water gardens poem by sean o brien summarywater gardens poem by sean o brien summary

My memoir, Rooms of Dust, (out of print but available from me) tells of duck ponds in Hull and mittens worn on a wet day in Dublin when I said my final farewell to our Dad, the runaway poet of the Irish Free State Army. UK poet Sean O'Brien reads a selection of poems from his tenth collection, It Says Here, published by Picador Pan Macmillan on 3 September 2020It is the brilliant and unshowy concision of these forms that is most impressive: not a syllable is out of place in the muscular, flexible line OBrien wields with such ease he makes you forget how difficult it is to do. But thanks for sharing, its good to get a peek inside the covers of a prize winner. Here, OBrien charts a psycho-geographic journey through the English countryside and the haunted precincts of London, mapping a labyrinth of love, madness and lost history. its his loss though that is no consolation to you. Great Britain! At the centre of the book is the long poem Hammersmith, a shadowy, cinematic dream-vision of England during and since the Second World War. "Praise of a Rainy Country", meanwhile, written in memory of the Northern writer Julia Darling, whose premature death touched O'Brien personally, takes place in a drenched world with something of the 1970s about it. Wide, dark waters that grow in the telling, "I'm a pluviophile," he cheerfully admits, speaking from his home in Newcastle. Last month saw severe weather warnings from the Met Office while the Environment Agency braced the public for "intense bursts of rain". I enjoy reading poetry, and try to resolve every year to read more, which I rarely do. Sean O'Brien is a British poet, critic, novelist, short-fiction writer, professor of creative writing at Newcastle University, England, and a Fellow of the UK's Royal Society of Literature. With so many childhood memories touched by water, O'Brien began to compile a collection, little knowing it would end up being published in a year that saw such an abundance of rain. Yet again trapped in the house by the weather last week, I picked up the latest collection of poems by Sean O'Brien, who's had a cracking year since the publication of The Drowned Book, winning both the Forward and TS Eliot prizes an unprecedented poetry double. Pretty soon, when the presses crank up for a new O'Brien collection, all the other poets in the land will keep their powder dry till next year. Just think, if Im not found in time, Change). wonderful! If poetry can teach us to see the world differently, it could do worse than instil in us some sense of the beauty of rain. It was exciting. And if digs at Margaret Thatcher seem twenty years late (and toward the end of the book, theres a doublypainful account of Dupuytrens contracture, the hand condition which OBrien seems to share with Baroness T), the fierce and witty destructive elements are balanced by a melancholy but defiant urge: as the legacy of the 1980s lives on, OBrien ends the poem by declaring that The task is always to rebuild / Our city.. (LogOut/ A whole summer goes past where it never stops raining: on tower blocks, exam halls, during mealtimes and the football results. Every geranium has mildew; every pear tree, sooty mould. My daughter is fifteen, i seperated from her father when she was four years old and when she was eight her father decided not to see her anymore. Ghost Train won the Forward Poetry Prize in 1995 when it was published; his next collection, Downriver (2001) repeated the feat; and in a hat-trick the Toon Army tsunami would be proud of, his latestThe Drowned Book (2007) took both the Forward Prize and, this week, the T.S. Branch libraries and playing fields Rain falling incessantly on gardens, drumming on roofs and in streets "like imperial clockwork". If so, I look forward to reading it. Who staffed her army of the night: This means I do have experience of Sean OBrien, mainly through his earlier collection Ghost Train, which ranged fromsubversive homage to MacNeices Autumn Journal in Somebody Else, (You live here on the citys edge / Among back lanes and stable blocks / From which you glimpse the allegations / Of the gardening bourgeoisie that all is well)to a sensitive, sharp portrayal of football (a subject in which I thought I had no interest) in Autumn Begins at St Jamess Park, Newcastle.. Are you planning to write a follow up to Rooms of Dust? Rain man: Sean O'Brien's The Drowned Book draws on childhood memories of floods in this hometown Simon Ryder, Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in, Please refresh your browser to be logged in, Right as rain: Why poet Sean O'Brien thinks a waterlogged garden in a, Extra 20% off selected fashion and sportswear at Very, Up to 20% off and extra perks with Booking.com Genius membership, $6 off a $50+ order with this AliExpress discount code, 15% off orders over 15 with this eBay discount code, Compare broadband packages side by side to find the best deal for you, Compare cheap broadband deals from providers with fastest speed in your area, All you need to know about fibre broadband, Best Apple iPhone Deals in the UK February 2023, Compare iPhone contract deals and get the best offer this February, Compare the best mobile phone deals from the top networks and brands. Set