mind, or whether it should be more of an introspective experience – has divided poets past and present. Samantha is inclined to agree with the view of Craig Raine, a poet and retired academic, who in a lecture stated that poetry shouldn’t be something that “only the code breakers at Bletchley Park could understand”: that is, so coded that the message cannot be put across.

Due to this, Samantha likes to “road test” her poems, which involves “trying them out on an audience to see how they sound.”

“It’s important to have an actual audience in front of you […] and then if I hear something is not quite right in my own voice when I’m speaking it, then I’ve got the opportunity of going back and tweaking.”

Furthermore, Samantha finds that being on stage entails a more serious approach to her work, as it “becomes an interactive experience, especially when people want to talk to you about your work after the readings.” The introspective experience, then, is only a part of the initial phases of writing.

Favourite poets

Samantha cites Elizabeth Jennings and Philip Larkin as some of the first individuals who encouraged her to think about metre and form. Both poets were part of ‘The Movement’ which aimed in the 1950s to demonstrate the importance of traditional English poetry over the American-led rise of modernist poetry.

In addition, having lived in Wales for many years, Samantha often finds a lot of Welsh influence in the themes and concerns of her poetry. She cites Menna Elfyn and Gwyneth Lewis as Welsh writers who “in different ways helped me think about putting a story across in couplets”. Elfyn was noted for her bilingual selected poems Eucalyptus and Angel, and her work has been translated into 18 languages, whilst Lewis was made the first National Poet of Wales in 2005 and has published eight books of poetry in Welsh and English.

Image credit: Sophie Carlin

Published collections

Of her collection Banjo (2012), Samantha describes her enjoyment of “stepping into the shoes of different experiences, different characters from history,

“I like the fluidity that writing allows one to undertake, where you can “try out” a different experience within the confines of the poem. In Banjo, I was fascinated as to how music and theatre enabled the crews of the expeditions under discussion in this book to survive, or to get through certain experiences.”

The name of the collection is a reference to the sinking of the Endurance in 1915, the wreck of which was discovered in March 2022. At the time of the disaster, the crew were permitted to take only a few possessions with them from the ship, but the banjo-player was allowed his banjo. In her collection, Samantha explores the idea that “it’s not just about food and drink, but also a question of how you keep peoples’ spirits up in difficult times.”

Following a residency on a Leverhulme fellowship at the National Wool Museum in Drefach Felindre, Wales, a further collection of Samantha’s entitled Lime and Winter was published in 2014. This was “another opportunity to step into the shoes of weavers past and present” and entailed discussions about the way in which “the lines of the thread are actually like the lines of the poem”, which must be drawn together thoughtfully and effectively so that it can have an almost “neat look” on the page.

Samantha’s 2008 collection Not in These Shoes brought great success and was shortlisted for Wales Book of the Year in 2009. It is a collection, she says, fascinated with “spaces and objects and bodies”, the presentation of which in the poem explores the interaction between “states of romanticism and dereliction” and the possibility of having multiple perspectives on both objects and people.

“People are not just about one thing, they don’t have just one character; that’s what makes characters interesting to both writers and painters.

“The world of the poem is self-contained, it has its own characters and background and narrative; so you have to be prepared to enter the world of the poem and take everything that’s happening in it seriously.”

Image credit: Keira Quirk

Advice for aspiring writers and poets

For aspiring poets, Samantha highlights the importance of “being part of a community of writers”, where there is not only the opportunity to give and receive feedback, but also to share ideas and “think critically about others’ writing”, in an almost “forensic” manner. Moreover, having work published in magazines also helps to build a track record of submissions; from experience, Samantha is well aware that editors like to see commitment and “hard work on your craft.”

Finally, Samantha acknowledges that so long as she is able to “remain open to hearing or discovering voices and stories that I haven’t heard before, then that’s something that’s going to feed back into me as a writer and make me think and work at my own craft.” Indeed, this sentiment is important for writers generally, at any point in their careers: to listen to new voices, and to learn from their words.

That’s all for our poetry feature this Michaelmas term 2022! Hopefully, our submissions inbox will reopen in the future, so if you too would like to have your poetry published here at The Tab but haven’t got round to submitting yet, keep an eye out on our website and Facebook page for more details in the future!

Thank you to all the wonderful and thought-provoking poems we have received this term; be sure to keep writing and submitting in the terms to come!

Feature image credit: Ruth Pavey

Related articles recommended by this author:

• The Tab sits down with the youngest ever winner of the National Poetry Prize
• My Truth: rap, representation and diversity in Cambridge Theatre
• Professor Brian Cox: The universe, conspiracy theories, and music