The Marks on the Map
Brian Johnstone is far too well-known a figure in the Scottish poetry scene to require any potted biography here. That said, which Brian Johnstone will you meet in The Marks on the Map, his most recent collection?
Acres of Light
Its hazy beauty strangely keeps it new, helps you forget the damage or the why. On sunny days, the mountain turns quite blue – this lumened place you dream of coming to. Hauntingly beautiful, Katherine Gallagher’s Acres of Light is steeped in lyricism. It is observant, evocative, and is above all, a celebration of Read More
Subterranea
Jos Smith’s Subterranea is a poetry collection of vivid illustrations for searching imaginations. The poems explore and expand, the intimate space between internal and external landscapes. While it often focuses on specific settings, the collection in its entirety is about the pilgrimage from one reality to another. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines the “Subterranean” as both Read More
A Landscape Blossoms Within Me
Eeva Kilpi (translated by Donald Adamson) (Arc Publications, 2014); pbk, £9.99 Eeva Kilpi has herself remarked that her works have three main themes: the evacuation from Karelia where she was born, relationships and nature. These themes are prominent in A Landscape Blossoms Within Me, which consists of 70 poems chronologically arranged and meticulously translated from Read More
Self-portrait with a swarm of bees
Jan Wagner, translated by Iain Galbraith (Arc Publications, 2015); pbk, £10.99 In his introduction to this collection, Iain Galbraith notes that “a poem, we might hazard, is a highly sophisticated instrument for the measurement of, and ingress to, the real in all its dimensions.” This maxim exudes aptness, especially when applied to the wonderful variety Read More
Come to Me
“Ergo bibamus, my prince, we stole an entire country like one empty heart.” Latvian poet, Kārlis Vērdiņš (born in 1979) has already been anthologised in Arc’s Six Latvian Poets (2011, also translated by Ieva Lešinska) but with four full poetry collections, a career encompassing criticism, translation, song lyrics, libretti and more, he is both versatile Read More
Those April Fevers
Those April Fevers is the perfect fit for anyone looking for a collection of diverse poems that is far from conventional poetry associated with continuous meter and schematic rhymes. Mary O’Donnell produces exquisite, elegant and colourful poems, open to any field or subject. This expansiveness is also represented in her approach to genres: not only Read More
Inside Voices, Outside Light
Sigurður Pálsson is an established poet in his home country of Iceland, having won the Icelandic Literary Prize in 2008. He has built up a considerable reputation in France, which earned him both the title of Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1990, and Chevalier de l’Ordre National du Mérite in 2007. Read More
While I Am Drawing Breath
Rosalie Beatrice Scherzer was born in 1901 in Czernowitz to German-speaking Jewish parents. Having studied literature and philosophy at the city’s university, she emigrated to the US in 1921 with Ignaz Ausländer, her future husband. Although she was divorced from Ausländer after only three years of marriage, she is still best known as Rose Ausländer. Read More
Dancing in Odessa
I was born in the city named after Odysseus and I praise no nation – to the rhythm of snow an immigrant’s clumsy phrases fall into speech. Ilya Kaminsky is an immigrant but in this his first full collection his phrasing is anything but clumsy. Born in Odessa, his family was granted US asylum in Read More