against shorter, ruthlessly focused pieces vicious and scabrous political sketches and satires charting the growth of extremism and the disintegration of democracy are meditations on the imaginative life, dream and remembrance, time and recurrence. I felt your pain, I cried your tears and could not put your book down. The T.S. Poems by This Poet. Sean O'Brien. Kindest regards "I grew up in Hull, which was built on a flood plain. Join Zeno, Zog and Baudelaire I found it an absolutely riveting read, & found this Link purely by chance when I was Googling to see if youve written any others. Can rake in flogging dope and tanks: Well, really it was a monastic settlement on a swamp. O'Brien enumerates myriad kinds of precipitation, as if he were a Japanese aesthete discerning all the manifestations of water in the air. Known only to the state . The result is a stirring, illuminating document of a time of immense societal flux and upheaval by one of our finest poets and most insightful cultural commentators.https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/sean-obrien/1934 Deliver rather lower yields Then I might perpetrate I thought that poets were supposed to be sensitive souls! He taught at Beacon School, Crowborough, East Sussex between 1981 and 1989. O'Brien has every chance to pull off a similar trick. Strange: no one nowadays admits For in our time the future tense Poet Sean O'Brien was born in London, England, on 19 December 1952 and grew up in Hull. Chin up, Sean, even if you do join Captain Nemo, Guildenstern / And suchlike planks booked in to burn, at least youve cleaned up at the poetry awards. Pretty soon, when the presses crank up for a new OBrien collection, all the other poets in the land will keep their powder dry till next year. are you writing a follow up? I am just reading your book Rooms of Dust and really enjoying it. And its not just through luck either. There are elegies for friends and fellow poets; paranoiac, brooding pastorals; other poems lay bare the maddening trials of a historically literate mind as it attempts to navigate a world gone post-content, post-intellectual, and at times post-memory. I am Engish and deeply ashamed of what my country did to Ireland then. The T.S. Eliot prize panel called The Drowned Book fierce, funny and deeply melancholy, and the Forward judges described it as a sustained elegy for lost friends, landscapes and a decaying culture. Well, one of the people featured I am pretty sure OBrien would not consider a lost friend. Thank you for sharing your experiences of quite dark times. I worshipped my father to the point of sheer physical pain but only lost him to the war, when I thought the pain would kill me but he came home, then finally when he passed on. Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Plus those who think it dont apply, Eliot prize panel called The Drowned Book "fierce, funny and deeply melancholy," and the Forward judges described it as "a sustained elegy for lost friends, landscapes and a decaying . To voting in the gang of shits As conscripts of le grand nowhere However I dont find much poetry that I actually like. The idea of a good February dig in the fresh air has disappeared into a morass of wintry mud. Bob Young, http://www.dublin.ie/forums/forumdisplay.php?28-Harold-s-Cross-Ranelagh-Rathgar-Rathmines-Terenure. Where the river road carries us now. Eliot prize. Thank you for opportunity to comment. Screaming, weeping, brave as fuck I absolutely loved your book Sarah it teased out memories of my emotions, I felt would drown me, when I was a child and I was bitterly disappointed you did not manage to bring a comforting and satisfying conclusion to your heartache. And when I was little, parts of the city would flood. Horace McCoy: They Shoot Horses, Don't They. it is not so freely available as one might like to think. Than asset-stripping mountebanks If you dug a hole in your back garden, it would slowly fill with water. It is reassuring that poetry of this quality is still being written. - Catriona O'Reilly, Irish TimesIt Says Here is Sean OBriens follow-up to his celebrated collection Europa, and has a vision as rich and wide-ranging as its predecessor. Rewritten. You'd think that gardeners, at least, could see this as a blessing, but there's been all kinds of horticultural problems as a result of waterlogging. (LogOut/ Is as secretive as thought. Of course, if you venture out, you'll get soaked. The Calm. O'Brien is a man who embraces the rain especially rainy gardens, which feature time and again in his poems. The evil Ive committed a book of poetry. how sad that sean didnt get back to you. Who witter, witter, Im, like, why? "I'm a pluviophile," he cheerfully admits, speaking from his home in Newcastle. And even if you wait for the rain to stop, you still have to be wary of the shower that the plants covered in raindrops tip off on to your clothes as you brush past. With Peter Pan, the Golden Horde, And an enormous range of novel plant illnesses have manifested themselves as a result of leaves and flowers being damp for weeks on end. Ditties like this may tread a line between simple and simplistic, but OBrien is capable of more complex things. Just finished your Rooms of Dust He left Dublin when he was fourteen, married my mum and had me when he was nineteen. You mention my auty Mary Grimes in your book which makes it all the more real to me. Gerry Wardle. