The much-missed Les Murray, writing about David Morley, highlighted his capacity to achieve a ‘refraction of the familiar.’  Emma Simon’s Smith/Doorstop pamphlet competition winner The Odds (2019) shares this ability to imbue the everyday with a shining radiance.  Mundane details are given a twist of the Gothic as in a pub’s Hades-like cellar (‘The World’s … Continue reading Ken Evans reviews new work by Emma Simon, Alice Allen, Marie Naughton and Martin Zarrop