Wow

Author: Bill Manhire

Stock information

General Fields

  • : $25.00 NZD
  • : 9781776563173
  • : Victoria University of Wellington Press
  • : Victoria University of Wellington Press
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  • : November 2020
  • : 21.00 cmmm
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  • : 25.0
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  • : books

Special Fields

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  • : Bill Manhire
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  • : Hardback
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  • : 87
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Barcode 9781776563173
9781776563173

Description

Excuse me if I laugh. The roads are dark and large books block our path. The air we breathe is made of evening air. The world is longer than the road that brings us here. Bill Manhire's new book begins with the song of an extinct bird, the huia, and journeys on into troubling futures. These poems reach for the possibilities of lyric, even as their worlds are being threatened in a range of agitating ways. In the title poem we hear a baby say Wow to life and to the astonishing prospect of language; but almost immediately we hear the world reply: Also. Along the way there are several desperate jokes.  

Awards

Longlisted for the Mary & Peter Biggs Award for Poetry -- Ockham New Zealand Book Awards 2021

Reviews

'Being the leading poet in New Zealand is like being the best DJ in Estonia, impressive enough on its own terms. But Bill Manhire is more than that: he's unquestionably world-class. As with Seamus Heaney, you get a sense of someone with a steady hand on the tiller, and both the will and the craft to take your breath away.' —Teju Cole  'I hadn’t expected to be echoing the collection’s title quite so early in my reading, but the poem insisted. It was a “wow” of grief and shock, however, as well as admiration. . . . While conservation is a pressing concern in Wow, there are lighter moments, and a frequent fresh sparkle of humour among the warnings and sadness. The voice is terse, direct, sometimes quirky, altogether engaging.' —Carol Rumens, The Guardian 

Author description

Bill Manhire's most recent books include Some Things to Place in a Coffin (2017), Tell Me My Name (with Hannah Griffin and Norman Meehan, 2017) and The Stories of Bill Manhire (2015). He was New Zealand's inaugural poet laureate, and founded and until recently directed the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington. He has edited major anthologies, including, with Marion McLeod, the now classic Some Other Country: New Zealand's Best Short Stories (1984). Bill is a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit and a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand