Description
The Poetry Book Society Summer 2018 Choice. Shortlisted for The 2018 Forward Prize for Best Collection. Vahni Capildeo's Venus as a Bear collects poems on animals, art, language, the sea, thinghood, metaphor, description, and dance. They tend toward, and tend to, the inanimate and non-human, tenderly disclosing their forms of sentience. We have feelings for creatures, objects and places, but where do these affinities come from? How do things, as things, affect us, remain mysterious while making themselves known? For Capildeo answers formed at their own pace, while waiting for lambing at a friend's farm; exploring the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford; criss-crossing the British Isles with the Out of Bounds poetry project; or hearing of Africa and the Romans in Scotland, of Guyana and Shakespeare, while standing over-the-boots deep in a freezing sea off the coast of Wales. Many of the poems respond to real places, objects and people, as investigations, meditations, or dedications. They dwell on bodies and dwell in the body, inviting ardent, open forms of reading, in the spirit of their composition.
About the Author
Vahni Capildeo's multilingual, cross-genre writing is grounded in time experienced through place. Her DPhil in Old Norse literature and translation theory, her travels, and her Indian diaspora/Caribbean background deepen the voices in the landscapes that inspire her. Her poetry (six books and four pamphlets) includes Measures of Expatriation, awarded the Forward Prize for Best Collection in 2016. She has worked in academia; in culture for development, with Commonwealth Writers; and as an Oxford English Dictionary lexicographer. Capildeo held the Judith E. Wilson Poetry Fellowship and the Harper-Wood Studentship at Cambridge. She is currently a Douglas Caster Cultural Fellow at the University of Leeds.
Reviews
'This is a highly original collection in form and content, with blunted messages and sharp polished undertones. One to read slowly and savour.' - Poetry Salzberg Review on Measures of Expatriation
Awards
Winner of Poetry Book Society Spring Choice Award 2016 and Forward Prize for Best Collection 2016 and The Poetry Book Society Summer Choice Award 2018. Short-listed for T.S. Eliot Prize 2016 and The Forward Prize for Best Collection 2018.
Book Information
ISBN 9781784105549
Author Vahni Capildeo
Format Paperback
Page Count 112
Imprint Carcanet Press Ltd
Publisher Carcanet Press Ltd
Dimensions(mm) 216mm * 135mm * 9mm
About the Author
Vahni Capildeo's multilingual, cross-genre writing is grounded in time experienced through place. Her DPhil in Old Norse literature and translation theory, her travels, and her Indian diaspora/Caribbean background deepen the voices in the landscapes that inspire her. Her poetry (six books and four pamphlets) includes Measures of Expatriation, awarded the Forward Prize for Best Collection in 2016. She has worked in academia; in culture for development, with Commonwealth Writers; and as an Oxford English Dictionary lexicographer. Capildeo held the Judith E. Wilson Poetry Fellowship and the Harper-Wood Studentship at Cambridge. She is currently a Douglas Caster Cultural Fellow at the University of Leeds.
Reviews
'This is a highly original collection in form and content, with blunted messages and sharp polished undertones. One to read slowly and savour.' - Poetry Salzberg Review on Measures of Expatriation
Awards
Winner of Poetry Book Society Spring Choice Award 2016 and Forward Prize for Best Collection 2016 and The Poetry Book Society Summer Choice Award 2018. Short-listed for T.S. Eliot Prize 2016 and The Forward Prize for Best Collection 2018.
Book Information
ISBN 9781784105549
Author Vahni Capildeo
Format Paperback
Page Count 112
Imprint Carcanet Press Ltd
Publisher Carcanet Press Ltd
Dimensions(mm) 216mm * 135mm * 9mm
