I Am Evidence

Courtney Conrad’s debut I Am Evidence is published by Bloodaxe Books. These powerful poems interrogate the tensions within Caribbean migration, gender-based violence and national politics. Her poetry draws together subversive diasporic imagery, national political commentary and shatteringly personal narrative in its exacting response to the political corruption and violence in Jamaica in the wake of its colonial subjugation under the British Empire. I Am Evidence was the winner of the 2022 Mslexia Women’s Poetry Pamphlet Competition judged by Imtiaz Dharker, and includes some work which won her an Eric Gregory Award in 2022.  I Am Evidence is the winner of the Michael Marks Award 2023.

Reviews

  • "Courtney Conrad is one of the most promising voices to emerge in the British literary world. A voice of affirmation, testimony, survival and revival. The Jamaican spirit of remixing and mashing up English into new and deeper coherences. These poems are evidence of a truth-telling lyrical arrival."

    Raymond Antrobus

  • "Courtney Conrad’s book I Am Evidence is witness to the micro of Jamaica's underclass as it alludes to the macro of Jamaican politics. Throughout the book her identity and culture resonate in the fresh use of nation language which enables a nuanced unspooling of hidden Caribbean narratives. I Am Evidence feels like a new shot in the Caribbean Artist Movement and announces Courtney Conrad as an important voice to watch.”

    Roger Robinson

  • “Here, the body is indeed evidence, testifying with a serrated lyricism seeped in Jamaican vernacular. These cinematic poems examine the interiority of disenfranchised people’s lives as they navigate urban Jamaica. Each poem forms part of a montage chronicling scenes of: Coronation Market, eviction notices, violent neighbours, gunmen, and CCTV footage of kidnapped girls. An environment harsher than the rock pillow and cold concrete of Bob Marley’s Talking blues. These poems converse with Kei Miller’s collection in nearby bushes, while continuing the tradition of Jamaican poets like: Louise Bennett, Jean “Binta” Breeze and Olive Senior who unapologetically empowered the working-class voice. Yet Conrad is forging her own distinctive Jamaican poetic seeped in a literary orality, which enables the witness bearing of: the persevered, the forsaken, the rock bottom, the hold on better must come, all speaking to a fragile existence. Yet these are not downtrodden but celebrated as resilient.”

    Malika Booker

  • “With its striking title alone, Courtney Conrad’s debut pamphlet makes a bold, declarative statement. Placing her Jamaican community at the centre of her poems, she bears clear-eyed witness to a vivid world filled with a cacophony of voices vying for attention. The joys and banalities of island life are apparent, with violence, police corruption and destitution hovering as constant threats. Conrad shrewdly sidesteps poverty porn and exoticised cliches, however, allowing her work to quiver with dissonance and complexity. Braiding patois in and out of her verse, Conrad seamlessly moves between registers, sometimes an omniscient narrator, other times embodying her characters’ myriad perspectives. Conrad’s touch remains light throughout, her images blissfully efficient and cinematic. Commanding, witty, bracingly political yet never didactic, I Am Evidence engages the voice, the body and the intellect in equal measure. Conrad is one of the most dynamic and exciting poets I’ve read in a long, long time.”

    Vanessa Kisuule

  • "These are poems of archive, place and survival which are as bold as they are earnest and insistent on telling the stories of lives often relegated to the domain of footnote, headline and or stereotype. With a fresh voice offering authentic witness, Conrad relays the reality of life in community—there is love here, sitting alongside a pervasive sense of danger, loss, ethical negotiations and the creative ways that individuals and communities find to survive. Conrad writes poems of real feeling and grit with a tenderness that is reflective of who she is in real life. The stories in these poems, the use of language, the vivid imagery, and the innovative forms in poems like Classified all point to the fact I Am Evidence, is a remarkable debut on its own terms that will stick with readers long after the last page."

    Tolu Agbelusi

  • "I Am Evidence employs the poetics of witness to lay bare injustice, poverty and violence with an ease of expression and imagery that is fierce and agile. Each poem contains narratives that speak to power and powerlessness in surprising ways, from the political expediency of ‘stuffing election ballot boxes like spice buns’ to the visceral horror of children ‘leak[ing] like half-open ketchup bottles.’ Each line is meticulous in its execution and infused with symbolism. This debut is firm evidence that we are in the hands of a talented poet, observer and chronicler of the Jamaican and the diasporic experience."

    Keith Jarrett

  • "Courtney Conrad is an exceptional writer. Her poems are utterly alive and completely immersive; they draw you in and leave you breathless. Each poem is a vivid and expertly drawn world which manages to confront and contain so much. These poems are full of struggle but they simmer with vibrance, with beauty, with truth, with care and with an addictive and distinctinve voice."

