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The State of the Prisons

Sinead Morrissey

Cover Picture of The State of the Prisons
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Paperback
ISBN: 978 1 857547 75 7
Categories: 21st Century, Irish, Women
Imprint: Carcanet Poetry
Published: April 2005
216 x 135 x 5 mm
63 pages
Publisher: Carcanet Press
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  •    One day, China met China in the marketplace.
       'How are you, China?' asked China, 'we haven't talked in so long.'
       China answered: 'The things we have to say to one another,
            laid end to end, and side to side,
       would connect the Great Wall with the Three Gorges Valley
            and stretch nine miles up towards the sun.'
       'It's true,' replied China. 'We have a lot to catch up on.'


    from 'China'

    POETRY BOOK SOCIETY RECOMMENDATION

    WINNER OF THE 2005 MICHAEL HARTNETT POETRY AWARD

    SHORT-LISTED FOR THE T.S. ELIOT POETRY PRIZE

    In her third book of poems, Sinéad Morrissey builds on the achievement of her award-winning collection, Between Here and There, by expanding the lyric into new territories and admitting new voices. The theme of imprisonment is variously addressed: in the actual prisons of eighteenth-century Europe; in the prison of our own limited perceptions of experience, particularly of other cultures when abroad; in the prison of the mortal human body itself.
        Alongside the intimate interiors of human relationships, the poems are also interested in broader discourses, particularly history, and range in scope from the Royalist convictions of a woman wearing a Scold's Bridle during England's interregnum, to the story of the number zero. Form and content, as well as the personal and the political, are blended throughout this collection with imagination and consummate skill. As in her previous two books, travel remains a source of inspiration: one exhilarating poem details, in nine 'chapters', a six-thousand-mile train journey across China in which the conflicting faces of a rapidly changing country jostle for space. The collection ends with a compelling act of ventriloquism, as Morrissey recounts, in the first person, the life and works of the great prison reformer John Howard, and details his vision for the moral regeneration of the corrupted human soul.

    'A book of splendours.' - Fiona Sampson, the Irish Times.
    Table of Contents

    Flight

    The Second Lesson of the Anatomists

    Forty Lengths

    Genetics

    Pilots

    Lullaby

    Contrail

    Little House in the Big Woods

    Juist

    China

    The Gobi from Air

    Polar

    On Omitting the Word 'Just' from my Vocabulary

    Advice

    Reading the Greats

    In Praise of Salt

    The Wound Man

    Clocks

    Aunt Sarah's Cupboards and Drawers

    Absences Also

    Icarus

    Forgiveness

    Driving Alone on a Snowy Evening

    Migraine

    The Yellow Emperor's Classic

    Zero

    Stepfather

    The State of the Prisons



    Notes

    Sinéad Morrissey was born in 1972 and grew up in Belfast. She read English and German at Trinity College, Dublin, from which she took her PhD in 2003. Her four collections are There Was Fire in Vancouver (1996), Between Here and There (2002), The State of the Prisons (2005) and Through ... read more
    Awards won by Sinead Morrissey ,      Poetry Book Society Choice for Through the Square Window (2009)
    Winner of UK National Poetry Competition for the poem 'Through the Square Window' (2007)
    Winner of a Lannan Literary Fellowship (2007)
    Poetry Book Society Recommendation for The State of the Prisons (2005)
    Shortlisted for the John Llewellyn Rhys Commonwealth Literature Prize for The State of the Prisons (2005)
    Shortlisted for the Irish Times Poetry Prize for The State of the Prisons (2005)
    Shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize for The State of the Prisons (2005)
    Joint winner of the Michael Hartnett Award for Poetry for The State of the Prisons (2005)
    Shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize for Between Here and There (2002).
    MaCaulay Fellowship (2002)
    Rupert and Eithne Strong Award for Between Here and There (2002).
    An Eric Gregory Award for There Was Fire in Vancouver (1996)
    Patrick Kavanagh Award for Poetry (1990)
    Sinead Morrissey's new collection is impressive in its range of poetic styles and forms: from an epic ballad, to a travelogue, to short and sharp pieces dealing with subjects such as forgiveness and the Troubles, this book shows the skills of an ambitious, curious writer, engaged with the world and with the confidence to try new ways of showing it to us. read more
    The North , Issue 38
    Sinead Morrissey begins her long poem China : '...There read more
    David Boll, Magma 33 , Autumn 2005:
    In The State of the Prisons , Sinead Morrissey writes particularly well about people other than herself, often as narratives. read more
    Robert Potts, The Guardian , 17th December 2005
    Robert Potts rounds up the poetic year
    Ambitious and intelligent poetry published in 2005 also included Sinead Morrissey's The State of the Prisons , in which this talented poet tackles her historical and political material in a sophisticated and vivid fashion. read more
    Polly Clark, Tower Poetry , December 2005
    Sinead Morrissey's new collection is impressive in its range of poetic styles and forms: from an epic ballad, to a travelogue, to short and sharp pieces dealing with subjects such as forgiveness and the Troubles, this book shows the skills of an ambitious, curious writer, engaged with the world and with the confidence to try new ways of showing it to us. read more
    David Morley enjoys the formal risks and subtle linkages in Sinéad Morrisey's The State of the Prisons
    The Guardian , Saturday 1st October 2005
    The whales in Helen's Bay
    Sinéad Morrisey is part of a fascinating new school of poets in Ireland, mostly in their 30s, who take pleasure in the denseness and complexity of language and are driven to test how much the body of a poem can contain. read more
    The Guardian , 1st January 2005
    Pick of the literary highlights of 2005: The State of the Prisons by Sinead Morrissey:
    The young Irish poet Sinead Morrissey's humane but cleareyed explorations of the personal and the political in her previous collections give good reason to look forward to this new book. read more
    Fiona Simpson, The Irish Times , June 2005. read more
    Robert Potts, The Guardian , Books of the Year 2004
    The young Irish poet Sinead Morrissey's humane but clear-eyed explorations of the personal and the political in her previous collections give good reason to look forward to this new book. read more
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