Summary
After the appearance of Fleur Adcock’sPoems 1960-2000she wrote no more poems for several years. This cessation coincided with but was not entirely caused by her giving up smoking. When poetry returned to her in 2003 it tended towards a sparer, more concentrated style.Dragon Talk, published in 2010, reflected her continuing preoccupations with family matters and her ambivalent feelings about her native New Zealand.
Her initial inspiration was the letters her father wrote home from E…
Book Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781852248789 |
|---|---|
| ISBN-10: | 1852248785 |
| Author: | Fleur Adcock |
| Publisher: | Bloodaxe Books Ltd |
| Imprint: | Bloodaxe Books Ltd |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Number of Pages: | 64 |
| Release Date: | 30 May 2010 |
| Weight: | 112g |
| Dimensions: | 216mm x 138mm |
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What They're Saying
Critics Review
‘It’s a shock to realise that this is Adcock’s first new collection for a decade; the pin-sharp voice of poems such as “Against Coupling”, “Advice to a Discarded Lover” and “For a Five Year Old” is so essential and recognisable that it’s difficult to know how we’ve done without it for 10 years. Inspired by the letters her father wrote from England, where he was stationed, to his parents in New Zealand during the second world war, this collection returns Adcock to familiar territory: the family, and her own complex feelings towards her native country’ - Sarah Crown, Guardian
About The Author
Fleur Adcock
Fleur Adcock (1934-2024) was born in New Zealand in 1934. She spent the war years in England, returning with her family to New Zealand in 1947. She emigrated to Britain in 1963, working as a librarian in London until 1979. In 1977-78 she was writer-in-residence at Charlotte Mason College of Education, Ambleside. She was Northern Arts Literary Fellow in 1979-81, living in Newcastle, becoming a freelance writer after her return to London. She received an OBE in 1996, and The Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 2006 forPoems 1960-2000(Bloodaxe Books, 2000). In October 2019 Fleur Adcock was presented with the New Zealand Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement in Poetry 2019 by the Rt Hon (now Dame) Jacinda Ardern.
Fleur Adcock published three pamphlets with Bloodaxe:Below Loughrigg(1979),Hotspur(1986) andMeeting the Comet(1988), as well as her translations of medieval Latin lyrics,The Virgin & the Nightingale(1983). She also published two translations of Romanian poets with Oxford University Press,Orient Expressby Grete Tartler (1989) andLetters from Darknessby Daniela Crasnaru (1994). All her other collections were published by Oxford University Press until they shut down their poetry list in 1999, after which Bloodaxe published herPoems 1960-2000(2000), followed byDragon Talk(2010),Glass Wings(2013),The Land Ballot(2015),Hoard(2017) andThe Mermaid’s Purse(2021).Poems 1960-2000andHoardwere Poetry Book Society Special Commendations whileGlass Wingswas a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. Fleur Adcock’sCollected Poemswas published by Bloodaxe Books in hardback and paperback on her 90th birthday, 10 February 2024. This is an expanded edition of theCollected Poemspublished in New Zealand in hardback only by Victoria University Press in 2019. The expanded edition was published simultaneously in New Zealand in paperback only by the same publisher, now known as Te Herenga Waka University Press.
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