Synopses & Reviews
Listen to what they did.Don't listen to what they said.
What was written in blood
Has been set up in lead.
--from "Blood and Lead"
The leading poet of his generation, James Fenton has over the course of his career built a body of work breathtaking in its range and sensibility. From the passionate political poems that launched him into fame to the intimate illuminations of love--and loss of love--in his later work, Fenton's poetry has always been marked by formal daring, wit, and an abiding empathy for the victims of war and political oppression. With selections from all of his published work since The Memory of War, the entire text of his libretto The Love Bomb, and new, previously uncollected poems, Selected Poems is an imaginative and formal tour de force.
Review
Praise for Out of Danger:
"[Fenton] writes as no one else dares to--with clarity, wit, and the simplest of rhymes . . . Like Auden, Fenton displays enormous range." -Village Voice Literary Supplement
"What love of words . . . could fail to be delighted by these heart-wrenching . . . lines?" -Geoffrey Stokes, The Boston Sunday Globe
About the Author
James Fenton was born in Lincoln, England, in 1949. His volumes of poetry include
Terminal Moraine,
The Memory of War,
Children in Exile, and
Out of Danger. He was Oxford Professor of Poetry from 1994 to 1999.
Table of Contents
Author's Note I. From
The Memory of War and
Children in ExileWindA German RequiemCambodiaIn a NotebookDead SoldiersLines for Translation into Any LanguageChildren in ExileGod, A PoemThe Skip II. From
Out of DangerBeauty, Danger and DismayOut of DangerSeriousThe IdealHinterhofThe PossibilityThe MistakeI'll ExplainIn Paris with YouThe Milkfish GatherersJerusalemFor Andrew WoodOut of the EastBlood and LeadThe Ballad of the Imam and the ShahI Saw a ChildTiananmenThe Ballad of the Shrieking ManFireflies of the SeaCut-Throat ChristGabrielThe Ballad of the BirdsI Know What I'm MissingHere Come the Drum Majorettes!The Orange Dove of FijiThe ExchangeAn Indistinct Inscription Near Kom Ombo III.
The Love Bomb IV.
Recent WorkMemorialYellow TulipsMartine's SongEverything in Your Window Is a SignWas That Your Idea of Love?The AlibiI Kept That GunDown to the Twigs and SeedsNever Let Me See You Suffer