Carcanet Press - Tonight the Summer's Over

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Family Business

The boatman stares through million-pock-marked waters,

tapping a cigarette, shying from the rain

in mac and wellies, beneath a London plane

that rustles and drips. He turns and tells his daughter

to bolt the hut. Tonight the summer’s over.

He heaves the skiff to the boatshed, ties the lines

and double-locks the door. She fits a sign:

CLOSED FOR SEESON. They load a battered Land Rover

with cash tin, radio, stools, as fast as they can,

for it’s raining harder. Lightning blanks the dark,

and then they’re away, the wiper thwacking its arc.

She glances at this ordinary man

then shuts her eyes: she’s damp and tired and bored.

He drives more gently. Neither says a word.

The poems in Rory Waterman’s debut collection Tonight the Summer’s Over explore belonging and estrangement with precise resonance. Born in Belfast and brought up in rural Lincolnshire, Waterman turns an unblurred eye on his own childhood, caught between two countries, two cultures, two parents. Yet his poems are never mere autobiography: they are rooted in a broader concern for the inconsistencies of human experience. Tonight the Summer’s Over becomes a book of love and hope: ‘Lift the purest feather from the wreck. / Ignore the seagulls laughing against the sky.’

Navigating

Family Business

Visiting Grandpa

Retrospect

What Passing Bells

Rebirth Island

In the Avenue of Limes

An Email from Your Mother

Two

Growing Pains

1. Distance

2. For My Father

3. Ireland, 10

Access Visit

Seeing Him Off at the Station

Craigmillar Castle at Dusk

Faroe Islands: Notes for Three Photographs

Nettles

Reverdie

Seeing Baby Emrys in Gwynedd

Salisbury, After the Argument

For R.S. Thomas

Coming Home

From a Birmingham Council Flat

Broadland

Where Were You When...

The Outings

A Suicide

West Summerdale Ave

53° 09'33.17" N, 0° 25'33.18" W

To Help the Birds through Winter

The Lake

Shrine for a Young Soldier, Castle Drogo

On Derry City Walls, 1992

Unfolding

Marstrand

Winter Morning, Connecticut

A Wedding Photograph

Back in the Village

Compulsions

The Fields over Winceby Battlefield

Spring Shower, Metheringham Fen

The Beck

Keepsakes

‘You’re a shower of bastards’

Note to Self: Chip Shop Battered Sausage and Other Meat

Stopping for a Moment on Exmoor

Back

Infant

Stranger

Sendai

Fall

Hallowed Turf

The Shipwreck Memorial a Mile from Town

Over the Heath

Out to the Fen

Rory Waterman was born in Belfast in 1981, grew up in rural Lincolnshire, and lives in Nottingham, where he is Senior Lecturer in English at Nottingham Trent University. His first collection of poetry, Tonight the Summer’s Over, was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and was shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney ... read more

'Rory Waterman writes poems of the kind there'll always be a need for poems that require skill to make but don't insist on it, that combine keen-eyed observation and immediately graspable shades of feeling in a memorable way. Waterman's is a very appealing voice, laconic, unillusioned and vulnerable. His world is a recognisable and convincing one, his rueful, sometimes harsh sincerity is palpable, and he deserves to be read by anyone to whom these things still matter.'
Alan Jenkins

Praise for Rory Waterman 'a volume that balances both wit and wisdom'

Kate Noakes, the North

'Waterman's work extends out and beyond any dangerously neat equations or notions of 'home' and 'self'; with him, it is in the settings of Europe's past and future. The reader visits Iceland, Palma's Bellver Castle, Venice, Krujë, the Italian ghost-town Craco, St Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, and in all the travellings we become more and more aware of the precarious fragility of human 'settlements' in all senses.'

Peter Carpenter, Under The Radar

'Waterman is a fine craftsman and this is a thing most needful in the collection's journeyings through 'industrial dereliction' and the painful re-calibrations of a 'post empire' experience. Re-imaginings of spaces for leisure are met by a poet who is at home with formal variations, rhyme and meter.'

Peter Carpenter, Under the Radar
  'The collection is marked by a sense that the world is indifferent to us, both as species and individuals, that time is slippery and fast-moving...For all his often regular metrics and traditional craft, these are not conservative poems... It's a consistently 'political' book.'
Declan Ryan, Poetry London
  'The world is a slightly better place for the existence of this book. I do not write that lightly.'
Peter Pegnall, Ploughshares

