Trouble in "rhymeland"?

Poetry Review editor Fiona Sampson [left] with Judith Palmer in 2009.

"Poetry Society riven by mysterious divisions"

No explanation for string of resignations at senior level

by

Richard Lea

June 28th, 2011

guardian.co.uk

Like a summer storm, the row that has engulfed the Poetry Society seems to have come out of a cloudless sky. Membership is up, audiences are up and the society has been one of the big winners from Arts Council England's most recent round of funding, with grants increased 30% to £360,000.

But after a month which has seen the society's president Jo Shapcott, its director Judith Palmer, and its financial officer Paul Ranford, all hand in their resignations, some members are demanding that the society's board be called to account.

And with the final funding agreement with the Arts Council England (ACE) yet to be settled, the fallout could put the society's financial plans in jeopardy.

The writer and society member Kate Clanchy is assembling a list of members calling for an extraordinary general meeting.

"We need to know why Jo Shapcott – who's amazing – and Judith Palmer, who as far as I could see was doing a great job, have resigned," she said.

Is it a clash of personalities, a disagreement over artistic priorities, an argument over spending or a failure of management? With the eye of the hurricane still whirling over the society's Covent Garden headquarters, the reasons for the disturbance are cloaked in mystery.

Both sides seem keen to scotch suggestions that the trouble started with a battle between Palmer and Fiona Sampson, the editor of the society's magazine Poetry Review.

After a "very difficult decision to step down", Palmer said she was "taking legal advice as to how much I can say about what has happened", but was keen to stress that the society "has been enjoying a period of great success" and that the current turbulence has nothing to do with personal disputes.

"I've been dismayed to read reports of some kind of falling-out with the editor of our magazine," she said. "Certainly, nothing like that happened."

This is a declaration echoed by Sampson.

"I have not picked a fight with Judith Palmer," she said, "and I'm not interested in picking a fight with Judith Palmer."

Sampson also rejects recent suggestions that she wanted to focus more on high-profile poets, citing 13 years working in arts education and statistics which show that 20% of the poets published in Poetry Review have yet to publish a book – a proportion she described as "astonishingly high".

"My express policy is to honour the slush pile," she said, "because I always came out of the slush pile myself."

But Sampson declined to explain whether the dispute centres on the allocation of the recent ACE funding, as alleged in one report, saying that the spate of resignations is something that she has "no interest in, and no power over".

"It has never been the case that the editor has had any role in steering the society as a whole," she said, "and I haven't been."

Neither Palmer nor the society's board have been able to confirm or deny reports that the board wanted to change the distribution of the funds, or that meetings were arranged without the director's knowledge.

In a statement, the board said that they accepted Palmer's resignation "with regret", adding that, "In light of ongoing discussions with Judith, the board deems it inappropriate to comment on Judith's reasons for resigning."

For the poet Lemn Sissay, who admits to being baffled by recent developments, the storm has been brewing for some time.

"This goes back much further than the resignations of Judith Palmer and Jo Shapcott," he said. "People have been leaving the Poetry Society for some time now. If all your people are leaving ship, it shows there's something going wrong."

Meanwhile signatures keep coming in from the society's 4,000 members. Clanchy says she's nearly halfway to collecting the 10% required to trigger a meeting, but she's heard "not a smidgeon" from the society.

"They need to hold a meeting in the next four weeks," she said, "because this needs sorting out."

And the outlook remains unsettled, with ACE saying it would remain "in close contact" with the society while they "work to resolve their current difficulties".

In the most recent round of ACE funding awards, the Poetry Society was the biggest winner the poetry world, with the Poetry Book Society losing all its support, provoking outrage in poetry circles. The publisher Enitharmon also had its funding axed.

But the payout has yet to be finalised. "All our offers of funding are subject to negotiating a final funding agreement," said ACE. "These negotiations will take place between the Arts Council and all our new funded organisations between now and the autumn."