I was immediately unsettled during the early pages of Orhan Pamuk’s “Silent House” (translated by Robert Finn) with the consistent use of the first person – but where the ‘who’ that first person represents changes from chapter to chapter. It’s initially very disorienting! But once you get used to it – and recognise that in […]
This may seem a little harsh, but for me there’s little of merit in Vahni Capildeo’s collection “Venus as a Bear”. Some of the ‘poems’ in here are, frankly, nonsense. For example, here’s the first half of a whole piece: I. the voice of the seed II. you said III. […]
look for an inauspicious door left hand-width ajar and push gently do not knock gauge with that sixth sense you never knew you had the potential of the space beyond weigh its dimensions draft the atmosphere in charcoal dark and finger-smudged sketch the tension air-clashed by the bow-wave of your coming your intrusion replaces the unseen […]
The Spanish names and phrases that are woven into Loretta Collins Klobah’s “Ricantations” endow it with a certain charm, even for the non-Spanish speaker like me. The poems have a lilt to them, and are clearly rooted in the Puerto Rico that is laid bare and celebrated in this volume. The sense of place and […]
I’m biased, I admit it. But I just love Haruki Murakami. His collection of short stories – “Men Without Women” – are typically him: whimsical, slightly weird, about love, relationships, loneliness. They are subtle stories too. Often Murakami explores what it is like to be human – specifically to be a man – by putting […]
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