Blog Archives

Challenging, touching, persuading, Janet Hughes

How I Get Ready
Ashleigh Young
Victoria University Press, $25.00,
ISBN 978176562367

The Dangerous Country Of Love And Marriage
Amy Leigh Wicks
Auckland University Press, $25.00,
ISBN 9781869408978

To The Occupant
Emma Neale
Otago University Press, $28.00,
ISBN 9781988531687

Judging a book by its cover would not be a cliché or a hazard, if so much design talent did not go into trying to make us do exactly that. Who, faced with a display of new books, has not followed the urging of the eye, probably at the expense of worthy competitors?

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Listening for the voice, Janet Hughes

Coming to it: Selected Poems
Sam Hunt
Potton and Burton, $30.00,
ISBN 9780947503802

Poeta: Selected and New Poems
Cilla McQueen
Otago University Press, $40.00,
ISBN 9781988531281

Watching for the Wingbeat: New and Selected Poems
Pat White
Cold Hub Press, $40.00,
ISBN 97804734444204

A “Selected Poems” doesn’t confer quite the accolade of a collected, with its connotations of canonisation. But the poet is more likely to have a hand in shaping it, and to be around to enjoy it; it is more likely to privilege reading pleasure; and it’s simply more likely to happen. Back when publishers were powerful arbiters and gatekeepers, a selected poems affirmed a career and a reputation. Now that there are more gates and fewer keepers, the fact of a selected probably carries less freight.

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Prodding the boundaries, Janet Hughes

Work 
Sarah Jane Barnett,
Hue & Cry Press, $25.00, ISBN 9780473333331

Tender Machines 
Emma Neale
Otago University Press, $25.00, ISBN 9781927322345

Soundings of Hellas 
John Davidson,
Steele Roberts, $20.00, ISBN 9781927242957

Looking out to Sea
Kevin Ireland
Steele Roberts, $20.00, ISBN 9781927242926

I’m looking at another pile of rich, rewarding collections of poetry, looking for commonalities so that I can do them some kind of justice in the allotted space. I see that Emma Neale glosses her title by quoting two poets who likened a poem to a machine. Don Paterson is deprecatory: a poem is “just a little machine for remembering itself”; while William Carlos Williams throws the possibilities wide open with another craftily small claim: “A poem is a small (or large) machine made of words”.

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Raw edges of wonder, Janet Hughes

The Hill of Wool Jenny Bornholdt Victoria University Press, $25.00, ISBN 9780864736529   Thicket Anna Jackson Auckland University Press, $24.99, ISBN 9871869404826   Aloe Diana Bridge Auckland University Press, $24.99, ISBN 98718669404413   The Leaf Ride Dinah Hawken Victoria University

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Stitches in time, Janet Hughes

The Blind Singer Chris Price Auckland University Press, $24.99, ISBN 9781869404338 Vivid Familiar Stephanie de Montalk Victoria University Press, $25.00, ISBN 9780864735980 The Tram Conductor’s Blue Cap Michael Harlow Auckland University Press, $24.99, ISBN 9781869404307 Pocket Edition Geoff Cochrane Victoria

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Hymns, history and haemorrhoids, Janet Hughes

Three Regrets and a Hymn to Beauty Ian Wedde Auckland University Press, $22.00, ISBN 1869403495 Afternoon of an Evening Train Gregory O’Brien Victoria University Press, $21.99, ISBN 9864735014 Oooooo…..!!! Hone Tuwhare Steele Roberts, $24.95, ISBN 1877338699 Footfall Brian Turner Godwit,

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Taking to the air, Janet Hughes

Rosalie Gascoigne: Plain Air City Gallery/Victoria University Press, $49.95, ISBN 0864734727 As I shelved Rosalie Gascoigne: Plain Air among my treasured collection of exhibition catalogues, it set me thinking about the reasons we buy catalogues, and the various pleasures they

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Posted in Art, Non-fiction, Review

Eczema and ampersands, Janet Hughes

Sing-song  Anne Kennedy Auckland University Press, $24.95, ISBN 1869402952 Electric Yachts Tony Beyer Puriri Press, $26, ISBN 0908943253 Nonsense Nick Ascroft Victoria University Press, $24.95, ISBN 0864734514 Imagine a sequence of 80-odd poems centred on a case of eczema. That’s

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The traffic in perceptions, Janet Hughes

Talking Pictures: Selected Poems Riemke Ensing HeadworX, $26.95, ISBN 0473068044 The cover of Riemke Ensing’s latest collection sends mixed typographic signals. You read Selected Poems first, at the top; but it’s in italic, and grey, so it defers to the

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Down memory lane, Bernadette Hall

Axis: Poems & Drawings Cilla McQueen Otago University Press, $34.95, ISBN 1877276065 The Sky’s Enormous Jug Jan Kemp Puriri Press, $24.00, ISBN 0908943199 Stairdancing Janet Hughes Wai-te-ata Press, $24.95, ISBN 1877159077 It was a rather odd experience writing this particular

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