Autumn Poetry Recommendations 2023
Selected by the Bookshop
Loads of good new poetry has come into the shop in the last few weeks. Marvellous pamphlets from David Hackbridge Johnson and Courtney Conrad; a selection of James Tate (which I was pleased to see contained my two favourite Tate poems, 'I Am a Finn' and 'I Am Still a Finn', as well as much else which was new to me); Amy Acre's super debut collection Mothersong; Seamus Heaney's collected translations, in a much more manageable and affordable paperback edition; and a second collection from Andrew Wynn Owen, Infinite in Finite, so far (one month and a bit to go) my favourite book of the year - wise and silly at the same time, and with a command of prosody which would have made Auden jealous. He would have loved it and I do too.
From the publisher:
‘A huge book, an immense book. Such adventure and variety, such industry, such subjugation of self.’ Michael Hofmann, TLSHeaney not only translated classic works of Latin and Old English but also poems from a great number…
From the publisher:
A lyrical excavation of trauma and healing in the midst of early motherhood - the debut work of an endlessly inventive poet whose work 'fizzes with energy, physicality, and the levitating openness of song' (Rebecca Tamás)'An…
From the publisher:
Felicien Rops (1833-1898) was a Belgian artist, primarily a print-maker. He was a friend of Baudelaire, Gautier, Mallarme and Peladan. His work - symbolist and decadent in tone - retains its shock value over a century later. In a sequence…
From the publisher:
Winner of the Mslexia Women's Poetry Pamphlet Competition 2022Courtney Conrad’s powerful work interrogates the tensions within Caribbean migration, gender-based violence and national politics. Migrating from Kingston as a…
From the publisher:
Infinite in Finite develops the inimitable style of The Multiverse, the author's first collection (2018), praised as showing 'some of the best technical skills of any living poet', the work of 'one who is not afraid of big subjects, whose…
From the publisher:
Hell, I Love Everybody: 52 Poems by James Tate re-introduces the poet, providing a poem for every week of the year, every mood and season. It includes work from his first publication, The Lost Pilot, a Yale Younger Poets selection (1967)…