The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log

Happy National Poetry Day to you all! As I mentioned the other week the Association for Scottish Literary Studies has decided to mark this year’s UK National Poetry Day by asking Glasgow’s delightful Metaphrog to adapt The First Men on Mercury, a science fiction themed poem from the man that I (and a lot of others) would consider the finest living Scottish poet, the very fine Edwin Morgan (who was the first National Makar appointed by the new Scots Parliament, a measure of the respect and affection he is held in). Thousands of copies of the resulting four page, full colour comic adaptation are being given out to school students across Glasgow to mark the day. Comics have been getting used increasingly as a fun and accessible way to encourage more youngsters to read (especially to introduce them to the classics) by teachers and librarians and I’m utterly delighted to see poetry and comics coming together in this way and being shared out with school kids, especially since its often such an uphill struggle to get people to read poetry, which is a huge shame; much as I love well-written prose there are some ideas, feelings and thoughts which are best articulated in verse.

I’m also very happy that Metaphrog and the Association For Scottish Literary Studies have kindly agree to let us post up those pages to share with everyone (thanks, guys!); John and Sandra at Metaphrog, freshly returned from enjoying the Wigtown Book Festival,  tell me that their own site will have a section with more information on the making of the comic, the project and some notes for teachers to use as study aides in the classroom (see here). There’s a nice 50s Sci-Fi feel to the art designs, I think, which I rather appreciate.  Click on the pages below to see the larger size; the text is (c) Edwin Morgan, comics adaptation (c) Metaphrog and ASLS):