FINAL
Written, edited and published
December 2023
"Well, that's me done.
It's been equal parts stressful
and satisfying to produce
12 pamphlets in as many months.
This 'final' one contains 24
of my pieces from three
half/marathon workshops
with Bullion Hall Writers,
Waddington Street Writers
and Washington Writers.
Thanks to everyone
who wrote with me
this month." - S.U.
28-page stapled pamphlet
gloss cover, pale green endpaper
£4.00 plus £1.50 postage
Ian McMillan, The Verb, BBC Radio 3
‘With poems as energetic as their performer, this collection bursts off the page. These pieces are crammed together in the best way possible: this is lively, it’s loud, it’s wild, it’s tumultuous. Somehow, Steve has managed to publish a gig, but it’s so much more emotionally complex than that. Steve has real range. It really is quite a stand-out collection. This book matters.’
Sophia Walker, BBC Poetry Slam Champion
Five Star Review of the book HERE
PENULTIMATE
Written, edited and published
November 2023
This booklet gives an insight
into the difficulty of keeping going
when a regional bus strike
makes getting around as a
freelance writing facilitator
a bit tricky.
Also contains dreams,
Death Cult '8323' YouTube gig notes,
attending a Goth book event,
thoughts on making a will,
a rhyming blues inspired by
a mobile phone alarm,
a Fury gig at Trillians rock bar
amongst other things.
48-page stapled pamphlet
£5.00 plus £2.00 postage
If you liked Steve Urwin’s
'MY DARK MATTER'
you’ll love his ‘QUEASY, UNEASY’
24-page pamphlet containing poetry and prose
Available late October 2023
(Just in time for Halloween)
£3.00
plus
£1.25 (1st class)
or 85p (2nd Class) postage
DM Steve / Talking Pen to order
Private Message Steve for Payment Options
SEPTEMBER SCRAPBOOK
20-page word processed, laser printed,
stapled pamphlet with heavy gloss cover
80gsm pages, blue heavy stock endpaper
Contains short fictions
and other prose fragments
Written and published September 2023
£3.00 (free postage)
BIG OLD LEFT TOE
49pp word processed, laser printed
stapled booklet with heavy gloss cover
80 gsm pages, Canson plum endpaper
containing edited extracts from morning pages
Written and published August 2023
£5.00 plus £1.50 postage
Soon will come thunder
48 pages, kraft card cover and heavy stock endpaper.
Stapled, handmade perzine-style volume of handwritten
and typewritten journals, poems and morning pages.
Written and published July 2023
£4.00 plus £1.75 postage
"POINTS OF ENGAGEMENT"
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Journal entries and Poems
44pp. Glossy card cover. Brown endpaper.
Written and Published June 2023
£5.00 plus £2.00 postage
thirteen days in May
booklet by Steve Urwin
52 pages, mottled black endpaper,
hand lettered wine cover
written and published May 2023
£3.00 plus £1.75 postage
Thirteen days in May is a hastily assembled hotchpotch of
scribbles from various notebooks.
It contains preparatory notes on attempting to get house and
body in better shape; some positives and negatives from the daily round
inspired by a ‘thumbs-up-thumbs down’ newspaper clipping; first drafts from a
Waddington Street Centre writing session plus a fictional short story about a
bicycle.
Two full morning pages entries reflect on workshop activity
and 34 years of putting pen to paper respectively. There is a thumbnail outline
of a writing taster session with exercise examples.
The booklet ends with a justification for DIY publishing.
All content is in the author’s own handwriting.
BULLET YOUR WHOLE DAY
Monograph by Steve Urwin
16 pages, black endpaper, light blue
cover
Written and published April 2023
£2.00 including postage
Tiny Tales by Steve Urwin
22 mini fictions
30pp A7 pamphlet
Handmade by the Author
Written and published March 2023
£2.00 (postage free)
22 mini fictions
30pp A7 pamphlet
Handmade by the Author
Written and published March 2023
£2.00 (postage free)
"This Isn't A Story About An Octopus"
Prose pieces and poems.
30pp pamphlet, approx A5.
Handmade by the author.
Wriiten and published February 2023.
£3.00 (postage free)
"A Warm Space" - observations, opinions, mini fictions and prose poetry. 50pp chunky chapbook, approx A5 on 120gsm paper, hand-sewn and inked by the author. Written and published January 2023.
£5.00 (plus £2.00 postage)
It's an icy trek to Consett library to freewrite the world into uneasy coherence/ It's a trip down memory lane that ends touching the Void before re-routing to trial bike Nirvana via thoughts on Madonna's comeback tour/ It's a thumbs-up to Samuel Beckett/ It's Goth-tinged kitchen sink vignettes/ It's unmistakably this time, this place, this winter of deprivation and coming catastrophe and sleepwalking to the Abyss hoping someone's Doc Martens hold us on the Edge/ It's possibly the right device to drive a stake through the demonic heart of Tory government and nail it to the crossroads before waving a peanut butter and orange marmalade sandwich in victory salute.
