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- Book of the Spirit<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Mostly Welsh<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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- Braiding Brexit<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Short Stories<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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- Lost Time<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- The Dark Trilogy<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\nChris Armstrong. Lost Time: Chorus and Other Poems, <\/em>Curated Lines, <\/strong>2023<\/strong>. 72pp<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poetry : Paperback<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lost Time<\/em><\/strong> brings together a collection of poems written during the last two to three years. There are poems that relate to Place, the Sea (if not the sea, then the horizon! The sea is always there), Writing, Memories and Time… and a few poems brought about by Covid and lockdown found their way in at the beginning. There are no breaks between the themes and they do not have section headings as it would be fair to say that their edges are blurred, each one blending softly into the next.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, Lost Time:<\/em> a few angry or resigned poems about Covid. Then, moving into the collection, place<\/strong> \u2013 mostly Wales but not entirely so \u2013 gives way to the largest group \u2013 poems about or reflecting the sea<\/strong>. Beyond their horizon (horizons?), you come to poems about writing<\/strong> and about memories<\/strong>, which seem to lead \u2013 at least in my mind \u2013 to poems on time<\/strong>. The light-hearted Killing Time (which is prefixed, appropriately enough, with a quotation from Rainer Maria Rilke, The Duino Elegies: \u201cFor staying is nowhere\u201d) is about waiting to go into the auditorium from a theatre cafe, and leads into the long five-part Elegies of Time. Unredeemable Time picks up the theme and the short Creation combines time with last two themes: writing and memory. In some ways, The Departed makes a fitting end to both the theme and the collection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\nDirectly from here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\nAmazon<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
Chris Armstrong. When I Am Not Writing Poetry: Selected Short Stories, <\/em>Curated Lines, <\/strong>2023<\/strong>. 216pp<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fiction : Paperback<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
This collection of short stories \u2013 some very short and one almost the length of a novella \u2013 was written during the latter half of 2020 while Chris Armstrong was locked down in front of his computer during Covid! And there are only so many poems a man can write! Several of the stories make oblique reference to the Covid \u2018plague\u2019 but other tales are a reflection of the author’s earlier life, a half-dozen of them going all the way back to his time at sea! Several of the stories also bring to life some of the minor characters from The Dark Trilogy.<\/em> Regular readers \u2013 of both his poems and his fiction \u2013 may notice a tendency to link themes to the sea! And if not the sea, then the horizon! The sea is always there!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\nDirectly from here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\nAmazon<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
Chris Armstrong. Book of the Spirit. <\/em>Curated Lines, 2022. 26pp.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poetry : Paperback \/ Chapbook<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rooted in the mythologies of religion, of church, synagogue and the Zen Buddhist temple or monastery, and calling, too, on the Graeco-Roman gods and muses, this collection of poems borrows words, terminologies and phrases as well as their characteristic styles to resonate with the Christian and Jewish language and liturgies, with just a whisper of Far Eastern religions. Blending near identical theologies around a single belief system, a religion centred on love, there are echoes of the Old Testament of the Bible, and of the Torah, the Talmud, and Midrash and Kabbalistic teachings. The collection speaks from – and for – the spirit of the modern world. It is the voice of our deepest, most primal faith.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many of my traditional images, found in many of my poems and writings – time, the horizon, the sea – as well of course as love, find a place again in these lines – in my prayers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\nDirectly from here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\nAmazon<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
Chris Armstrong. The Dark Trilogy. <\/em>Austin Macauley, 2022. 292pp.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fiction: Paperback \/ eBook<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
A book that follows one man’s life might be an autobiography, but what is a book that traces the lives of two men?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The fictional autobiography which makes up the longest book of The Dark Trilogy<\/em> holds the two histories of one man displaced by several hundred years, histories which interweave and come together in the Welsh mountains in the present day. And a part of one of those lives is traced further in the play for voices which makes up the second volume. Book three brings our characters to a resolution of kinds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Chris Armstrong has blended fact and fiction to create a complex story with many strands… a story of the sea, a story of passionate love, a story about a poet, a story about his friend and editor, and a story about the past: a past that the writer only understands completely at the very end of his anabasis – his journey away from the sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
October and November 2022 posts in the blog offer further insights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Available here, from the original publisher or Amazon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\nAustin Macauley<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\nDirectly from here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\nAmazon<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Video Introduction <\/a>(YouTube)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\nChris Armstrong. Mostly Welsh. <\/em>Y Lolfa, 2019. 140pp<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poetry : Paperback<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mostly Welsh<\/em> is a collection of poetic forms rooted in the Anglo-Welsh tradition, offering something for everyone as they read of the landscapes where the poet lives in rural mid-Wales and also of his life. But the strength of the volume lies in its series of powerful poems dealing with love – in all its varied guises – and loss, time and memory, and emotion. The shorter poems in the body of the collection end with four longer poems, one of which, The Voyage, deals with the poet’s early life at sea, while – like many of the earlier poems – the autobiographical Retrospective embraces the time when he met his wife and the marriage which ended in her early death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“At their best, these poems have a directness, honesty and crispness of diction which enables the poet to communicate the most raw of experiences with a degree of sureness, restraint and power.” Ffrangcon Lewis<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Available here, from the original publisher or Amazon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\nY Lolfa<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\nDirectly from here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\nAmazon<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nWelsh Books Council Review<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
London Grip
Review<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\nGwallter
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\n\nChris Armstrong. Braiding Brexit: A Lemming’s-eye View<\/em>. Curated Lines, 2019. 17pp.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poetry : eBook<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
In preparing for a couple of poetry readings in 2019 – at Gwyl Lyfrau Aberaeron Book Festival and, the next day, at an evening reception at that lovely treasure trove of a shop in Aberystwyth, Broc-Mor<\/a> – I suddenly came to realise that I had – over the years – written ten poems around Brexit. I read one in Aberystwyth but it occurred to me that it might be worthwhile… or at least fun… to bring them together in one publication!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And so Braiding Brexit: a Lemming’s-eye View<\/em> was born!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Someone at one of the readings said to me that perhaps if I hadn’t spoken of the context, it was probable that no one would have understood that the first poem was indeed referring to Brexit – I can see that this is true, but it is also true that the poem doesn’t make much sense without some context! And mine was certainly Brexit when I wrote all of these poems, although I acknowledge some are more obscure than others! The poems are presented in the chronological order of their writing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n - The Dark Trilogy<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
- Short Stories<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
- Mostly Welsh<\/sup><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/BraidingBrexit-cover-thumbnail.jpg\")