Posted by Jane McMorland Hunter on December 29th, 2022
For many years I have juggled being a children’s bookseller at Hatchards, a writer and an editor (as well as being a potter, quilter and gardener but that is another story for another time). Every so often one of the three strands of my working life gets out of control and takes over but mostly it is a lovely combination: interesting, varied and fun. This autumn, between selling children’s books, I have had three anthologies published, whilst working on more anthologies and a book about urban nature for 2023 and 2024.
Many years ago when I was at university we were encouraged to see careers advisors. ‘I want to be happy,’ I said. The poor advisor looked at me blankly; this was not a career. I have stuck to my aim and, on the whole, achieved it. When my publisher Batsford suggested a daily anthology of happy poems it was like a dream come true. We are all familiar with the image of a poet struggling in a freezing garret, short of food and mainly writing anxt-ridden verse so I was initially worried that I might have difficulty finding three hundred and sixty-six good happy poems. Not at all. I discovered that many poets had surprisingly comfortable lives and wrote a lot of very jolly verse. Lodged in the airy world of the imagination, happiness is almost impossible to pin down in a hard and fast definition but I had a great time trying. While I was compiling the anthology an article appeared in a newspaper giving a complicated scientific formula for happiness. Learned neuroscientists discovered that happiness doesn’t last long; it seems our brains adjust to a happy situation very quickly so we are ready to make the next move in life. Perhaps the best policy is to follow Iris Murdoch’s advice and aim for a life with ‘continuous small treats’. A daily poem (with one or two pieces of prose) will, I hope, bring readers of this collection continuous small slivers of happiness.
A Bedside Companion for Book Lovers
This follows the format of Bedside Companion for Gardeners which was published in 2021. Both anthologies have a reading for every day of the year and are a mix of fact, fiction, prose, poetry, adults’ and children’s books. I grew up in a house full of books, have worked in bookshops for most of my adult life and now live in a house where the books regularly threaten to take over. My love of books, and stories in particular, began early; every night my parents read to me, although they chose the books with the result that by the time I went to school I had a wide but fragmented knowledge of Charles Dickens’ novels and was under the mistaken impression that P. G. Wodehouse wrote children’s books about pigs. This should have been the easiest anthology to compile but looking round my shelves when I started collecting pieces, I was slightly daunted. Three hundred and sixty-six pieces may seem a lot but I soon realised that I would have a problem when I compiled a ‘short’ list of over four hundred and eighty possibilities.
I have attempted to cover all aspects of books and the book world and have included pieces on books themselves, reading, writing, libraries, both public and private and, of course, bookshops. There are even pieces about Hatchards: a note from the founder, advice from the manager in the twenties, mentions in novels and a very magical description of the shop.
A Nature Poem for Every Winter Evening is a smaller anthology covering December to February, the perfect time to settle down beside a roaring fire and read poetry. The poems are taken from A Nature Poem for Every Night of the Year and whilst that is a substantial book this is a handy little collection. A Nature Poem for Every Spring Evening will follow later and there will eventually be a series of four with delightful seasonal jackets.
Jane’s other anthologies Favourite Poems of London Favourite Poems of England First World War Poems A Nature Poem for Every Day of the Year A Nature Poems for Every Night of the Year Friends: A Poem for Every Day of the Year Bedside Companion for Gardeners Nature Writing