On Trust
A Book of Lies
Published on 30. November 2017
72 pages
978-1-78410-417-7 (ISBN)
Description
Shortlisted for the 2019 Ledbury Forte Poetry Prize for Second Collections
Longlisted for the 2018 International Dylan Thomas Prize
On Trust: A Book of Lies, James Womack's second collection of poems, is organised around the notion of telling the truth. Working against ideas of poetry as a vehicle for displaying individual truths or unprocessed confessions, these poems play hilariously, earnestly, undecidedly, with such simple identifications as the 'I' of a poem with the 'I' of the poet, offering us monologues which seem to be sincere, unvarnished accounts of things that have 'really' happened, but which twist and escape any absolute statements of identity. Serious questions of being and belonging, as well as frivolous themes such as the Marquis de Sade, Siberia, genitals, the Fates, and death, are picked up in play, prodded at, then put down in new and sparkling configurations.
Longlisted for the 2018 International Dylan Thomas Prize
On Trust: A Book of Lies, James Womack's second collection of poems, is organised around the notion of telling the truth. Working against ideas of poetry as a vehicle for displaying individual truths or unprocessed confessions, these poems play hilariously, earnestly, undecidedly, with such simple identifications as the 'I' of a poem with the 'I' of the poet, offering us monologues which seem to be sincere, unvarnished accounts of things that have 'really' happened, but which twist and escape any absolute statements of identity. Serious questions of being and belonging, as well as frivolous themes such as the Marquis de Sade, Siberia, genitals, the Fates, and death, are picked up in play, prodded at, then put down in new and sparkling configurations.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Carcanet Press Ltd
File size
0,43 MB
ISBN-13
978-1-78410-417-7 (9781784104177)
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
Person
James Womack is a poet and translator, based in Cambridge. He is the author of four collections with Carcanet: Misprint (2012); On Trust: A Book of Lies (2017); Homunculus (2020), and Why Are You Shouting? (2024). He translates widely from Spanish and Russian, and has put together anthologies for Carcanet of Vladimir Mayakovsky ('Vladimir Mayakovsky' And Other Poems, 2016) and Manuel Vilas (Heaven, 2020). He is currently working on contemporary Russian and Spanish poets and has recently completed a science fiction novel.
Content
- Intro
- Title Page
- Contents
- Author Biography
- 'flew in on New Year's Day the fireworks'
- Target
- That Kiss
- Co-respondent
- Such Affairs
- Seawife
- Brief Poems of Frustration
- Note to Self (I)
- To ****
- Aisling
- 256 Poems of Love and Regret
- Hour-Glass Figure
- Dick Jokes
- Listen, Friday was Crazy
- 'Do you remember a couple of poems back'
- 'I said that it had been destroyed-'
- Going North
- Glass Half Dark
- Note to Self (II)
- Propositions
- Lethe
- The Naked Fates
- Untitled
- error
- 'And then you ask'
- Note to Self (III)
- The Ambassadors
- 'I kiss you once and say I love you twice'
- Oliver and Glass
- Foreshadowing
- All Summers.
- Note to Self (IV)
- 'You in Switzerland, walking away from a divorce'
- Dust and Apples
- The Same Poem, Moving Backwards Through Time
- 'My wife just broke her little toe'
- From Mayhew
- From a Brother
- Storm
- Prometheus
- After Rilke
- Caucasian Melodies
- Fireworks in Zakamensk
- Balance
- Beheading videos
- Things I Remember About Germany
- Oliver and the Bears
- Europe
- On Trust
- Notes
- Also by James Womack from Carcanet
- Copyright