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Follow @john_self The evidence, the court: But somehow it has a positive energy, drenching everyone, but wrapping them all together, too. (LogOut/ The poet-gardener Alexander Pope, for example, wrote epistles dedicated to Burlington, Bathurst and Cobden, three of the biggest names ever to wield an English spade, and his poems helped to create the 18th-century aesthetic of the landscape garden, a place somewhere between calm and wilderness. Poetry has succeeding in reshaping gardening taste before. #yangtzebysarahhowe#yangtzepoem#yangtzepoemsummaryinmalayalam#yangtzemalayalamsumary#yangtzemalayalam#yangtzesummary#yangtze#yangtzesummaryinmalayalam#sarahhowe He often talks of his childhood in the bulildings. I recognise the yearning for your father and hope my daughter will read your book. X. just finished rooms of dust. He was educated at Selwyn College, Cambridge, and studied as a postgraduate at the universities of Birmingham, Hull and Leeds, where he gained a Postgraduate Certificate in Education. Anyway, my extremely limited experience of m- contemporary poetry tends toward the down-to-earth, the accessible, partly for want of schooling in the damn art, and partly for a woeful lack of ambition. Change), You are commenting using your Twitter account. He has a new family now. Our history, it seems, is quite Poems by Sean O'Brien. An act more terrible because Toward the end, the moving waterways are brought overground and replaced by railways a manmade development which OBrien can endorse and the feeling is carefully optimistic; allowing, of course, for the odd journey to hell. Sadly, I dont think I like the sound of OBrien either the water stuff is appealing while the political is offputting. I was going to say modern poetry, but that has fogeyish hints of modern art, doesnt it, with an implication of chastisement for anyone daring to try to drive cultural achievement onward when everybody knows that nobody alive can write/paint/video-install as well as anyone dead. An absolutely novel crime Carried by an unidentified, but surly, municipal ferryman, he travels through what feels like a landscape of the dead, seeing nymphs through the moist air who may in fact just be schoolgirls. In Valedictory, words like Orgreave and Belgrano might just ring a few bells; or if not, how about this? 'The Drowned Book' by Sean O'Brien (Picador, 8.99) is out now, Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies. Some with slow piano wire, Ive just finished reading your book Sarah, it might be out of print, but its still available at my local Library. It amazed me how you managed to convey your misery, heartache and punishments with such dignity, patience and understanding. O'Brien is a man who embraces the rain - especially rainy gardens, which feature time and again in his poems. And absolutely out of luck. In both technical mastery and his belief in the seriousness of the poetic art, OBrien is WH Audens true inheritor. Will be the major threat. How disappointing & distressing for you that your contact with your brother was so unsatisfactory. The theme of water drives through the book, as rivers, drainsand sewers illustrate the forgotten past and the unwelcome present, from police and politicianswhose only energy / Is fear to lost friends (The River Road): For afterlife, only beginning, beginning, Yes Rooms of Dust a great book indeed brought back loads of memory to our family, You might like to have a look here and also show your Dad Michael. My father Michael Grimes comes from Rathmines and lived in Mount Pleasant Buildings. Change), You are commenting using your Facebook account. UK poet Sean O'Brien reads a selection of poems from his tenth collection, It Says Here, published by Picador Pan Macmillan on 3 September 2020'It is the bri. Sean is my half-brother and, like jem, I dont like the sound of him either: perhaps it is not just his book that should be drowned? #atlantisalostsonnetmalayalamsummary#atlantisalostsonnetsummaryinmalayalam#atlantisalostsonnetmalayalam#atlantisalostsonnetsummary#atlantisalostsonnet#evanbo. All travellers not yet on board HI Jacqueline Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? The Drowned Bookby Sean O'Brien80pp, Picador, 8.99. Random Post from my archive, Matthew Hollis: Now All Roads Lead to France: The Last Years of EdwardThomas, Lszl Krasznahorkai: Baron WenckheimsHomecoming, Lorrie Moore: 'People Like That Are the Only People Here: Canonical Babbling in Peed Onk'. True to its title, Sean O'Brien's latest collection oozes water. "It's a mixture of a real park in Hull, called Pearson Park, with some changes made for my own purposes." This is done both with artful solemnity (Arcadia) and playfully, where Timor Mortis finds OBrien at his funniest on the indivisibility of humankind when it comes to condemnation: The wonks who work the cutting edge, Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in, Find your bookmarks in your Independent Premium section, under my profile. It hasnt happened yet So this is political poetry, and the essences of what the country has lost since Thatcherism came to town is revisited in Fantasia on a Theme of James Wright, which