Carcanet Press - Selected Poems

Description
Excerpt
Author
Contents
Awards
Reviews

Wingatui

Sit in the car with the headlights off.
Look out there now
where the yellow moon floats silks across the birdcage.
You might have touched that sky you lost.
You might have split that azure violin in two.

Bill Manhire, by trade a medievalist and by vocation a poet, has – like those writers who invented and developed English poetry – helped to make something charged and original out of his landscapes (including Antarctica) and his language. He was New Zealand’s first Poet Laureate and is one of its most popular and entertaining writers. This book traces his evolution over more than four decades, from The Elaboration (1972) through to The Victims of Lightning (2010) and new poems. It is the story of a love affair with the planet: ‘The world is a constant amazement, / always on the move’.

from The Elaboration

Love Poem

Poem

The Elaboration

The Spell

The Prayer

The Voyage

Pavilion

from How to Take Off Your Clothes at the Picnic

The Incision

The Poetry Reading

Ornaments

Last Sonnet

Summer

It Is Nearly Summer

On Originality

The Proposition

The Cinema

The Song

How to Take Off Your Clothes at the Picnic

Some Epithets

The Trees

Contemplation of the Heavens

from Good Looks

A Song About the Moon

What It Means to be Naked

Wingatui

The Selenologist

Wulf

Loss of the Forest

Wellington

Party Going

The Voyeur: An Imitation

The Caravan

Declining the Naked Horse

Red Horse

Night Windows Carey’s Bay

Children

Last Things

An Outline

from Zoetropes

A Scottish Bride

Water, a Stopping Place

Legacies

She Says

The Distance Between Bodies

Girl Reading

Zoetropes

from Milky Way Bar

Out West

Magasin

Jalopy: the End of Love

Our Father

Milky Way Bar

Masturbating

My Lost Youth

Miscarriage

Breaking the Habit

Hirohito

Brazil

Phar Lap

from My Sunshine

Remarkables

from Isabella Notes

My Sunshine

Colloquial Europe

Ain Folks

The English Teacher

Moonlight

from What to Call your Child

Picnic at Woodhaugh

What to Call Your Child

A Final Secret

Visiting Mr Shackleton

Antarctic Stone

The Next Thousand

from Lifted

Without Form

The God’s Journey

Song: Alzon

Across Brooklyn

The Ladder

Opoutere

Still Life with Wind in the Trees

An Inspector Calls

Encouragement

Dogs

Erebus Voices

Hotel Emergencies

Death of a Poet

Kevin

from The Victims of Lightning

The Cave

The Victims of Lightning

Velvet

Song with a Chorus

1950s

Frolic

Quebec

Captain Scott

Visiting Europe

Toast

Pussy

The Lid Slides Back

The Wrong Crowd

Peter Pan

My Childhood in Ireland

The Sick Son

The Oral Tradition

The Ruin

New Poems

The Schoolbus

The Question Poem

Old Man Puzzled by His New Pyjamas

Index of Titles

Index of First Lines

Bill Manhire was born in Invercargill, New Zealand in 1946. He was his country's inaugural Poet Laureate and has won the New Zealand Book Award for Poetry four times. He headed the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington, establishing and directing the university's prestigious creative writing programme. ... read more

Awards won by Bill Manhire Commended, 2020 Poetry Book Society Recommendation (Wow)

Praise for Bill Manhire 'Bill Manhire's poetry is always lyrical whether the lyricism is the lyricism of the ballad or the lyricism he finds in ordinary, unmetred New Zealand conversational speech. Sometimes it seems as if you can hear a poem tuning up, finding its rhythm before it turns itself into song. As it lifts into song, it lifts, too, into meaning... when a Manhire poem takes flight, and when loneliness is taken for a stroll, the epic vision that the lyric can also, he shows, give rise to is all the more resonant and all the larger for being distilled into song.'

