The Marks on the Map
Brian Johnstone is far too well-known a figure in the Scottish poetry scene to require any potted biography here. That said, which Brian Johnstone will you meet in The Marks on the Map, his most recent collection?
Juke Box Jeopardy
The first thing one notices upon picking up Brian Johnstone’s latest poetry collection, Juke Box Jeopardy, is the binding. The pamphlet comes in a brightly coloured sleeve, like a record. It’s a promise that you have picked up something unique, maybe even fun. And Johnstone delivers. As the title and sleeve suggest, this is a Read More
An Interview with Brian Johnstone
This is an edited transcript and interview, recorded in May 2016 at the University of Dundee for DURA. The interview can be viewed by clicking on the image above. Beth McDonough: Good afternoon Brian Johnstone… it’s a pleasure to have you here. If I were to go through your CV, I think we would take Read More
Two Poems by Brian Johnstone
Tickets for Dundee had been collected from passengers on the train before crossing the bridge. A photograph shows the tickets [of] some who lost their lives that night. The Library of Nineteenth-Century Photography The Last Train from St Fort They have the stubs, some fifty-six Read More
The Fields of War
War and its losses are never far from the surface in Brian Johnstone and Chrys Salt’s mixed media performance The Fields of War. Breaking through in powerful human expressions of anguish and outrage, the poets assume voices from across a century of fighting – the soldier returning in peacetime, the bomber pilot surveying his target, Read More