Title: Imperfect Beginnings
Author: Viv Fogel
Price: £9.99
Publisher: Fly on the Wall Press
Publication Date: 28/02/2023
Hello lovely readers! Today I'm pleased to be taking part in the blog tour for Viv Fogel's latest poetry collection 'Imperfect Beginnings' which is 'a journey towards hope and redemption'.
Synopsis:
Imperfect Beginnings lays its poems out to rest on uncertain terrain. Visa paperwork deadlines hang in the air. Newborns, torn too early from their mother's breast, learn to adapt to harsh guardianship. Belonging and exile are mirrored in the stories of having to leave one's birthmother - or motherland.
From narrative poems such as 'My Father Sold Cigarettes To The Nazis', Fogel takes us on a journey throughout history, spanning ancestry, wartime, adoption and peacetimes, as life styles. Family, work, love and the natural world provide purpose, meaning and a sense of coming 'home'.
Review:
The collection is divided into five sections which takes the readers through an exploration of pain, isolation, love and hope. The collection delves straight away into the trauma of being forced away from your birthmother and homeland in the poem 'Exile', and continues on a historical and personal journey as Viv Fogel writes of growing up adopted, meeting her birth mother and finding love as a parent and grandparent.
"Torn from your homeland
you strain towards a dream
beyond your grasp"
There is certainly a deep connection between visual art and poetry, and the way both mediums help to evoke emotions in us hence why I enjoyed the addition of the few illustrations in the collection, and especially the image of the Memorial installation 'Shalekhet': Fallen Leaves, which is also depicted on the cover and which provides a haunting display. The 'fallen leaves' appear to be screaming out at you from the image and the experience of seeing the installation certainly brings the poem 'And I Cannot Walk Over You' to life, as Fogel describes that the 'mouths gasp/shafts of gaseous light' which present the violence due to which the Jews died. Some other poems also depict violence but in those instances the violence is personal caused by the adoptive mother, and experienced as a child.
"Decades on, the chair listens, solid and soothing,
its seat stained with ink, pawed and clawed by the cats."
Fogel experiments with different poetry forms in the collection and brings them to life using extremely accessible language. The poems are definitely easy to understand for those readers who struggle with deciphering meanings as Fogel uses objects, narration and descriptive imagery to allow the reader to delve into the history of her life, as well as the history of the Holocaust.
I enjoyed reading all of the poems, however, some that touched me particularly deeply were 'Exile', 'When Poverty is s Keep Out Sign', 'My Father Sold Cigarettes To The Nazis', and 'White'.
Overall, 'Imperfect Beginnings' is a collection that is an emotional journey into the history of war, but also into the depths of family life and love. It is a collection of poems which are bound to evoke a plethora of emotions, be it sadness, joy or hope but which are important to read to understand the impact of isolation and trauma on a refugee, and how history and childhood experiences, in particular 'imperfect beginnings' can shape your life. Fogel's collection opens up a conversation which is very much relevant today as we see politicians make heartless decisions when it comes to refugees and asylum-seekers. Fogel's poetry highlights the impact that cruel actions can have on current refugees, as well as their future children.
If you are interested in reading the collection then you can purchase it at Fly on the Wall Press.
Massive thanks to Isabelle Kenyon for organising the blog tour and for allowing me to take part, as well as for the gifted copy of 'Imperfect Beginnings' in exchange for my honest review.
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About the Author
Viv Fogel was born in Kent in 1948 and adopted ten months later by two refugee Holocaust survivors who escaped from the Nazis and met in this country. Her adoptive mother was bi-polar (or manic-depressive as it was then called) and Viv learnt to self soothe with drawing and poetry and, much later, therapy. As an Islington based artist and art teacher, she was involved with adult and community education projects, mural painting and the mid-70s licensed squatting movement which provided free studio space.
Her first poem was published in Peace News when she was sixteen. Since then, her poetry has been published in various magazines and anthologies and heard on radio. In the early 80s, she was part of a performing quarter of feminist poets called the Evettes and in the 90s, she co-organised local poetry and music events. Her first collection was Without Question in 2006 and she has two pamphlets: Witness (2013) and How it is (2018).
Make sure to check out the other reviews of 'Imperfect Beginnings' on the blog tour, as well as some interviews with Viv Fogel which delve into her inspirations and the process of writing the collection.
