![]() Quote of the Day
an admirable concern to keep lines open to writing in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and America.
Seamus Heaney
|
|
Book Search
Subscribe to our mailing list
|
|
The ReasonerJeffrey Wainwright![]() 10% off all versions
Categories: 21st Century, British
Imprint: Carcanet Poetry Publisher: Carcanet Press Available as: Paperback (80 pages) 9781847771469 £9.95 £8.96 eBook (EPUB) Needs ADE! 9781847776785 £9.95 £8.96 eBook (Kindle) 9781847776792 £9.95 £8.96 To use the EPUB version, you will need to have Adobe Digital Editions (ADE) installed on your device. You can find out more at https://www.adobe.com/uk/solutions/ebook/digital-editions.html. Please do not purchase this version if you do not have, or are prepared to install, Adobe Digital Editions.
In a series of ninety-five poems we listen to ‘the Reasoner’, a voice that is by turns ardent, despairing and comic. Petty obsessions rub against attempts at philosophical seriousness; vernacular expression vies with an intent deliberation. Above all, the Reasoner is worried. He has cherished the notion that, with thought and study, the world may be understood. But the world remains recalcitrant, elusive even in simple things like the trickeries of light on a spider’s web. Language plays tricks, although it may be as complete as we can manage. History proposes and disposes of its patterns. Behind all this there may be a ‘hidden order’ – and that is both a hope and a fear.
Does God help us to understand any of this? Does Art? Is the ‘soul’ a sanctuary? The Reasoner, the reader, ‘smiles ruefully and soldiers on’, ‘for this is not a wicked but a hard world, / and people struggle, without a scheme of things, / and deserve release.’
Awards won by Jeffrey Wainwright
Short-listed, 2017 Arnold Bennett Book Prize (What Must Happen )
Praise for Jeffrey Wainwright
'In Wainwright's philosophising lies a questioning, experimental and playful essence hidden in household objects, imaginary ships and childhood homes [...] As Best We Can contains delicate balances'
Ben Ray, Oxford Review of Books 'There are some lovely individual poems here, like 'Spring Walk', 'Seascape' and 'The Window-Ledge'. But best are the poems of loss and change, about growing up in the Potteries after the War' Andy Croft, The Morning Star 'Many of these quiet poems have a disproportionately unsettling effect... This is work that comes from slow attention, proper effort and commitment to understanding.' Steve Hanson, Manchester Review of Books 'What Must Happen is at once a lyrical meditation on the nature of history and on ourselves as perceiving subjects in a world of objects and other species. It ranges confidently across different geographies and societies from working lives in Josiah Wedgewood's Etruria in the Potteries to the example of the Eternals: Jupiter, Venus, and Apollo. Combining sinuous intelligence with humanity and compassion, Jeffrey Wainwright's latest collection puts him at the forefront of contemporary English poets.' John Whale 'Jeffrey Wainwright's work is among the most interesting of any poet now writing' The Guardian
You might also be interested in:
|
Share this...
Quick Links
Carcanet Celebrates 50 Years!
Anvil Press Poetry
Aspects of Portugal
Audio Books
Carcanet Classics
Carcanet Fiction
Carcanet Film
Carcanet Poetry
FyfieldBooks
Lintott Press
Little Island Press
Lives and Letters
OxfordPoets
PN Review
Sheep Meadow Press
The Carcanet Blog
New Poetries VIII: Sinad Morrissey on Conor Cleary
read more
The Earliest Witnesses: G.C. Waldrep
read more
Conor Cleary: NPVIII: Meet the Contributor
read more
New Poetries VIII: Tara Bergin on Suzannah V. Evans
read more
Suzannah V. Evans: NPVIII: Meet the Contributor
read more
New Poetries VIII: Andrew Wynn Owen on Tristram Fane Saunders
read more
![]() |
![]() We thank the Arts Council England for their support and assistance in this interactive Project.
|
|
This website ©2000-2021 Carcanet Press Ltd
|