Favourite lines:
'She gave him the Necronomicon/ He gave her IT for dummies..../ Their friends give them six months.'
I give him at least a century and a half and classic status.
Buy the booklet from Talking Pen and read the Blog.
– Ann Porro
Contains poems, graphics, flash fiction, journal entries, rants and morning pages. All 2020 material. Handmade in a perzine (personal zine) style. A6 copier paper, black endpaper, sturdy pale blue
card cover.
£3 plus £1 postage (UK). PayPal : steveurwin@talktalk.net
ANOMALIES 1989-2014
HANDMADE HARDBACK BOOK
Anomalies is a 26-year retrospective which includes direct reproductions of poems and vignettes from magazines, alongside essays and flash fiction. None of it has previously been collected in book form.
Anomalies also contains a selection of colour photographs plus handwritten, word processed and typewriter journal entries.
ANOMALIES 1989-2014 is available in two versions:
1) Standard 152-page (incl 8 pages of colour photographs) hardback. Handmade to order on gloss white 100 gsm paper - £20
2) Deluxe kettle-stitched 420-page (incl 16 pages of colour photographs) hefty hardback. Handmade to order (15 to 20 hours labour per book) on asorted coloured paper stock, hand fed through a home laser printer - £50
Anomalies isn't 'published' in the conventional sense. No two 'copies' will be exactly the same - content varying slightly for each assembly.
The recipient's name will be printed on verso and dedication pages.
Message Steve for more details.
Production photo album HERE
‘Steve Urwin’s work has a winning combination of humour and deep, deep emotion; here are ordinary lives and ordinary places with all their extraordinary and multifaceted diversity. Poetry can be a map to live by, and Steve Urwin is an expert cartographer.’
Ian McMillan, The Verb, BBC Radio 3
‘With poems as energetic as their performer, this collection bursts off the page. These pieces are crammed together in the best way possible: this is lively, it’s loud, it’s wild, it’s tumultuous. Somehow, Steve has managed to publish a gig, but it’s so much more emotionally complex than that. Steve has real range. It really is quite a stand-out collection. This book matters.’
Sophia Walker, BBC Poetry Slam Champion
Five Star Review of the book HERE
So Much for the Sunshine
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Shades of Grey is a brooding collection of prose vignettes, diary entries and nightmarish reveries from one of the most prolific spoken word artists in the North East. Cover art by Stephen J. Clark.
Review
Hypomaniac
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Facebook message for info / options
Milking a Joe Brainard Riff
£4.00 OUT OF PRINT
HANDMADE HARDBACK BOOK
Anomalies is a 26-year retrospective which includes direct reproductions of poems and vignettes from magazines, alongside essays and flash fiction. None of it has previously been collected in book form.Anomalies also contains a selection of colour photographs plus handwritten, word processed and typewriter journal entries.
ANOMALIES 1989-2014 is available in two versions:
1) Standard 152-page (incl 8 pages of colour photographs) hardback. Handmade to order on gloss white 100 gsm paper - £20
2) Deluxe kettle-stitched 420-page (incl 16 pages of colour photographs) hefty hardback. Handmade to order (15 to 20 hours labour per book) on asorted coloured paper stock, hand fed through a home laser printer - £50
Anomalies isn't 'published' in the conventional sense. No two 'copies' will be exactly the same - content varying slightly for each assembly.
The recipient's name will be printed on verso and dedication pages.
Message Steve for more details.
Production photo album HERE
Ian McMillan, The Verb, BBC Radio 3
‘With poems as energetic as their performer, this collection bursts off the page. These pieces are crammed together in the best way possible: this is lively, it’s loud, it’s wild, it’s tumultuous. Somehow, Steve has managed to publish a gig, but it’s so much more emotionally complex than that. Steve has real range. It really is quite a stand-out collection. This book matters.’
Sophia Walker, BBC Poetry Slam Champion
Five Star Review of the book HERE
So Much for the Sunshine
Facebook message for info / options
Handwritten book containing journal entries, fictional prose, writing marathon vignettes, NaPoWriMo poems and performance pieces, all 2012 material. Spined paperback, cream pages, orange endpaper. Cover illustration by Stephen J. Clark.
The above title is a standard edition. The original deluxe limited edition (sold out) of fifty handmade copies had parchment pages, heavy cardstock cover, dust jacket and hand-lettered slipcover.
Sample poem
Handwritten book containing journal entries, fictional prose, writing marathon vignettes, NaPoWriMo poems and performance pieces, all 2012 material. Spined paperback, cream pages, orange endpaper. Cover illustration by Stephen J. Clark.
The above title is a standard edition. The original deluxe limited edition (sold out) of fifty handmade copies had parchment pages, heavy cardstock cover, dust jacket and hand-lettered slipcover.
