Cynan Jones has a light touch with painful and ugly truths, as illustrated in his latest novel, The Dig. At the heart of this short work set in rural Wales is the intense desire for an elusive harmony, for which the principal characters search in very different ways. The themes of The Dig are isolation Read More
The back cover of Marianne Morris’s The On All Things Said Moratorium, instead of the usual editorial blurb, presents a statement. The poet refers to how language shapes the way we think and the manners in which we structure our lives, culture and society, adding: “the specific, intentional, and pointed use of language may also Read More
There is something compelling about the recent spate of texts that employ cartography or walking as a trope for addressing how we inhabit our environments: finding the rhythms of place and space, marking your body in relation not only to the world around you but also to physical, textual and figural ‘others’ that have traversed Read More
This is an edited transcript of Lindsay Macgregor in conversation with Robert Alan Jamieson for DURA conducted at the Dundee Literary Festival, 23 October 2013. The full audio recording can be heard by clicking on the video image. LM: Well, good afternoon everybody and welcome to Dundee University Review of the Arts. We’re very Read More
There is no shortage of books written on the subject of Hollywood and its relationship with World War Two, nor is there a lack of material on the lives and work of the period’s most prominent filmmakers. Titles such as Thomas Doherty’s Projections of War examine the film industry’s involvement in the war effort, covering Read More
Published in 2013, the year which saw Michael Symmons Roberts’ Drysalter justly lauded, The Lost Boys bears a warm endorsement from Les Murray. However, Penelope Shuttle’s claim on the cover of the collection that Victoria Field is “that rare avis, the religious poet” rings somewhat hollow. Shuttle is on surer ground with “Place is the Read More
The author of this intimate collection is well-known American feminist poet and essayist Katha Pollitt. Following on from her previous works, The Mind/Body Problem maintains a note of social criticism, although here it is subdued by the more private and urgent theme of nostalgia for things and times passed. Divided into three parts – “The Read More
indwelling is the sixth collection of poems Gillian Allnutt has produced for Bloodaxe. It is a collection of understated beauty: sparse, yet refined and eloquent, yielding the consistent impression of a quiet voice speaking steadfast words. The collection divides into three main parts: “Boxted”, “Stoup”, and “Steppe”. “Boxted” begins with a number of delicately descriptive Read More
In something of a Carter-esque vein, Kirsty Logan’s debut collection of modern fairy tales, The Rental Heart and Other Stories, includes both tales of her own invention and seeks to add new flavour to old stories. Each short story presents the reader with an immersive fantastical world through which they may journey: the land of Read More