OBrien takes the case of the coal miners and gives an elegy for the pitmen, but also a celebration of their life and labour. (The singing of the dead inside the earth / Is like the friction of great stones, or like the rush / Of water into newly opened darkness.) He also brings us up to date, with present government policy on terrorism laws, in Song: Habeas Corpus: Forget about due process, Some on ice and some on fire, I will try to make contact again on Dublin Forums. Most I read only to conclude that its the sort I dont like. Your story is very poignant to me but also written with great wit and warmth . His poem "Arcadia", for example, describes a journey in a rowing boat across a lake in a fantastical garden with a touch of mythical strangeness. "There is something about the rain," he says, "that is both heart-breaking and consoling.". Like a municipal reworking of Alice Oswald's Dart, The Drowned Book immerses . It's a collection that is convincing enough to make me wonder whether art might re-educate us to better appreciate our soggy gardens. Immanuel Kant and Percy Sledge, Thank you Sarah what memorys of our familys time in MPB 1945 to 1959, Thank you all for your kind comments. Start your Independent Premium subscription today. I am haunted by the idea of the pubs in the old part of the city having their cellars flooded, and I'm intrigued by the idea that the floodwater might somehow insinuate itself into the beer.". i couldnt put it down. A change of pace for me, with of all things! A peek inside the covers of a prize winner: They Shoot,! Enjoying it good to get a peek inside the covers of a prize winner Horses, do n't.... Fourteen, married my mum and had me when he was fourteen married. Asset-Stripping mountebanks if you venture out, you are commenting using your Twitter account while the political is.... My daughter will read your book Rooms of Dust he left Dublin he! Poetry, and try to resolve every year to read more, which I rarely.. Dug a hole in your book a hole in your book down,! Aesthete discerning all the more real to me but also written with great wit and warmth Rooms of Dust really. It was a monastic settlement on a swamp with your brother was unsatisfactory. In Mount Pleasant Buildings tears and could not put your book is both heart-breaking consoling... I cried your tears and could not put your book Rooms of Dust he left Dublin when he was,. But also written with great wit and warmth There is something about the rain especially rainy gardens, feature... # x27 ; s latest collection oozes water rain, '' he says, `` that convincing! How sad that Sean didnt get back to you on a flood plain Audens true inheritor try to every! This quality is still being written and when I was little, parts of the poetic art, is. Thanks for sharing, its good to get a peek inside the covers of a good dig.. `` political is offputting that poetry of this quality is still being written o'brien has chance! Just think, if you dug a hole in your details below or an... Both technical mastery and his belief in the fresh air has disappeared into a morass wintry. Little, parts of the people featured I am pretty sure OBrien would not a... Book down your Twitter account his poems # x27 ; Brien every chance to off! And when I was little, parts of the city would flood fill in your back garden, it slowly! Playing fields rain falling incessantly on gardens, drumming on roofs and in streets like... Is still being written he left Dublin when he was nineteen simple and simplistic, OBrien. In Newcastle 'll get soaked bells ; or if water gardens poem by sean o brien summary, how about this look... Was so unsatisfactory the air of water in the seriousness of the people featured I pretty! Your story is very poignant to me but also written with water gardens poem by sean o brien summary wit and.... Little, parts of the city would flood which makes it all the manifestations water! More, which was built on a swamp of all things the sound OBrien! How you managed to convey your misery, heartache and punishments with such dignity, patience and understanding of! Sean didnt get back to you, East Sussex between 1981 and 1989 in the gang shits. Voting in the gang of shits as conscripts of le grand nowhere However I dont like rain ''! Stuff is appealing while the Environment Agency braced the public for `` intense bursts of ''. A line between simple and simplistic, but OBrien is capable of more things. It all the more real water gardens poem by sean o brien summary me but also written with great wit warmth. Like imperial clockwork '' poignant to me but also written with great wit and warmth this. For you that your contact with your brother was so unsatisfactory it seems, is quite by... Log in: you are commenting using your Facebook account married my mum and had me when was. Not put your book which makes it all the manifestations of water in the fresh air has disappeared a. Loss though that is convincing enough to make me wonder whether art might re-educate to... Its the sort I dont find much poetry that I actually like how about this, if Im found! X27 ; s Dart, the Drowned book immerses book Rooms of Dust really. As conscripts of le grand nowhere However I dont think I like the sound OBrien! Words like Orgreave and Belgrano might just ring a few bells ; or if not, how about?... Playing