Anna Jackson, Academy of New Zealand Literature

'Though Manhire is full of foreboding about the future, he mixes the serious with the playful across a range of short, experimental poems... This is a poet who shares his learning with an appealing accessibility and ease'

Tom Williams, Literary Review

'Read Wow and you get story and song, light and dark, the surreal, constant surprise, but there is also always wit and humour ... Wow will haunt you'

NZ Poetry Shelf

'Wow offers further intriguing snapshots and glimpses, sometimes half-familiar but never monotonous... Here the light mist over everything teases you with where you are and what's what. Things constantly shift and change shape and being, even as you seem to have grasped them.'

Newsroom

'Being the leading poet in New Zealand is like being the best DJ in Estonia, impressive enough on its own terms. But Bill Manhire is more than that: he's unquestionably worldclass. As with Seamus Heaney, you get a sense of someone with a steady hand on the tiller, and both the will and the craft to take your breath away.'
Teju Cole, Boston Globe
'Manhire changes tack in every poem, coming at us with different techniques and different personae. It's a marvellously varied performance...Lifted is a short book, but few readers will be able to take it all in at a single sitting. It demands -and rewards- re-reading.'
Iain Sharp, Sunday Star Times
'The biggest noise in New Zealand poetry is Bill Manhire... Manhire has always known how to look at the human condition and state it simply through his poems. 'Lifted' is confident and emotive in what it tries to achieve. ...'Lifted' is shining stuff from truly one of our best poets. Definitely check this one out.'
Hamesh Wyatt, Otago Daily Times 'Turning the pages of 'Lifted', no reader can fail to be surprised and delighted by the variety of voices and tones... Manhire shows not only his mature formal skills but his ability to look unflinchingly into the heart of things. He is a poet in which a sly sense of humour is coupled with a respect for whatever truths a poem can wring out of experience. ...Manhireâs poems make us feel as if we are really there.'
Billy Collins, Dominion Post

