New poetry collection follows recent diagnosis of autism

Alan will read from the book and, in conversation with Naomi Foyle, discuss his literary career, including the impact on his writing of his recent diagnosis of autism. This public event is one in a series presented by the Chichester Centre for Critical and Creative Writing.

Formerly of Brighton, now based in Bognor Regis, Alan has published poetry collections with six UK presses. He was joint winner of the 2018 Bread and Roses Poetry Award and highly commended in the Shelley Memorial Poetry Competition 2022. Alan is also a prolific poetry critic; founding editor of The Recusant and Militant Thistles poetry webzines, and The Recusant imprint, Caparison; and associate editor of arts cooperative Culture Matters.

A spokesman said: “Rag Argonauts (Caparison, 2024) is a collection of erudite and emotionally charged poems. Within its pages, disparate and desperate characters from ancient Greek orator Demosthenes and Swedish artist and mystic Hilma af Klint to T S Eliot and W H Auden navigate ragged waters with fabulous beings including a Stochastic Parrot (AI large language model program) capable of sentient thought, and Harpies-persecuted Phineus of Greek mythology transposed as a benefit claimant preyed upon by the Department for Work and Pensions.”

Dr Foyle praised the book’s combination of innovative and scholarly verse-essays and more personal and affective lyric poems: “Having myself received a late diagnosis of autism, I am hugely looking forward to hearing Alan Morrison read his multifaceted poems and to speaking with him about the relationship between autism, creativity, mysticism, anxiety and depression. Alan’s beautiful, sensitive poetry dismantles the stereotypes that autistic people lack empathy and cannot understand metaphor. Rather, his writing career demonstrates the autistic strengths of perseverance, focus, a keen eye for detail and a powerful sense of justice.

“Autism is also strongly correlated with mysticism and I am also keen to hear more from Alan about his Christian socialist beliefs. Being autistic in a world not designed for neurodivergent people can, of course, be difficult. Rag Argonauts artfully explores the experience of mental distress in relation to sociopolitical precarity and the lives of poets and artists.

“The book will fascinate anyone with an interest in literary history, and has immense relevance to the personal and collective challenges many people, neurodivergent or not, face in Britain today.”

The event is free, and members of the public are welcome. It will be held on Wednesday, October 23, 4pm to 4.50pm in Room E124 on Bishop Otter Campus, Chichester. The room will be signposted on the day.