Literature, book reviews and thoughts on wonderful authors
Hold on tightly; let go lightly: ‘Song, after an Abortion’ by Diane DiPrima
The above phrase, “Hold on tightly; let go lightly” was spoken by the spiritual teacher, writer and thinker Ram Dass. But this quotation is one I have not heard first hand: it was quoted to me from a podcast. Somehow, I would like to keep it this way: language can gain resonance through the second-hand…
Floating through Tides: a new, formless existence
Sara Freeman’s construction of a fragmented, formless and at times empty world in Tides (2022) is filled with a buoyant lyricism that keeps the prose moving in a manner resembling its title. Each page is its own lyrical segment, chapter-less and unique; a tribute to a woman drifting, purposefully, out to sea. It is this…
Philip Larkin: the poet and person who dulls and shocks
Delving into the critical quagmire of Philip Larkin’s reception as a poet, and a very controversial person, is at once time-consuming and shocking. Prior to reading John Sutherland’s biography of Larkin’s wife, Monica Jones, Philip Larkin and Me (2021), I had no idea whatsoever of the couple’s abhorrent racism, anti-Semitism and misogyny. Towards the end…
Fake deaths: Shakespeare’s and Will Kemp’s co-authorship
Although it was rare for playwrights to have much control over casting in the 1590s, Shakespeare’s role as a sharer in the Lord Chamberlain’s Men and his likely involvement in performance suggests a stronger overlap between parts and players. There is, in fact, textual evidence for Kemp’s roles — whose own name replaces the direction…
Partly of the Sky
In a photograph from 1917, the avant-garde poet Mina Loy appears both enigmatic and defiant. Taken by Man Ray, the centrepiece of the portrait is Loy’s earring: a dark-room thermometer. In a typically Dadaist manner, the object detracts from the subject. The portrait mirrors the way twentieth-century critics, from Ezra Pound to Roger L. Conover,…
The Women of Troy
Pat Barker’s female protagonist Briseis in The Women of Troy (2021) has to be one of the most understated, measured and omniscient narrators I have come across in a while – which is why the following is my favourite excerpt from the novel: Then — and now — people seem to take it for granted…
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Roots & Wings 