- Hardcover: 120 pages
- Publisher: Faber and Faber Ltd (6 Aug 2001)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0571210716
- ISBN-13: 978-0571210718
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 5,469,677 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Selected Poems of Simon Armitage
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Author
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
28 of 32 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I became interested in Simon Armitage via the Tom McRae album, Just like Blood, so when I searched for a volume of Simon Armitage poetry this is what I found. I have discovered my favourite poet here. I love many of the poems but my favourites are from Book of Matches and The Dead Sea Poems, both of which I now have firmly rooted in my growing poetry collection.
I Say I Say I Say from The Dead Sea Poems is my absolute favourite, no doubt about it. This volume is fantastic for anyone who is curious about Simon Armitage, trust me, it will not be a disappointment when it arrives through the letter box.
I Say I Say I Say from The Dead Sea Poems is my absolute favourite, no doubt about it. This volume is fantastic for anyone who is curious about Simon Armitage, trust me, it will not be a disappointment when it arrives through the letter box.
9 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Simon Armitage used to be a social worker, now he's a world class poet. A `kid' from Huddersfield who manages in these poems to create a kind of magic, an effortless-seeming cornucopia of words that both thrill and caution, cauterise and twist in the gut. He has his magical gifts wrapped up with newspaper and barbed wire, his images are street-level, sarky, litanies of lives and living. Poems angry and uncouth, like their subjects, or down in the political morass - take this for instance, a verse from 'Lines Thought to Have Been Written on the Eve of the Execution of a Warrant for His Arrest':
Down Birdcage Walk in riots or wartime
we will not hear of her hitching her skirt
or see for ourselves that frantic footwork,
busy like a swan's beneath the surface.
But quickly our tank will stop in its tracks;
they'll turn the turret lid back like a stone;
inside, our faces set like flint, her name
cross-threaded in the barrels of our throats.
No guess needed as to whom that refers.
'To His Lost Lover' may be the best poem ever about a love affair that wasn't, and 'A Week And A Fortnight' is like a glimpse into uncovered lives only ever read about in shocking headlines. There is a certain slickness, something of a flash, urgent, disregard to some of this work. Perhaps evidence of the craft that goes into poetry-making is missing? If so, it's as it should be. Something especially in the internal rhythms, the beautiful power of the enjambments. Though I feel this is only because it reads effortlessly, and is so blindingly apposite. These lines below from 'A Book of Matches' are haunting:
Tonight I'm blank, burnt out, parked
in the garage with the engine running, in the dark.
The ones who know me hold me at arm's length,
the others want to see me dead.
Not yet.
I tear the last match from the book,
fetch it hard and once
across the windscreen. In the glass
I'm taken with myself, caught in the act -
conducting light, until the heat licks
up against my thumb and fingertips, unlocks
my hand, gives me a start, trips
something in the flashbulb of my heart.
Down Birdcage Walk in riots or wartime
we will not hear of her hitching her skirt
or see for ourselves that frantic footwork,
busy like a swan's beneath the surface.
But quickly our tank will stop in its tracks;
they'll turn the turret lid back like a stone;
inside, our faces set like flint, her name
cross-threaded in the barrels of our throats.
No guess needed as to whom that refers.
'To His Lost Lover' may be the best poem ever about a love affair that wasn't, and 'A Week And A Fortnight' is like a glimpse into uncovered lives only ever read about in shocking headlines. There is a certain slickness, something of a flash, urgent, disregard to some of this work. Perhaps evidence of the craft that goes into poetry-making is missing? If so, it's as it should be. Something especially in the internal rhythms, the beautiful power of the enjambments. Though I feel this is only because it reads effortlessly, and is so blindingly apposite. These lines below from 'A Book of Matches' are haunting:
Tonight I'm blank, burnt out, parked
in the garage with the engine running, in the dark.
The ones who know me hold me at arm's length,
the others want to see me dead.
Not yet.
I tear the last match from the book,
fetch it hard and once
across the windscreen. In the glass
I'm taken with myself, caught in the act -
conducting light, until the heat licks
up against my thumb and fingertips, unlocks
my hand, gives me a start, trips
something in the flashbulb of my heart.
6 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Simon Armatige is a brilliant modern day poet. his poems are relevant and stike a cord in all who read them.
well worth a read as its a good mix of his work
well worth a read as its a good mix of his work
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Was this review helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
The lad that made good
There's a lot of reasons why you like a poet. If you have so many that they cancel each other out the instant you try to set them out on paper, it's a good sign you've struck gold. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Ryan Williams
Really Good Selection Here
If you are in the market for enjoyable and accessible poems that aren't too complex and have a natural air to them then I would say give this a go as well as the collections In the... Read more
Published 4 months ago by Lesley Tingle
Poor excuse for a poet
I can't believe people rate this man as a poet. It's amateurish at best, crikey I've heard better poems being read in coffee shops.
Published 21 months ago by E. Olsson
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Search Customer Discussions
|
![[Start the discussion]](http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/02/x-locale/communities/discussion_boards/start-new-discussion-sec._V192198663_.gif){kind=small}
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