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Tonight the Summer's Over Rory Waterman RRP: GBP 9.95 Discount: 10% You Save: GBP 0.99 Price: GBP 8.96 Available This title is available for academic inspection (paperback only). Paperback ISBN: 978 1 847772 07 7 Categories: 21st Century, British, First Collections Imprint: Carcanet Poetry Published: November 2013 216 x 140 x 5 mm 66 pages Publisher: Carcanet Press Also available in: eBook (Kindle), eBook (EPUB) Description Excerpt Author Contents Reviews Family Business The boatman stares through million-pock-marked waters, tapping a cigarette, shying from the rain in mac and wellies, beneath a London plane that rustles and drips. He turns and tells his daughter to bolt the hut. Tonight the summer’s over. He heaves the skiff to the boatshed, ties the lines and double-locks the door. She fits a sign: CLOSED FOR SEESON. They load a battered Land Rover with cash tin, radio, stools, as fast as they can, for it’s raining harder. Lightning blanks the dark, and then they’re away, the wiper thwacking its arc. She glances at this ordinary man then shuts her eyes: she’s damp and tired and bored. He drives more gently. Neither says a word. The poems in Rory Waterman’s debut collection *Tonight the Summer’s Over* explore belonging and estrangement with precise resonance. Born in Belfast and brought up in rural Lincolnshire, Waterman turns an unblurred eye on his own childhood, caught between two countries, two cultures, two parents. Yet his poems are never mere autobiography: they are rooted in a broader concern for the inconsistencies of human experience. *Tonight the Summer’s Over* becomes a book of love and hope: ‘Lift the purest feather from the wreck. / Ignore the seagulls laughing against the sky.’ Navigating Family Business Visiting Grandpa Retrospect What Passing Bells Rebirth Island In the Avenue of Limes An Email from Your Mother Two Growing Pains 1. Distance 2. For My Father 3. Ireland, 10 Access Visit Seeing Him Off at the Station Craigmillar Castle at Dusk Faroe Islands: Notes for Three Photographs Nettles Reverdie Seeing Baby Emrys in Gwynedd Salisbury, After the Argument For R.S. Thomas Coming Home From a Birmingham Council Flat Broadland Where Were You When... The Outings A Suicide West Summerdale Ave 53° 09'33.17" N, 0° 25'33.18" W To Help the Birds through Winter The Lake Shrine for a Young Soldier, Castle Drogo On Derry City Walls, 1992 Unfolding Marstrand Winter Morning, Connecticut A Wedding Photograph Back in the Village Compulsions The Fields over Winceby Battlefield Spring Shower, Metheringham Fen The Beck Keepsakes ‘You’re a shower of bastards’ Note to Self: Chip Shop Battered Sausage and Other Meat Stopping for a Moment on Exmoor Back Infant Stranger Sendai Fall Hallowed Turf The Shipwreck Memorial a Mile from Town Over the Heath Out to the Fen Rory Waterman was born in Belfast in 1981, grew up in rural Lincolnshire, and lives in Nottingham, where he is Senior Lecturer in English at Nottingham Trent University. His first collection of poetry, Tonight the Summer’s Over, was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and was shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney ... read more 'Rory Waterman writes poems of the kind there'll always be a need for poems that require skill to make but don't insist on it, that combine keen-eyed observation and immediately graspable shades of feeling in a memorable way. Waterman's is a very appealing voice, laconic, unillusioned and vulnerable. His world is a recognisable and convincing one, his rueful, sometimes harsh sincerity is palpable, and he deserves to be read by anyone to whom these things still matter.' Alan Jenkins Praise for Rory Waterman 'a volume that balances both wit and wisdom' Kate Noakes, the North 'Waterman's work extends out and beyond any dangerously neat equations or notions of 'home' and 'self'; with him, it is in the settings of Europe's past and future. The reader visits Iceland, Palma's Bellver Castle, Venice, Krujë, the Italian ghost-town Craco, St Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, and in all the travellings we become more and more aware of the precarious fragility of human 'settlements' in all senses.' Peter Carpenter, Under The Radar 'Waterman is a fine craftsman and this is a thing most needful in the collection's journeyings through 'industrial dereliction' and the painful re-calibrations of a 'post empire' experience. Re-imaginings of spaces for leisure are met by a poet who is at home with formal variations, rhyme and meter.' Peter Carpenter, Under the Radar 'The collection is marked by a sense that the world is indifferent to us, both as species and individuals, that time is slippery and fast-moving...For all his often regular metrics and traditional craft, these are not conservative poems... It's a consistently 'political' book.' Declan Ryan, Poetry London 'The world is a slightly better place for the existence of this book. I do not write that lightly.' Peter Pegnall, Ploughshares You might also be interested in: This is Yarrow Tara Bergin Bevel William Letford	Share this... Quick Links Anvil Press Poetry Aspects of Portugal Audio Books Carcanet Classics Carcanet Fiction Carcanet Film Carcanet Poetry FyfieldBooks Lintott Press Lives and Letters OxfordPoets PN Review Sheep Meadow Press The Carcanet Blog Chris Beckett: Ethopian Literature Festival read more Gallop Blog Brackenbury read more 'Disciplines of Experiment': John Wilkinson read more PN Review 245: Editorial read more Setting Sally's Songs read more Nina Bogin: 'Thousandfold' read more
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