Lauren Hollingsworth-Smith is living the dream. Well, maybe not the dream but certainly a dream. She is a published author before even graduating with a degree from Oxford. More specifically, her poetry anthology, Look How Alive, was published earlier this year to great acclaim. Â
Percy Bysshe Shelley managed to have Zastrozzi, his first novel, published during his last term at Eton and prior to his enrolment at Univ. Before he came up, the Romantic hero also squeezed in Original Poetry by Victor and Cazire . To reach for a slightly more recent example, the right-wing pundit, Douglas Murray wrote and released Bosie: A Biography of Lord Alfred Douglas while in his second year at Magdalen â a book which Christopher Hitchens described as âmasterlyâ. Hitchensâ autobiography, Hitch-22, records that his university compadre, James Fenton, was reviewing for the Sunday newspapers even before his 1970 graduation.Â
Following this long precedent, I asked Lauren to describe the experience of having her poetry collection published and she said to me âsurreal and still surrealâ.Â
I inquired into the mechanics of the anthology coming into being. âThe whole thing came about in a very strange wayâ, she told me. âThe publisher contacted me on Twitter after having read a small pamphlet I had published in 2020, messaged me saying âwe really like your workâ and asking if I would be interested in publishing a collectionâ.Â
Obviously, she said yes.Â
Most of the poems were written after Lauren rusticated from Lady Margaret Hall, taking a year out to work as a cleaner and au-pair in France. Look How Alive is preceded by her 2020 anthology entitled She Will Roar and her debut pamphlet Ugly Bird which won the New Poets Prize, judged by Luke Kennard whose own collection, Notes on the Sonnets, was awarded the Forward Prize last year. Â
âSeagullâ appears roughly three-quarters into the collection. Lauren said to me that this poem, which declares âyou do not know grace, stumbling through the air / like a drunkardâ, described the experience of a ânorthern working-class person in somewhere like Oxfordâ. I asked Lauren to expand on her experience of classism in the city. Confined to a small accommodation block, Covid worsened her circumstances, as she explained to me that she was âlumped with people who were a lot different to me in terms of wealth and behaviour and would spend loads of money on fancy foodâ. Particularly difficult were Laurenâs French classes: âour French tutor just expected to understand all these allegories and Greek myths and talked to us in Latinâ – countering many claims of the liberalisation and inclusivity of the university.Â
âI felt out of place.â Â
the choice of form is designed âto convey a sense of powerlessness and being voicelessâ.
Her poem âEmailsâ appears on the page like a set of emails being sent between parties, complete with addressee names and subject headings. The situation slides from âthe fact that you have missed classes and failed to submit workâ to âmore work is required to make progressâ and ultimately, âyou were removed from college in Mayâ. Lauren told me that the choice of form is designed âto convey a sense of powerlessness and being voicelessâ. As some broader context to the poem, she talked about having to go see the crisis team at an Oxford hospital. She commented to me that she has serious objections about how LMH handled the situation. âWithout my consent, my parents were called, told to pick me up and I was told to leave, leave nowâ. Lauren did not necessarily want to go home because of âtensions with familyâ and it not being âa very good environmentâ. Some comments which stuck in her mind as especially cutting were: âyou are a threat to our other studentsâ and âyouâre going to be a distraction for people with examsâ. Â
Lauren critiqued welfare provisions like alpacas or manicures as âvery performativeâ. Her poem âA Touch of the Bluesâ, which has certain lines redacted, makes the same case. Things spiral from âfailed to complete an assignmentâ to âtouch of the bluesâ and âtook his lifeâ. Lauren took inspiration from Raymond Antrobus, who published âDeaf Schoolâ by Ted Hughes with the text redacted. âIt translates the horror of reading that poem and blackout feels like a good method to convey something ineffableâ.Â
There is one organisation without which Lauren would not have enjoyed the literary success she has so far achieved. Aged fifteen, after seeing a poster in her local library, she started attending a writing group called Hive. âI canât sing their praises enough.â Consequently, since going to that initial meeting, she has been working with the same writing mentor, Vicky Morris, also a poet, whose first pamphlet had just been published. Guidance about style or form often bleeds into life advice. âShe knows my inner most thoughtsâ, Lauren said.Â
Â
Lauren Hollingsworth-Smithâs poetry anthology, Look How Alive, is out now.Â