Hide Now
Glyn Maxwell
Hide Now
In "Hide Now", Glyn Maxwell shows how the times have begun to warp time itself: in the poet's vision, the past rears up again with its angry ghosts, the present is racked by its martial and climatic nightmares, and the future has already come and gone. All the stories of the earth seem menaced by just one - to which nations cover their eyes and ears, and from which the grown-ups run and hide. Scheherazade, Robespierre, Dick Cheney and the Reverend Jim Jones all have their place here, though the book's presiding genius is the lonely figure of Cassandra, cursed with knowing the fate of a world that finds her screamingly funny.
2.5 out of 5 based on 1 reviews
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Omniscore:
|
| Classification |
Fiction |
| Genre |
Poetry |
| Format |
Paperback |
| Pages |
67 |
| RRP |
£8.99 |
| Date of Publication |
October 2008 |
| ISBN |
978-0330456241 |
| Publisher |
Picador |
| |
In "Hide Now", Glyn Maxwell shows how the times have begun to warp time itself: in the poet's vision, the past rears up again with its angry ghosts, the present is racked by its martial and climatic nightmares, and the future has already come and gone. All the stories of the earth seem menaced by just one - to which nations cover their eyes and ears, and from which the grown-ups run and hide. Scheherazade, Robespierre, Dick Cheney and the Reverend Jim Jones all have their place here, though the book's presiding genius is the lonely figure of Cassandra, cursed with knowing the fate of a world that finds her screamingly funny.
Reviews
The Guardian
Adam Newey
"At times it's hard to know what is going on even grammatically... Yet there is some excellent material in Hide Now. In "Ariadne to Theseus", a loose version of Ovid, King Minos's daughter writes to the lover who has so inexplicably abandoned her..."As white as the white page before there falls / the print of loss, so were the sheets I rose / to find this morning, and the roar of shells / was all my voice"... This is bravura stuff, the caesuras and enjambments skilfully arranged. At moments like this Maxwell fully deserves to be called into the company of Auden and Frost. For the most part, though, Hide Now leaves me as perplexed as Dylan's Mr Jones - I know something's happening, but I don't know what it is."
15/11/2008
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