From the East
Sixty Huntingdonshire Codices
Published on 8. April 2024
Book
Paperback/Softback
72 pages
978-1-80447-109-8 (ISBN)
Description
In over twenty poetry collections since 1982, John Greening has explored subjects as varied as Egypt, Captain Scott, WWI, classical music, Ben Jonson and Heathrow airport, but he has kept returning to the landscape of a quintessentially English (and technically non-existent) county. His well-received Huntingdonshire Eclogues of the late 1980s were followed a decade later by Huntingdonshire Nocturnes and, another ten more years after that, the Huntingdonshire Elegies.
On a cold Boxing Day walk in 2017, while the ferocious storm, the 'Beast from the East' prowled the land, his Huntingdonshire Codices began to come together, and what had been a trilogy turned into a quartet.
Formed of sixty fifteen-line stanzas, this haunting and consistently entertaining collection can be read like a journal, tracking lines of thought through time and space, painting detailed, witty and moving pictures of a countryside and life that lie unchanged, even through periods of great upheaval - political, ecological and cultural.
On a cold Boxing Day walk in 2017, while the ferocious storm, the 'Beast from the East' prowled the land, his Huntingdonshire Codices began to come together, and what had been a trilogy turned into a quartet.
Formed of sixty fifteen-line stanzas, this haunting and consistently entertaining collection can be read like a journal, tracking lines of thought through time and space, painting detailed, witty and moving pictures of a countryside and life that lie unchanged, even through periods of great upheaval - political, ecological and cultural.
Reviews / Votes
'A poet whose unbounded curiosity has taken him through the wide (and often conflicted) world with a passion for details that root his work in place.' -- Jay Parini (on The Interpretation of Owls) 'I much enjoyed and admired this book: the way John keeps the past and the present to hand and gives telling evidence of both; evidence, too, of the domestic quotidian as a crucial part of the story he tells; and the fens as a familiar, dark backdrop.' -- David Harsent 'In his hands the tercet is capable of a fine range which includes bold humour, subtle wit and delicate emotion. Throughout the sequence ingenuity is apparent, but never pushes for attention in its own right.' -- John Whale * Stand * An exhilarating read. John Greening is master of his craft. -- Peter Ualrig Kennedy * London Grip * If you had to convince a fair-minded sceptic that English poetry is alive and well, and you were allowed only one example to make your case, and it had to be a book published in this country in 2024, a good choice would be John Greening's From the East: 60 Huntingdonshire Codices. -- Ed Reiss * Stand *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 199 mm
Width: 130 mm
Thickness: 5 mm
Weight
100 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-80447-109-8 (9781804471098)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
04/2024
Renard Press Ltd
€9.99
Available for download
Person
John Greening is the author of over twenty collections of poetry, most recently The Interpretation of Owls: Selected Poems 1977-2022. His essays on poetry are collected in Vapour Trails and A High Calling. He has taught in Upper Egypt, Scotland and New Jersey, and has lived for many years with his family in Cambridgeshire.