Sample poem
Shades of Grey
ISBN 978-1-906700-56-0
Red Squirrel Press 2011
ISBN 978-1-906700-56-0
Red Squirrel Press 2011
Facebook message for info / options
Shades of Grey is a brooding collection of prose vignettes, diary entries and nightmarish reveries from one of the most prolific spoken word artists in the North East. Cover art by Stephen J. Clark.
Review
Hypomaniac
ISBN 978-1-906700-14-0
Facebook message for info / options
"Unrelenting, honest and told with great economy, this is a very fine collection indeed."
- DP, The Crack (Book of the Month, September 2009)
- DP, The Crack (Book of the Month, September 2009)
"Steve's poetry performances are filled with a frenetic, angry, joyful energy which pervades the pages of Hypomaniac.
"There are also beautiful moments of detached observation and hyper-realism here too. These poems speak to the 'obsessed, the depressed, the dispossessed' but they also speak to everyone interested in the states of mind that we sometimes own, and that sometimes own us.
'Thank your lucky stars for endurance' he says. I say, thank our lucky stars for someone who endures and writes this well about it."
"There are also beautiful moments of detached observation and hyper-realism here too. These poems speak to the 'obsessed, the depressed, the dispossessed' but they also speak to everyone interested in the states of mind that we sometimes own, and that sometimes own us.
'Thank your lucky stars for endurance' he says. I say, thank our lucky stars for someone who endures and writes this well about it."
- Kate Fox, BBC Radio 4
Read a poem
Tightrope Walker
ISBN 978-0-946980-77-2
Redbeck Press 2001
Facebook message for info / options
“Invisible struggles are documented with detached astonishment. There's the sense that expression is always on the edge of exhaustion yet some poignant bliss is suddenly found in the banal. The commonplace glows with a secret and fleeting wonder.”
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Sample poem
There Are Easier Ways of Living than Bleeding to Death
“There Are Easier Ways of Living than Bleeding to Death” was written in 1991 and printed in a private edition of just 25 perfect bound copies in January 1992 by Griffin Print in my hometown of Consett. A few copies were bought by family and friends, some were placed in Newcastle Waterstones and Forbidden Planet and eventually sold, one or two gifted or borrowed and never returned and that was the end of it.
I followed up the book with a slim pamphlet “Reflecting Hurt” – then spent years writing poems that would become my first official full-length collection, “Tightrope Walker”, published by Redbeck Press in 2001.
Last year my girlfriend requested that I ‘knock up’ a copy of “…Easier Ways…” as a Christmas present to complete her collection of my titles and, being the ever dutiful partner, I happily obliged.
Raw and existential in outlook, and ever so slightly influenced by Henry Rollins and Charles Bukowski, the book was written whilst grinding myself down to the bone in a giftware distribution centre for a criminally low hourly rate. It contains forty-two pieces of free verse and three prose poems – including the untitled one often referred to as “i ran barefoot…” which has closed many of my readings over the years and was performed at two poetry slams that I won in 2011. A number of the pieces appeared in reputable small press magazines when the book was no longer available.
I have always resisted the temptation to reissue “…Easier Ways…” but recently I decided that if ever it should have a wider circulation than just over two dozen copies, then the twentieth anniversary of its original release would probably be the right time to gain a few more readers.
The reissue is assembled from reproductions of the sixty original master pages that were set in Prestige 1012 on a Brother AX140 electronic typewriter. Hand stitched, pink endpapers and bound with the red Stephen J. Clark illustrated cover from the initial print run.
This book is made to order.
Reflecting Hurt
ISBN 0 9524155 0 X
Talking Pen 1994
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Early pamphlet containing 'Gutter Man' and 'The Picture'
Handmade 16 page A6 chapbook
Talking Pen 2014
£2.00 plus 75p postage
paypal.me/TalkingPen
Facebook message for info / options
Published for National Poetry Day 2014. A poem in 13 parts on the theme of remembering. Laser printed parchment card pages, beige grained vinyl endpaper, sturdy brown cover hand lettered in gold ink.
Dark Matter 5
ISSN 2053-2601
£4.00 OUT OF PRINT
This is a double-header chapbook featuring prose poems and flash fiction alongside the poetry of Catherine Ayres.
MY DARK MATTER
Steve Urwin Handmade Limited Edition Pamphlet (31 Copies)
Published by Talking Pen October 2018
Contains vignettes and prose poems
20pp on 140gsm cartridge paper.
Canson Burgundy endpaper.
420gsm black cover, red print.
Hand-sewn with embroidery thread.
£4.00 plus £1.50 postage
(Paypal: steveurwin@talktalk.net)
Published by Talking Pen October 2018
Contains vignettes and prose poems
20pp on 140gsm cartridge paper.
Canson Burgundy endpaper.
420gsm black cover, red print.
Hand-sewn with embroidery thread.
£4.00 plus £1.50 postage
(Paypal: steveurwin@talktalk.net)
(Previously published by The Black Light Engine Room Press
with poems by Catherine Ayres)
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