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The Stairwell by Michael Longley
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The Stairwell (edition 2014)

by Michael Longley

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371660,867 (3.5)1
Winner of the 2015 Griffin Poetry PrizeShortlisted for the 2014 T.S. Eliot PrizeIn The Stairwell, his tenth collection, Michael Longley?s themes and forms reach a new intensity. The second part of the book is a powerful sequence of elegies for his twin brother, Peter, and the dominant mood elsewhere is elegiac. The title poem begins- 'I have been thinking about the music for my funeral ...? The two parts are also linked by Homer. Longley is well-known for his Homeric versions, and the Iliad is a presiding presence - both in poems about the Great War and in the range of imagery that gives his twin?s death a mythic dimension. Yet funeral music can be life-affirming. Longley has built this collection on intricate doublings, not only when he explores the tensions of twinship. The psychologically suggestive word 'stairwell? is itself an ambiguous compound. These poems encompass birth as well as death, childhood and age, nature and art, the animal and human worlds, tenderness and violence, battlefield and 'homeland?. The Stairwellis a richly textured, immensely moving work. Michael Longley has the rare ability to fuse emotional depth with complicated artistry- to make them, somehow, the same thing.… (more)
Member:Caroline_McElwee
Title:The Stairwell
Authors:Michael Longley
Info:Jonathan Cape (2014), Paperback, 96 pages
Collections:Your library, Read 2014 (my own collection), Read (of my library)
Rating:***1/2
Tags:Poetry, poems, Ireland, 2014, R

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The Stairwell by Michael Longley

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A return to some familiar Longley themes of nature, place, family and war. In particular, this volume has an emphasis on the poet's twin brother (weaving in Homeric analogies to his memories), and towards raging, loss and renewal. ( )
  rrmmff2000 | Dec 18, 2014 |
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Winner of the 2015 Griffin Poetry PrizeShortlisted for the 2014 T.S. Eliot PrizeIn The Stairwell, his tenth collection, Michael Longley?s themes and forms reach a new intensity. The second part of the book is a powerful sequence of elegies for his twin brother, Peter, and the dominant mood elsewhere is elegiac. The title poem begins- 'I have been thinking about the music for my funeral ...? The two parts are also linked by Homer. Longley is well-known for his Homeric versions, and the Iliad is a presiding presence - both in poems about the Great War and in the range of imagery that gives his twin?s death a mythic dimension. Yet funeral music can be life-affirming. Longley has built this collection on intricate doublings, not only when he explores the tensions of twinship. The psychologically suggestive word 'stairwell? is itself an ambiguous compound. These poems encompass birth as well as death, childhood and age, nature and art, the animal and human worlds, tenderness and violence, battlefield and 'homeland?. The Stairwellis a richly textured, immensely moving work. Michael Longley has the rare ability to fuse emotional depth with complicated artistry- to make them, somehow, the same thing.

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