Again Behold the Stars
Published on 15. February 2023
Book
Paperback/Softback
34 pages
978-1-78864-138-8 (ISBN)
Description
It's winter, 1553. A small Italian hill town is under siege...
In this narrative of uncommon endurance Alex Josephy inhabits place and people with lively precision. Told in the voices of women, including a chorus, a nearby mountain and the fortress herself, the uniting voice of the pamphlet is a 'girl', through whose eyes we see the minute details of life under immense stress and feel the nuances of loss, hunger and uncertainty. Again Behold the Stars is an intense immersion into a lockdown that challenges all the senses, one utterly different from the modern experience of lockdown during the Covid pandemic, yet also hauntingly resonant with it. Most vitally, the empathy evoked reaches us across almost five centuries, making us care in the present.
In this narrative of uncommon endurance Alex Josephy inhabits place and people with lively precision. Told in the voices of women, including a chorus, a nearby mountain and the fortress herself, the uniting voice of the pamphlet is a 'girl', through whose eyes we see the minute details of life under immense stress and feel the nuances of loss, hunger and uncertainty. Again Behold the Stars is an intense immersion into a lockdown that challenges all the senses, one utterly different from the modern experience of lockdown during the Covid pandemic, yet also hauntingly resonant with it. Most vitally, the empathy evoked reaches us across almost five centuries, making us care in the present.
Reviews / Votes
It is in their timelessness that Josephy's glimpses-scorci-through the arrow slits of lives under siege are given their timeliness. The narrative of these exquisitely crafted poems, with their echoes of sonnets and madrigals, is both meditative and outraged; poems that exist of themselves and yet cohere. At its heart, however, Again Behold the Stars is an anthem of hope and endurance, is a celebration of the complexity and strength of community and womanhood in hard times. -Claire DyerMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Blaenau Ffestiniog
United Kingdom
Product notice
A5: Tankobon
Illustrations
1 Illustrations
Dimensions
Height: 210 mm
Width: 148 mm
Thickness: 2 mm
Weight
59 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-78864-138-8 (9781788641388)
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
Person
Alex Josephy lives in London and Italy and worked as an NHS education adviser. She has been a student and teacher of poetry all her life and has an MA in Creative and Life Writing from Goldsmiths College, University of London. For many years she has been a member of Robert Vas Dias' Poetry School seminar and has she led a poetry reading group in East London. Her poems have been published widely in magazines and anthologies including The Rialto, Smiths Knoll, The Interpreter's House, Domestic Cherry and the online arts magazines London Grip, The Clearing and The Sigh Press in Italy. Alex's other publications include the collections White Roads, Paekakariki Press, 2018 and Naked Since Faversham, Pindrop Press, 2020. Find out more about Alex's writing on her website.