Book after Book

As the new month begins, I embark on a poetic journey through my shelves and I vow to start reading more poetry. What are your favourite poets and poems? Let me know in the comments below or share them on Twitter at @Silvia_reads .

Film review, that's correct! Juliet Wilson , fellow blogger and poetry expert here at Book After Book , had the great idea of writing a review of this recently released film in occasion of the LGBT reading challenge. This is how it begins... Howl , the film, centres on Allen Ginsberg's famous poem of the same name. It juxtaposes an animated interpretation of the poem alongside clips from re-enacted interviews with Ginsberg (played brilliantly by James Franco), scenes from the first reading of Howl in San Francisco in 1955 and scenes form the 1957 obscenity trial against the publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti. more...

By Roberto Bolaño Translated by Laura Healy Reviewed by Juliet Wilson Published by Picador Roberto Bolaño was a Chilean novelist and poet, who travelled and lived in Mexico, El Salvador, France and Spain. He saw himself primarily as a poet, setting up infrarrealista an anarchic school of poetry. He later turned to writing novels as a way of supporting his family. The Romantic Dogs , a collection of his poetry written between 1980 and 1999, was published in 2006 and this bilingual edition, with translations by Laura Healy came out in 2008. The poetry is varied in style and content, some of the poems are long narratives, while others are fragments, some are clearly inspired by political events, while others seem to be based on personal experiences. The poet’s obsessions quickly become clear, particularly in a sequence of five poems about detectives. ‘I dreamt of frozen detectives in the great refrigerator of Los Angeles.’ from Dirty Poorly Dressed ‘Detectives who stare at Their open pa...

By Jackie Kay Published by Picador Reviewed by Juliet Wilson Jackie Kay is a talented writer, a novelist, a short story writer, a playwright and a poet. I recently really enjoyed her book of short stories Wish I Was Here and her brilliant novel Trumpet . I was therefore looking forward to reading her new poetry collection Fiere , which is described on the book jacket as ‘ her most accomplished, assured and ambitious collection of poems .’ Fiere (the title means friend in Scots) is billed as a lyric counterpart to Kay’s Red Dust Road (the story of her search for her birth parents) which I haven’t read, but the collection stands alone. It is full of the different voices that make up the poet’s heritage, so Scots poems such as Body o’ Land are found alongside poems set in Nigeria such as Egusi Soup . There are poems about ancestors and children, adopted parents and birth-parents; poems inspired by paintings and poems about love and friendship. All are heartfelt, simply written and acc...

By Deborah Tyler-Bennett Published by Smokestack Books Rex Whistler's allegory of H.R.H. the Prince Regent Awakening the Spirit of Brighton dons the front cover of Pavilion, Deborah Tyler-Bennett’s second collection of poems, and is a perfect pictorial representation of the self-indulgent and gaudy characters that roam the pages of the little booklet. The carefully chosen words of Tyler-Bennett’s pen kept me company many times while sitting at the beach. The West Pier, one of Brighton’s icons, stars in many of the poems. My favourites, West Pier Serenade and The Brighton Mystery, allow readers to catch a glimpse of a pier that is derelict by day and alive by night, the setting of romantic moonlit dances. Browse the pages and the “spirit of Brighton” truly comes alive, with scenes of grandeur and decadence and a city populated by holidaying tourists, thugs, homeless people and all those picturesque characters that can be found between the piers.

By Carol Ann Duffy Published by Picador Carol Ann Duffy’s Love Poems, a poetry collection published by Picador at the beginning of the year, will conquer you from the moment you lay eyes on its book jacket, deliciously decorated with dream-like patterns. However, you need to beware: the contents of this little volume are not as romantic as the cover might suggest. Or at least, not romantic in the conventional meaning of the word. The thirty-four poems selected were drawn from previous collections, such as The World’s Wife and Rapture, as well as the forthcoming The Bees, to be published in 2011. All the poems are joined by a common thread: love. This however, can take many shapes and appear in different nuances and combinations. Love and desire, as in Girlfriends: ‘That hot September night, we slept in a single bed/ naked, and our frail bodies the sweat/cooled and renewed itself’. Love and truthfulness, as in Valentine: ‘I give you an onion/ Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips/ poss...