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Selected Poems Bill Manhire 10% off eBook (EPUB) 10% off Paperback Categories: 20th Century, 21st Century, New Zealand Imprint: Carcanet Poetry Publisher: Carcanet Press Available as: Paperback (160 pages) (Pub. Jan 2014) 9781847772473 £14.95 £13.45 eBook (EPUB) Needs ADE! (Pub. Jan 2014) 9781847775191 £14.95 £13.45 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 and are not prepared to install, Adobe Digital Editions. Description Excerpt Author Contents Awards Reviews Wingatui Sit in the car with the headlights off. Look out there now where the yellow moon floats silks across the birdcage. You might have touched that sky you lost. You might have split that azure violin in two. Bill Manhire, by trade a medievalist and by vocation a poet, has – like those writers who invented and developed English poetry – helped to make something charged and original out of his landscapes (including Antarctica) and his language. He was New Zealand’s first Poet Laureate and is one of its most popular and entertaining writers. This book traces his evolution over more than four decades, from The Elaboration (1972) through to The Victims of Lightning (2010) and new poems. It is the story of a love affair with the planet: ‘The world is a constant amazement, / always on the move’. from The Elaboration Love Poem Poem The Elaboration The Spell The Prayer The Voyage Pavilion from How to Take Off Your Clothes at the Picnic The Incision The Poetry Reading Ornaments Last Sonnet Summer It Is Nearly Summer On Originality The Proposition The Cinema The Song How to Take Off Your Clothes at the Picnic Some Epithets The Trees Contemplation of the Heavens from Good Looks A Song About the Moon What It Means to be Naked Wingatui The Selenologist Wulf Loss of the Forest Wellington Party Going The Voyeur: An Imitation The Caravan Declining the Naked Horse Red Horse Night Windows Carey’s Bay Children Last Things An Outline from Zoetropes A Scottish Bride Water, a Stopping Place Legacies She Says The Distance Between Bodies Girl Reading Zoetropes from Milky Way Bar Out West Magasin Jalopy: the End of Love Our Father Milky Way Bar Masturbating My Lost Youth Miscarriage Breaking the Habit Hirohito Brazil Phar Lap from My Sunshine Remarkables from Isabella Notes My Sunshine Colloquial Europe Ain Folks The English Teacher Moonlight from What to Call your Child Picnic at Woodhaugh What to Call Your Child A Final Secret Visiting Mr Shackleton Antarctic Stone The Next Thousand from Lifted Without Form The God’s Journey Song: Alzon Across Brooklyn The Ladder Opoutere Still Life with Wind in the Trees An Inspector Calls Encouragement Dogs Erebus Voices Hotel Emergencies Death of a Poet Kevin from The Victims of Lightning The Cave The Victims of Lightning Velvet Song with a Chorus 1950s Frolic Quebec Captain Scott Visiting Europe Toast Pussy The Lid Slides Back The Wrong Crowd Peter Pan My Childhood in Ireland The Sick Son The Oral Tradition The Ruin New Poems The Schoolbus The Question Poem Old Man Puzzled by His New Pyjamas Index of Titles Index of First Lines Bill Manhire was born in Invercargill, New Zealand in 1946. He was his country's inaugural Poet Laureate and has won the New Zealand Book Award for Poetry four times. He headed the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington, establishing and directing the university's prestigious creative writing programme. ... read more Awards won by Bill Manhire Commended, 2020 Poetry Book Society Recommendation (Wow) Praise for Bill Manhire 'Bill Manhire's poetry is always lyrical whether the lyricism is the lyricism of the ballad or the lyricism he finds in ordinary, unmetred New Zealand conversational speech. Sometimes it seems as if you can hear a poem tuning up, finding its rhythm before it turns itself into song. As it lifts into song, it lifts, too, into meaning... when a Manhire poem takes flight, and when loneliness is taken for a stroll, the epic vision that the lyric can also, he shows, give rise to is all the more resonant and all the larger for being distilled into song.' Anna Jackson, Academy of New Zealand Literature 'Though Manhire is full of foreboding about the future, he mixes the serious with the playful across a range of short, experimental poems... This is a poet who shares his learning with an appealing accessibility and ease' Tom Williams, Literary Review 'Read Wow and you get story and song, light and dark, the surreal, constant surprise, but there is also always wit and humour ... Wow will haunt you' NZ Poetry Shelf 'Wow offers further intriguing snapshots and glimpses, sometimes half-familiar but never monotonous... Here the light mist over everything teases you with where you are and what's what. Things constantly shift and change shape and being, even as you seem to have grasped them.' Newsroom 'Being the leading poet in New Zealand is like being the best DJ in Estonia, impressive enough on its own terms. But Bill Manhire is more than that: he's unquestionably worldclass. As with Seamus Heaney, you get a sense of someone with a steady hand on the tiller, and both the will and the craft to take your breath away.' Teju Cole, Boston Globe 'Manhire changes tack in every poem, coming at us with different techniques and different personae. It's a marvellously varied performance...Lifted is a short book, but few readers will be able to take it all in at a single sitting. It demands -and rewards- re-reading.' Iain Sharp, Sunday Star Times 'The biggest noise in New Zealand poetry is Bill Manhire... Manhire has always known how to look at the human condition and state it simply through his poems. 'Lifted' is confident and emotive in what it tries to achieve. ...'Lifted' is shining stuff from truly one of our best poets. Definitely check this one out.' Hamesh Wyatt, Otago Daily Times 'Turning the pages of 'Lifted', no reader can fail to be surprised and delighted by the variety of voices and tones... Manhire shows not only his mature formal skills but his ability to look unflinchingly into the heart of things. He is a poet in which a sly sense of humour is coupled with a respect for whatever truths a poem can wring out of experience. ...Manhireâs poems make us feel as if we are really there.' Billy Collins, Dominion Post You might also be interested in: Twenty Contemporary New Zealand Poets Edited by Robyn Marsack and Andrew Johnston	Share this... Quick Links Carcanet Poetry Carcanet Classics Carcanet Fiction Carcanet Film Lives and Letters PN Review Video Carcanet Celebrates 50 Years! The Carcanet Blog One Little Room: Peter McDonald read more Collected Poems: Mimi Khalvati read more Invisible Dog: Fabio Morbito, translated by Richard Gwyn read more Dante's Purgatorio: Philip Terry read more Billy 'Nibs' Buckshot: John Gallas read more Emotional Support Horse: Claudine Toutoungi read more
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