    Cecilia Knapp

  • "Courtney Conrad's debut hacks out a route to survival through its agility and its music and is unstoppable. The voice is so powerful and individual, it leaps off the page. The poems in this pamphlet speak from a visceral place in the face of political and personal violence. But what Conrad does is make the language itself the means of defiance. This is English remade, remashed. It hacks out a route to survival through its agility and its music and is unstoppable. So, I expect, is this poet."

    Imtiaz Dharker

  • "Courtney Conrad, what an outstanding, original voice! These poems bear (unbearable) testimony and witness. This is work so rooted and yet transportive, utterly transformative."

    Rachel Long

  • "The poems in this pamphlet give fierce witness to the precarity and turmoil of a violent and impoverished Jamaica. The poems are linguistically surefooted, and enriched by a rich, dynamic Jamaican patois; they are also technically incredibly accomplished. Through evocations, classifieds, stories, recipes and witness, we are immersed in the convulsions and mercies of a dangerously unequal society. While these poems bear witness to the most brutal violence, the collection is not without joy, because love is always present at the table. Although the pamphlet is a short form, I Am Evidence has the reach, ambition, structural integrity and humanity of a long novel. This pamphlet is wonderful, dangerous magic."

    The Michael Marks Awards Judges (Fiona Benson, Imogen Cassels, Laura Jansen, Stephen Cleary)

  • “Identity is a key concern in these pamphlets, diversely explored as the poets consider how it is formed, asserted or disrupted. In some the focus is on sidelined cultural identities, reclaiming voice at an intersection of self and other, past and present, culture and society. Others destabilise perceptions of identity, opening up new possibilities within the layers of history and technology. Each poem in Courtney Conrad’s I Am Evidence has breathtaking individual force, and collectively they form a sweeping and viscerally personal montage of belonging and inequality across the UK and Jamaica. The voice threading through the poems is clear, warm and resolute, guiding the reader through explorations of cultural identity, violence and political corruption. Formal richness is interwoven with the texture of everyday life: ‘Snapper’ takes the form of a recipe, while ‘the path of no papers’ is made up of a mother’s instructions on how to evade deportation. The latter poem is shaped as a continuous block of text with no punctuation or line breaks, instead leaving lacunae within the lines. The leaps between instructions evoke a sense of precarity, twist up yuh mouth and twang rip off yuh fahda name and staple a white one before yuh touch di keyboard The poems act as bridges, occupying a rich in-between space by using cinematic imagery and vibrant linguistic interweaving of English with Jamaican patois. Conrad’s skill as a storyteller gives these poems a flesh-and-blood quality of witness bearing. She tells inequality as it is with cutting imagery: ‘He drags her body outside like a mic stand’ (‘Shhh... Gunshot Can Pick Padlock’). ‘Babylon Wah Tun Us Inna Rasta Mouse’ describes the intimacy of a sound system in a garage, ‘sanctuary for slow sways, prayerful eyes, / and ganja’. This sibilant peace is destroyed when ‘Babylon’s batons bash doors their speaky-spokey accents, / turn off this racket’. The final lines are written in Jamaican patois, a perseverance of language that hammers home the brutal reality of racism: ‘If flatten bodies on concrete coulda mek a boat / Babylon’s spit woulda send dem sailing home, long time.’ This pamphlet speaks with both grit and sensitivity for the persevering, for those holding on.“

    S.C. O'Reilly - Poetry Review Spring 2024 issue

In-person Book Launch

Secure your spot for this vibrant event, including a copy of I Am Evidence, and access to a live poetry reading, accompanied by delectable Jamaican treats and beverages. The evening will end with the rhythm of Jamaican street dance, accompanied by a live DJ playing Reggae, Dancehall, and Afro-Beats. Anticipate enriching conversations, author interactions, and chances to acquire signed copies of the book. Save the date, and get ready for an extraordinary literary journey.

Get ready to embark on a literary journey like no other as Courtney Conrad's highly anticipated debut, I Am Evidence, bursts onto the scene, published by the esteemed Bloodaxe Books. Conrad delves into the intricate tapestry of Caribbean migration, weaving together threads of subversive diasporic imagery and incisive national political commentary, crafting verses that pierce through layers of history, pain, and hope. These poems are a vivid reminder of the power of words to inspire change, spark conversations, and bring forth a new dawn of awareness. Due to the first launch being sold out, The Africa Centre decided to add an extra date.

Online Book Launch

I Am Evidence Spotify Playlist

To enhance the experience of the "I Am Evidence" poetry pamphlet, a specially curated Spotify playlist has been crafted. Each poem within the book is thoughtfully paired with a reggae song that served as an inspiration during the writing process. 🎶

You can find this playlist by searching for "I AM EVIDENCE by Courtney Conrad" on Spotify. Enjoy the harmonious fusion of words and music! 📖🎵