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 ~: POETRY / BOOK REVIEWS :~  Review: Shades of the Sublime and the Beautiful by Phillip A Ellis John Kinsella, Shades of the Sublime and Beautiful (Fremantle : Fremantle Press, 2008) ISBN 9781921361098; $24.95 John Kinsella should scarcely need any introduction to those interested in contemporary Australian poetry. Not only is he reasonably prolific, he is active in his advocacy and exploration of what is, in essence, a regionalism rather than nationalism. It is by being rooted in the particulars of a particular place that we start to become, that is, more cosmopolitan, more of a citizen of the world. Kinsella's place is, likewise, fairly well known, the wheatbelt of Western Australia, and it with this setting in particular that we find the poems of Shades of the Sublime and Beautiful exploring. Taking its cue from the famous aesthetic treatise by Burke, Shades of the Sublime and Beautiful examines and challenges our ideas of what is sublime, and what is beautiful, as well as what is ugly, is terrifying, and so forth. So that we find poems about wedgetailed eagles of a size approaching the sublime, meditations upon the nature of rural life, even a poem about Mount McKinley in Alaska, poems that, in general, use the regional to approach universal concerns. There is, as you would expect, the usual range of styles already established by Kinsella, as his 'voice.' That is, the poems tend towards an easy speech, with varying degrees of technical language appropriate to the poem at hand. His diction, whilst not always clear in the more technical parts, is, overall, fairly easy to deal with; Kinsella is no Brennan, despite the importance of that earlier poet in his decision to write poetry. As a result, Shades of the Sublime and Beautiful gives readers new to Kinsella a fairly good overview of his style and concerns, even as it forms a unity through the thematic concerns of the poems themselves. Kinsella may not be to everybody's taste, but give Shades of the Sublime and Beautiful a go, and hopefully you will want to explore his extensive, and interesting, back catalogue of books. Shades of the Sublime and Beautiful is available from all good bookstores, and directly from Fremantle Press <http://www.fremantlepress.com.au/>. |
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| Phillip A Ellis | |
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| Phillip A. Ellis is currently studying English at the University of New England at Armidale. A disab...>> | |
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| More by author: Review: Worldshaker Book Reviews Review: The Umbrella Club Book Reviews Review: Southern Edge Book Reviews | |
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| More Book Reviews: Review: Southern Edge by Phillip A Ellis One of poetry's strengths is the creation of narratives in taut, poetic languages, ranging anywhere from the laconic to the elliptical. The three narratives that comprise Southern Edge fall towards the latter of the two extremes, and they demand the reader's attention lest a vital aspect of the narr... >> Review: Beautiful Waste by Phillip A Ellis At some point, particularly when the poet concerned has died too young, it is time to let go of the poet and to concern oneself with the poetry that has been left.... >> | |