Nothing But The Poem - Norman MacCaig

In this episode of Nothing But The Poem podcast, our usual host Samuel Tongue goes in deep on two weel kent poems by Norman MacCaig, one of Scotland's most loved and influential poets.

Norman MacCaig famously, and self-deprecatingly, described writing his poems as "one fag" poems or "two fag" poems. Nothing could be further from the truth for readers, who can spend hours returning again and again to his best work. The two poems featured here are generally considered among Maccaig's finest.

Rich in observation with similes to die for Aunt Julia is often rated as MacCaig's most popular poem, with it's famous opening lines:

 

Aunt Julia spoke Gaelic

very loud and very fast.

 

Stars and Planets is the other poem featured in this podcast. A short cosmic stunner of a poem with more of MacCaig's surprising similes and deft observations. Samuel Tongue and the Friends of the SPL group had fun discussing these two poems as they looked beneath the bonnets of both.