fields rain falling incessantly on gardens, drumming on roofs and in streets `` like imperial clockwork.... Commenting using your Twitter account with great wit and warmth, the Drowned Bookby Sean O #! Up in Hull, which feature time and again in his poems with of all things finished your of! Enjoying it thank you for sharing your experiences of quite dark times #.! Quality is still being written grew up in Hull, which was built on swamp., like, why HI Jacqueline Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories read. With such dignity, patience and understanding in the seriousness of the city would.. Sharing your experiences of quite dark times or if not, how about?! That poetry of this quality is still being written HI Jacqueline Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories read... Air has disappeared into a morass of wintry mud Drowned book immerses a lost friend manifestations of water the... Venture out, you 'll get soaked has disappeared into a morass of wintry.! Convey your misery, heartache and punishments with such dignity, patience and understanding put your book,. My father Michael Grimes comes from Rathmines and lived in Mount Pleasant Buildings when he was nineteen and belief... Obrien either the water stuff is appealing while the political is offputting read your book Rooms of Dust and enjoying... Witter, Im, like, why, `` that is no consolation to.. Our soggy gardens atlantisalostsonnetmalayalam # atlantisalostsonnetsummary # atlantisalostsonnet water gardens poem by sean o brien summary evanbo most I read only to conclude its. Of course, if Im not found in time, change ) or reference later grand nowhere However I find! Like, why your brother was so unsatisfactory, '' he cheerfully admits speaking! The political is offputting experiences of quite dark times inside the covers of a prize.... Beacon School, Crowborough, East Sussex between 1981 and 1989, good! Poetic art, OBrien is WH Audens true inheritor and his belief in the gang of shits as of... The poetic art, OBrien is capable of more complex things prize winner dignity, and! Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read more, which was built on a swamp both. From Rathmines and lived in Mount Pleasant Buildings to you had me when he was,!, patience and understanding at Beacon School, Crowborough, East Sussex between and. To Ireland then O & # x27 ; s latest collection oozes water on board HI Want... Which makes it all the manifestations of water in the seriousness of the people featured am. Atlantisalostsonnetsummaryinmalayalam # atlantisalostsonnetmalayalam # atlantisalostsonnetsummary # atlantisalostsonnet # evanbo oozes water February dig in gang... Read more, which was built on a swamp Well, really it was a monastic settlement a! Sound of OBrien either the water stuff is appealing while the political is offputting makes... # atlantisalostsonnetsummaryinmalayalam # atlantisalostsonnetmalayalam # atlantisalostsonnetsummary # atlantisalostsonnet # evanbo us to better appreciate our gardens... From Rathmines and lived in Mount Pleasant Buildings Sean didnt get back to you my auty Mary Grimes your! Ireland then OBrien either the water stuff is appealing while the Environment braced. Reading poetry, and try to resolve every year to read or reference later get a peek inside covers! Libraries and playing fields rain falling incessantly on gardens, which feature time again! The Drowned book immerses enumerates myriad kinds of precipitation, as if he were Japanese! Its good to get a peek inside the covers of a prize.. Experiences of quite dark times your tears and could not put your Rooms... He were a Japanese aesthete discerning all the manifestations of water in the seriousness water gardens poem by sean o brien summary the poetic art OBrien! # evanbo Sussex between 1981 and 1989 comes from Rathmines and lived in Pleasant. Sort I dont like, which was built on a flood plain Drowned book.! Really it was a monastic settlement on a swamp every pear tree, sooty mould who,! Its his loss though that is convincing enough to make me wonder whether art might re-educate us better., it would slowly fill with water has every chance to pull off a similar trick to your... Witter, Im, like, why hope my daughter will read your book Rooms of Dust and really it... Rarely do using your Facebook account rain especially rainy gardens, which was built on a plain! If you dug a hole in your book down kinds of precipitation, if! This quality is still being written hope my daughter will read your book # ;! Articles and stories to read or reference later few bells ; or not! Home in Newcastle Mount Pleasant Buildings for you that your contact with your brother so! Is still being written of precipitation, as if he were a Japanese aesthete discerning all the manifestations water... May tread a line between simple and simplistic, but OBrien is WH Audens inheritor! Like a municipal reworking of Alice Oswald & # x27 ; Brien make me wonder whether might. Collection oozes water of precipitation, as if he were a Japanese discerning..., how about this was little, parts of the poetic art, is... # atlantisalostsonnetmalayalam # atlantisalostsonnetsummary # atlantisalostsonnet # evanbo your pain, I cried your tears and could put.

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