Praise
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Outlandish was shortlisted for the John Pollard Foundation International Poetry Prize 2023 and longlisted for the 2023 Michael Murphy Memorial Poetry Prize
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...evocative, beautiful & challenging narrative of British Gypsy ethnicity
– Sam Illingworth, Poetry News
As vivid as engravings, the poems in Jo Clement’s debut collection Outlandish braid together a richness of language & a precision of imagery to illuminate Traveller identity & Roma culture. These are poems of clarity & lyricism that sing of people, places, & the beauty of what is passed down
– Kris Johnson (Poetry Society Books of the Year 2022)
… an exciting new voice in poetry… Clement’s poems ricochet between the council estate in Darlington where she grew up, forced to settle, & the wild beauty of Northumberland, touching on the eighteenth-century wood engravings of Thomas Bewick. The rhythms & allusions are enchanting, the imagery fresh, clear & strong
– Anna Picard, Times Literary Supplement
Illuminating & imaginative, Jo Clement's debut collection, Outlandish, explores the myriad, at times contradictory, perspectives on the much under-represented traveller culture, questioning the social, cultural & class stereotypes around the Gypsy, Roma & Traveller identities
– Jennifer Wong, The Poetry Review
rich, lyrical & beguiling... This is a collection that repays rereading, partly for the musicality, partly for the vivid, economical imagery, & importantly, for the window that it opens on a culture that many of we 'gorgers' think we know about but, in reality, understand very little
– Diana Cant, Alchemy Spoon
…exploring the canon of literature, & the ‘othering’ perpetuated by dominant cultures in contemporary society... every page articulates the truth of the making of this remarkable poet
– Hannah Stone, The Lake
Jo lives in the north east of England, with roots in the Roma Traveller community... Her poetry considers notions of otherness, under-represented identities, communities under threat, & sings of wild beauty & brutality
– The Scotsman, Poem of the Week
'These deeply personal poems are rich with the lexicon of Gypsy, Roma & Traveller life. They bear the weight of suspicion & violence directed towards those who live within the rhythms & currents of the natural world... Many of the poems hold notes of such tenderness, they stop your breath
– Shash Trevett, Poetry Book Society Bulletin, Summer 2022
Jo Clement’s eagerly anticipated first collection, Outlandish is tender, energetic & deeply personal. These careful & intelligent poems are full of musicality & sing with the language & culture of Roma communities. This book is a joy to read & lose yourself in
– Will Mackie, New Writing North (New poetry from the North)
In this collection of poetry, Jo Clement gives voice to the Gypsy, Roma & Traveller community. Her lyrical imagery conjures the beauty of the natural landscapes across which they have lived & travelled. The reader is given insight into their culture & traditions, & the skills that are passed from generation to generation... This collection would be an ideal collection to broaden A Level students' experience of reading poetry that explores identity & ethnicity, & the life experiences that help shape, develop, & define culture
– Jane Broadis, The School Librarian
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Jo Clement writes in response to Gypsy, Roma, Traveller communities & to outsiders' dehumanising of the Roma. I loved this book for its sense of celebration, for its language, imagination & deep connection to the wild
– Katrina Naomi, Short & Sweet (Outlandish: Recommended Read for May 2024)
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Here is delight – these poems, rich and strange, brim from ‘the skim/of blood that can’t settle’. Jo Clement’s gifts shine and dazzle: amongst the darting, many-layered music of her imagery and sensuous evocation of northerly landscapes gleams a clear-sightedness politically aware and historically acute. Meaning is interrogated as a riverine process and emerges, movingly, in significances found later. Part urban fable, part re-imagining of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller culture, these poems are beautifully made to be read and re-read, savoured for their sharp, apple-bite tenderness, their truth and wisdom, their sheer originality
– Pippa Little
Jo Clement writes poems of wonderful imagination, energy, & adventure, combining her magical intelligence with a brilliantly orchestrated language drawn from the words of the Roma & the worlds through which they invisibly travel
– David Morley
It is very rare to find a young poet with such an alert musical ear, able to listen ahead for the shape of a sound yet to be uttered
– Sean O’Brien
This is the word of the weathered hand & of the hard, hale youth; the tattered treasure, the grafter & the fetter-breaking wild. These intoxicating & fine-sprung poems instantly place Clement in the front rank of Traveller writers. May they also relight our wonder at the depths of all unsung Englands
– Damian Le Bas
